SSCI 265Lg: The Water Planet
General Education Category E course (Physical Sciences)
Curious about water on our planet Earth? In this course, you’ll learn surprising things about the multi-faceted dimensions of water from a scientific perspective, from:
- micro-scale concerns (e.g., water properties, form, and behavior), to
- regional-scale issues (e.g., water resource distribution, groundwater mining, and watershed dynamics), to
- global-scale processes (e.g., the hydrologic cycle including atmospheric and oceanic circulation and climate change).
We examine the human (social science) dimensions of water supply and demand, and the implications for past and future societies. Through a series of case studies, we simultaneously explore the water footprint of modern consumer societies and how various cultures and countries have been shaped by some of the world’s largest and most iconic rivers as well as some other globally significant freshwater sources.
As the final project, you'll construct a Story Map, an online platform in which you can integrate digital maps with graphs, text, photographs, video and audio. Your Story Map will bring together data on natural and social systems around the presence (or absence), quality, and movement of water on or near the Earth’s surface. Take a look at some of the Story Maps produced by students in SSCI 265Lg:
