{"id":51343,"date":"2018-06-01T12:53:22","date_gmt":"2018-06-01T16:53:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/?p=51343"},"modified":"2018-06-01T16:05:21","modified_gmt":"2018-06-01T20:05:21","slug":"a-glimpse-of-life-in-the-field","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/2018\/06\/a-glimpse-of-life-in-the-field\/","title":{"rendered":"A glimpse of life in the Earth Sciences field"},"content":{"rendered":"

The days were long, but coffee was aplenty \u2014 and so were the valuable lessons.<\/span><\/p>\n

The morning pick-me-up was more a necessity than a perk for the team of 20 Earth Sciences students who recently spent 10 days exploring the remote northern Ontario wilderness.<\/span><\/p>\n

A veteran of the term-ending expedition of the annual 3P99 Field Camp \u2014 Solid Earth course, Professor Frank Fueten knew the importance of sending his team out sufficiently fuelled.<\/span><\/p>\n

Each day, he cooked up a hearty breakfast for the group before they headed out for time in the field examining sedimentary and igneous rocks.<\/span><\/p>\n

Among the team members was Todd Robinson, a third-year Earth Sciences student who joined the experiential education adventure in hopes of applying the knowledge he learned in class.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Field

Every two days on the way back to their cabins, participating Earth Sciences students would break into groups to buy supplies for the next two days.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cIt was a great opportunity to see exactly what it\u2019s like to be a field geologist dealing with all kinds of weather conditions and long days outside, trying to take in as much information as possible,\u201d said the 22-year-old Welland native.<\/span><\/p>\n

Over the course of the trip, which ran from April 26 to May 5, the group travelled to Sudbury and spent time describing outcrops (large areas of rock sticking out of the ground) between Manitoulin Island and Elliot Lake, focusing on Espanola.<\/span><\/p>\n

Outside of travel time, seven days were spent in the field, mapping an area of about 17 kilometres along Highway 6.<\/span><\/p>\n

With much on the go \u2014 from mapping rocks and collecting data to producing maps and working on a final written \u2014 students often averaged 12-hour days, applying in-class knowledge to field work under the guidance of Fueten and Phil McCausland, Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis trip took a lot of our class content and put it into an actual work environment,\u201d said third-year Earth Sciences student Ariel Van Patter.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEvery day in the field we got to be hands-on with the rocks,\u201d said the 20-year-old Dorchester, Ont., native. \u201cThe outcrops were picked to show us different surface types and structures. The field work allowed us to put together all the information we knew and create a \u2018story\u2019 of geologic history.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Robinson learned a lot from the experience, taking away new knowledge about geology, how to perform field work and work with others.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou learn to train your eyes to see things that just looked like a broken rock before, but after, you are able to see what may have caused that to happen,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s almost like trying to decipher the past.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The educational value of the trip was twofold; along with applying in-class knowledge to real-life field examples, students also experienced cabin life and variable weather conditions. <\/span><\/p>\n

The experience shed light on life in the field \u2014 key information for aspiring earth scientists.<\/span><\/p>\n

Students had to adjust to temperatures ranging from zero to 20\u00b0C and experienced little to no running water in four of the seven allotted cabins, but made the most of the off-the-grid challenge nonetheless.<\/span><\/p>\n

One of Robinson\u2019s favourite moments was the almost daily \u2018polar bear dips\u2019 he and several classmates took upon returning to camp.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ejaz Ahmed, Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics and Science, said the course exemplifies the importance Brock places on providing experiential learning opportunities.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt is no surprise that the program has enjoyed a more than two-decade-long run. Hands-on work in the field with leading experts provides our students with a competitive edge,\u201d he said. \u201cThey are able to take knowledge they learned in a classroom setting and apply it directly in an environment that simulates what they will find in future careers.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

For Robinson, the trip turned out to be everything he expected and more.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI had a great time learning to look at the outcrops and making my own observations. The experience really brought home the fact that I had chosen the right program for myself at Brock,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted a science-based program that involved going outside and getting your hands dirty to acquire the information you need. That\u2019s exactly what I got.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The days were long, but coffee was aplenty \u2014 and so were the valuable lessons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":51345,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,41,1,4],"tags":[6689,5050,885,4811,348,6686,3400,6687,6688],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51343"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51343"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51347,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51343\/revisions\/51347"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}