This is a distance-learning course begun in 1998 and developed for advanced undergraduate students, graduate students, and advanced employees of wildlife and natural resource agencies and enterprises. It is the best that I can bring together for you. It is the course I wish I had taken 50 years ago and the one on which I have been working for that long.
I have supported, promoted, and used educational technology for many years. No one can become an expert with such technology because the media change faster than the skills of the practitioners. I still try to do so, but know that I fail. I have a philosophy that no one is a teacher, only becoming one. This course is my latest effort, even after retirement in June, 1998. I have heard that a course like this one takes 3 to 5 times more time than an average course to prepare. Once a skeptic, now I am a believer. Perhaps it took me a little less time because I had spent 35 years getting ready.
This is a course that you must take seriously. It requires self-motivation. It is second best to having a teacher; I know that. I would like to be with you and work with you personally, over your shoulder, and to assist you when you need assistance. We do not have to belabor the point; I agree: it is second best. For many reasons, some personal, this is the only feasible way to learn the subject matter of modern wildlife resource management. I know most of the reasons as you do: money, time, work, location, family, time since graduation, qualifications, particular interests, ...and many more. It provides an opportunity for working people and others who cannot come to class in person. Opportunities for the stay-at-home-mom or dad are evident. If you are idiosyncratic in your learning pattern, this course is right for you. It lets you progress on your own time (thus called asynchronous) in your own location.
A new type of course for me, it is likely to be a new type of course for you ... at least one that you can master at your own pace. (Careful, though. Don't let the daily requirements let you get behind. You must agree at this point that this course is at least as important as the agency work. If not, then you will get behind or show poor performance and I have only one option when this occurs. This is not a threat, only a clear statement about my intent to make your grade reflect performance.) I have read that procrastination by students is the main failing of courses such as this one. Knowing this, it is important that we work together to prevent this becoming your criticism of the course. In many experimental situations, similar courses have resulted in improved learning for most participants as compared to conventional courses. The differences are conspicuous and include:
- Being well planned
- Having student interactions
- Having personal faculty interactions with students (via Email)
- Providing more diverse images
- Increasing student interaction with the material and ideas
- Using a variety of learning patterns of students.
There are no paper handouts that are part of the traditional class. These (from single pages to chapters of my textbook) are on the Web and you may have them printed or simply study them on the monitor (or "cut and paste" segments of them.)
The course has reduced pressures for learning certain materials in the right amount of time. This frees the student from "lock-step learning", a complaint for over 50 years. You need to learn certain things and to be able to recall them, but the genuine objectives of the course are for improving rule selection and application or rule use. We are striving to become superior, sophisticated, modern natural resource managers, manipulators of whole rural systems cost effectively for the good of people over the long run.
Distance learning is fairly new. It has been prompted by new pressures on universities, reluctance of the public to support higher education, financial needs of new family groups, and the rapid changes in knowledge that require updating and advancements. "Distance learning" will be over generalized; it will be neither good nor bad. There will be good courses and poor ones, good units and nonsense ones ... but that is the same as conventional university education. The possibilities distance learning hold for exchanging knowledge internationally are great. I am hopeful that you are excited by the course and that you will find it exciting as well as useful in your careers. Because we are interactive, (but not face-to-face), I expect you to ask thoughtful questions, seek places where certain ideas can be applied, seek leads to references and other sources of information, and to share your ideas, interests, and enthusiasm with me and the other members of the course.
I have had students miss class and report a car breakdown as the cause. I have had slide projector lights blowout. Both are technological failures in the learning process. There will surely be technological failures in this course, but we must not let them get in the way of you learning together. I shall provide what help that I can. I hope you will count getting some personal help as part of the benefit of taking the course. (You may remain anonymous, said by some to be an advantage of such courses). I am trying diligently to reduce the technological problems. Communicate the problems; shoulder the frustrations; get local help; make suggestions. Do not concentrate on the technology; the message is not in the medium, only the words, pictures, diagrams, and thought processes that are stimulated by our work together. There are limitations (such as my not being able to see your body-language that helps understand your questions and statements.) There are advantages that are unexpected. Students get more personal contacts with other students in the class than in more conventional classes. These are especially valuable in this class where there is much experience available among students to share via Email.
| Good students produce good teachers |
I have prepared several units that may be of value or interest to you. You may use them at any time. Some of the links may be recently closed. If so, use the Internet, e.g., www.Google.com for related help.
- Sample Exams and the Final Exam
- Top Final Exam Scores
- Potential Educational Funding Sources
- Finding a Job
- The Resume´
- Interview Advice
- The Professional Library
- The Professional Literature
- Professional Notes
- Conversation with a Student
- Competency and Questions for Its Evaluation
Assignment: Write an email letter briefly listing the reasons why the form of this course (the "distance-learning" form) is especially suitable for and selected by you. We shall exchange these letters in a few days after all registration is complete so that we may begin to get to know each other and compare responses. 
Not just an exercise, actively predicting the attitudes and behaviors of others (e.g., to take such a course) by writing them down (not just leaving them in brain-space), then testing the prediction against the evidence, is a trait to be developed. The trait will relate well to "people management," a major part of this course.