Course Description - This two-hour course is given on Roatan Island, Honduras. We use the facilities of the Institute of Marine Studies that is associated with Anthony's Key Resort. Our daily schedule needs to be flexible due to weather and vehicle availability. We envision a minimum of nine instructional contact hours per day, except Mondays (six contact hours). Typically the day will be divided into three parts: mornings which will be spent snorkeling/diving, and in the afternoons we will study physiology or diving/snorkeling, and evenings we will either be in the laboratory or snorkeling/diving.
It is our goal for students to be able to recognize and classify the major floral and faunal components associated with coral reefs, turtle grass beds, and mangrove communities. Therefore, much time will be spent observing these habitats and organisms. To facilitate this learning, and avoid the obvious information overload, students will be assigned specific taxonomic groups during each outing. Evening laboratory time will be spent either diving/snorkeling or reviewing these organisms and discussing their taxonomic position, natural history, and ecological relationships. Specific exercises such as transect, sponge morphology, and fish surveys, and calculation of diversity, dispersion, and community similarity indices will give students experience in ecological quantification techniques. Lab exercises will also involve crab physiology, production estimates, foraminifera quantification, and plankton description.
Another goal is providing the students with an opportunity to challenge themselves through engagement in new experiences, i.e., travel outside the United States, diving, mastery of new material, conversations with local people, new food, new smells, a foreign language, and working in uncomfortable conditions.
All diving is from a boat and we are always accompanied by a dive master. Most guests come to Anthony's for the diving (and I expect food and atmosphere too) and the dive operation there is well run by experienced professionals. You can visit them now at Anthony's Key Resort.
Students will be evaluated through laboratory practica and in-field examinations. Emphasis will be placed on learning taxonomy, energy regimes, and ecological role of common, unique, and important organisms. Frequent reference will be made to the assigned readings from Biology 253. There will be both a mid-term and a final examination.
Contributions
Students will also be evaluated on the extent to which they contributed to the group's activities. These criteria will include the extent of participation in discussions, laboratory and field data collection, experiment design, and facilitating the group's productivity.
Presentations
Students will be evaluated on the depth and organization of their oral species presentations.
Students are expected to chronicle their experiences in a journal. These will be collected after the first week and feedback given for improvement. They will be collected again near the end of the second week. Students are expected to describe their reactions to the course, suggest ways to improve the course, describe how they have changed from their experiences, record their interviews with local residents, and describe some of the highlights of their time on Roatan Island.
Schedule and Syllabus for 2008 - Click here for a copy of the 2008 schedule - 2010 schedule is not yet finalized but will be similar
Photos from 2005 course.
Photos from 2006 course
Photos from 2007 course
The round-trip cost from Houston will be $4450 for divers.
You need to see Dr. Kesler before registration. Admission to Bio 253 for term II is by permission only. This is critical. Once in this class you will be given details about Biology 254.