Here at the College of Coastal Georgia, we feel that serving our community is really important! As we grow, we hope to become known as "Georgia's College for Service-Learning." Service-learning is a method of teaching that entails integrating experiential learning into an academic course. The service experience itself, then becomes part of the "text" for the course, where students are learning by participating in their community.
CCGA has several Bachelor's programs, one of which is Biology. This class (BIOL4000 Special Topics in Biology: Conservation Biology) is an upper-division elective for Coastal Ecology majors. It is being offered as a service-learning course, as we can learn a great deal from our community partners by participating in real conservation activities in our region.
This service-learning course is centered on conservation of natural lands and restoring degraded habitats in collaboration with our community partner, the Coastal Resources Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. For many of the weeks, the textbook readings will be enhanced by service-learning experiences in the field. As a part of these field experiences, we will learn about estuarine ecology, focusing on oyster bed habitats, salt marshes, and the living shoreline projects around the region. As a group, we will go out to a restored site and monitor under the supervision of GA DNR. We will also participate in bagging oyster shells. On a few occasions, we will participate in other projects with GA DNR.
After each week that we participate in a service-learning experience, students will post a description of the activity and any good photos or videos. They will also describe how they think the experience linked back to what we have been reading about and discussing in class, as well as addressing other service-learning objectives.
We hope you enjoy learning along with us!
Please contact ktucker@ccga.edu for more information.
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