Oberlin College/AIRE/Curriculum/1999

AIRE CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT GRANTS AWARDED IN 1999 DESCRIPTIONS
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Projects developed during summer 1999:

Bob Bosch, Associate Professor, Mathematics, "Environmental Mathematics": Students will learn how to create, use, and analyze output from simulation models (which have applications to the topics of population growth, predator-prey relationships, and epidemics); optimization models (which have applications to groundwater hydrology, the study of the foraging behavior of herbivores, and the transportation of hazardous materials); and decision-theoretic models (which have applications to the management of endangered species and the resolution of environmental disputes) through the use of software such as STELLA and STORM. This modeling-based research will show them how to use mathematics to gain insight into "real world" problems and questions.
Sam Carrier, Associate Professor, Psychology, "Psychology and the Arts" : This project will widen the scope of an existing laboratory course, Psychology 108 - Psychology and the Arts. Upper-level psychology major "research coordinators" will assist groups of students to examine the biological and psychological processes involved in the experience and creation of art. Pilot experiments will possibly involve one of these areas: the Poggendorf illusion; adaptation to spatial frequency gratings; brightness discrimination; color discrimination; subjective contours; size constancy; facial symmetry and the rating of beauty; moods expressed in portraits; color and emotion; pitch discrimination; and loudness discrimination.
Patty deWinstanley, Associate Professor, Psychology, "Integrating Research and Psychological Science: Developing a New Freshperson Colloquium": Exercises will be developed for a new freshperson colloquium offered Spring 2000, PSYC 119 - Applied Psychological Science. This colloquium will increase basic scientific literacy early in students' education, by focusing on applications of psychological science in real-life phenomena. Four projects (the first conducting survey research, the second conducting empirical research, the third using the physiology of lie-detection, and the fourth of the student's choice) will provide models for developing a hypothesis, designing an experiment, running subjects, analyzing results, and presenting results orally to the class and in an APA-style written report.
Luis Fernandez, Professor, Economics, and Robert Piron, Professor, Economics, "Increasing the Use of Laboratory Experiments in Undergraduate Economics Instruction": Experimental Economics is a growing field. This project will expand the experimental methodology economics curriculum that is already offered by the Economics Department. A Windows NT web server and Visual InterDev application development software will be used to create a project web page, which will expose students to more experiments in ECON 232 - Introduction to Experimental Economics, and add experimental components to ECON 253 - Intermediate Microeconomic Theory, ECON 313 - Games and Strategy in Economics, and ECON 211 - Money, Credit and Banking.
Susan Kane, Associate Professor, Art, " Archaeometry ": This project will develop an introductory course in Archaeometry, which is an interdisciplinary field of study which lies at the intersection of archaeology, anthropology, and art history with the physical and natural sciences. Students will become acquainted with the process of extraction of technological, cultural, and historical information from cultural objects through laboratory exercises, case studies, field trips, and lectures by visiting archaeometrists, museum curators, and art conservators.
Stephen Sheppard, Associate Professor, Economics, "Measuring Environmental Benefits Through Analysis of Land and Housing Markets": This project will affect four existing courses, ECON/ENVS 231 - Environmental Economics, ECON/ENVS 241 - Economics of the Urban Environment, ECON/ENVS 331 - Economics of Land, Location and the Environment, & ECON/ENVS 431 - Seminar: Environmental and Resource Economics. Students will be introduced to data in a variety of formats, & will learn analytic techniques used to evaluate data and estimate the impact of environmental factors on house and property prices. Students will be guided in identification of research questions that would be relevant and manageable.
Bruce Simonson, Professor, Geology, "Installing Test Wells for Geology Courses",: The study of groundwater is a major subdiscipline in the earth sciences. Several accessible wells will be drilled and developed on the Clark Farm so that water tables and water quality can be measured & tested. This will provide a field learning experience for students in GEOL 160 - Physical Geology, GEOL 162 - Environmental Geology, and GEOL 242 - Groundwater Hydrogeology. AIRE also provided money for equipment to drill the test wells.
Dennison Smith, Professor, Neuroscience and Psychology, "Non-majors &/or Introductory Neuroscience Course": Currently, the information that describes how perceptions become integrated into our consciousness & belief system is given in a lecture format. This proposal will allow a series of experimental experiences to demonstrate the fact that, while experience of conscious awareness of events seems to be continuous, the nervous system actually gathers information in a discontinuous fashion. These demonstrations will give students a "hands-on" appreciation of the experimental work in this area. The experiments would demonstrate issues related to the perception of body image, visual perception, & time perception.
John Scofield, Associate Professor, Physics was awarded equipment money to purchase an infared video camera, a blower door and energy use simulation software. The equipment is used by students in PHYS-055 Introduction to solar Energy. They perform building energy audits on campus and in the community, and learn how to calculate building heat loss. Calculations are also performed using various scenarios for renovation to determine the cost-effectiveness.