Sequence | Background | Objectives | Materials | Activity | Evaluations

TOPIC-TITLE Careers Lessons 3 - Making the Career Connections AUTHOR STARBORD GRADE SUITABILITY High School SCOPE Appropriate for all science classes and especially for an integrated curriculum

Sequence This is the third in a series of six lessons on careers in the field of oceanography. The lessons would not necessarily have to be done as part of a unit of study on oceanography, marine science, marine biology, etc., but they would certainly be more meaningful to the students if they were integrated into the teaching of the academic content material. < < go top

Background Summary The COAST Careers module contains videotaped interviews with actual practitioners in several fields related to oceanography. These interviews are intended to put a face with a name as well as a career in order to let the students see "real" people involved in these careers. In using the interviews in a classroom, teachers can point out the diverse nature of the careers related to oceanography as well as the diverse nature of the demographic information related to the practitioners themselves. These men and women come from different backgrounds, are different ages, and have different career interests, yet they all have found a place of work within the broad field of oceanography. < < go top Objectives At the end of this series of lessons, students will be able to: Identify the differences between a job and a career Identify career areas within the broad field of oceanography Explain the commonalties and differences between the various careers in the field of oceanography Demonstrate a knowledge of how these various careers relate to each other Locate information on the World Wide Web related to a specific career field Recognize the necessary educational foundation needed for a specific career field Compare and contrast the requirements needed to become a practitioner of various oceanographic career fields Determine the high school course selections that would be most beneficial for someone planning a career in oceanography Create as part of a group a computer-based project relating to an oceanographic career < < go top Materials Access to computers and the Internet QuickTime plug-in for viewing the COAST Web site Dictionaries Spreadsheet software Presentation software (e.g., PowerPoint, HyperStudio) < < go top Activity Visit the web pages of The University of Southern Mississippi Institute of Marine Sciences or the Coastal Research and Extension Center (CREC) operated by the Mississippi State University Extension Service (MSU-ES): http://www.msstate.edu/dept/crec/envires.html This research center focuses on two main issues: water quality and wetlands. The opening paragraph of their web site says: "Good water quality is essential to life. The CREC works on many water quality projects that strive to provide sound, scientific data and information that can be transferred to state and federal regulatory agencies and local policy makers to assist when making decision that can improve public health and the overall quality of life of the residents of coastal Mississippi. The majority of these projects focus on non-point sources of pollution, specifically from failing septic systems and untreated storm water runoff, and how these may impact drinking water supplies, near-shore waters and coastal habitats. These types of non-point source pollution can result in serious public health problems within the community such as dysentery, infectious hepatitis, cholera, typhoid fever, etc. and an overall degradation of aquatic resources resulting in beach closures, prohibitions on harvesting shellfish, and loss of biological productivity in coastal habitats. Wetlands provide essential functions and values that help maintain the integrity of biological communities and assure good quality of life for local residents. However, with expanding populations in coastal regions, sensitive wetland environments are often compromised in favor of development. Wetlands and the regulations designed to protect them have been the focus of considerable debate in both technical and public forums. Basic information about the physical and biotic characteristics of the various wetland types and the relative proportion of types within a watershed are not always well documented. The CREC is contributing to addressing these inadequacies." [Used with permission of the CREC] Ask the students to consider how each of the following career areas could be involved in or affected by the research being conducted by CREC. Discuss whether people in these career areas would share similar viewpoints. Civil engineer Commercial Fisherman Environmental chemist Environmentalist Fisheries scientist Geologist Governmental official (e.g., U. S. Department of Agriculture, U. S. Department of Commerce) Local government official (e. g., a local mayor or member of the Board of Aldermen/City Council) Marine biologist Park ranger Physician Public health official Real estate developer As a class, develop a graphic representation of the different groups represented in this list and their interconnections with each other. Make an analogy between the food web and the career web. Ask the following questions and brainstorm the answers as a class: What impact do different careers have on each other? Which professions have a direct impact on one another? What should be at the center of the connections? If you remove one profession, do the other connections remain the same? Do some professions have a greater impact on other professions? Help the students understand the concept of the inter-relatedness of the professions and the impact that they have in the world in which they live. Divide the class into groups and ask each group to find another Web site of a group dealing with an aspect of oceanography that involves research of some type. Have the students determine and list the careers that are represented or affected by the research done as part of the program that they locate. To locate research units, use the COAST database of related sites. Ask the students to create their own web of at least 5 career areas that are related to or impacted by the research being conducted at their group's research site. This can be done using presentation/graphical organizing software and presented to the class using a computer or in print format. In a spreadsheet have the class compile a list of all the research units discovered by the students. Next, list the careers that each research unit represents. In a third column list the issues with which each research unit deals. In a final column, list the reasons why the research unit might deal with the particular issue it does. For example, is it because of the area of the country there the unit is located? Does it have something to do with the research unit's proximity or distance from the ocean? Does its source of funding relate to its mission? Ask the students to write a paragraph or more discussing what they have learned about the work of researchers in the field of oceanography and how this research can apply to the students' own lives. < < go top Teacher Evaluation Use a rubric to assess each student's ability to work collaboratively. For an example collaboration rubric, visit the EdWeb Web site: http://edweb.sdsu.edu/triton/tidepoolunit/Rubrics/collrubric.html Assess individual class member's contributions to the class discussion. Assess the thoroughness of the career web and the appropriateness of the careers chosen by each group as representative of the research unit they locate on the Web. Evaluate the content, originality of thought, and application of class discussion in students' writings about oceanography research and how it applies to their lives. < < go top