Preparing Meteorology Undergraduates for the 'Grand Challenge': A Prototype Course for Hands - on Observations of Climate Variables

North Carolina State University, Raleigh NC

Investigators

Abstract

ABSTRACT Preparing Meteorology Undergraduates for the "Grand Challenge": a Prototype Course for Hands-on Observations of Climate Variables The principal investigator is developing an innovative, undergraduate level course that focuses on meteorological instrumentation and observations of climate variables, along with the analysis and interpretation of climate data, and community interactions to develop cause-effect associations. The course involves hands-on training with meteorological instrumentation and analysis of climate variables using real-time and archived data, and web-based models. The curriculum introduces undergraduate students to practical applications of field instrumentation, measurements and observations while introducing them to the synthesis of heterogeneous instrumentation output with human observations. The project promotes and emphasizes student - community interactions for understanding the microvariability in climatological observations, and its feedback on regional perceptions. It focuses on educating students on climate analysis both as a monitoring and outlook problem, and employs a variety of field-tested instrumentation (radiation, micrometeorological and air pollution related) and calibration facilities. .