Hey wait a second, what happened to liberal arts education? Shouldn’t everyone know math and Shakespeare? Pure math is fun, if you give it a chance, and who cares if it is directly applicable to your job? Would you rather watch TV (which seems infinitely boring and not at all applicable to a job) than learn differential equations? I loved the calculus courses I took as an undergrad, along with philosophy, statistics, music, art, P-chem, physics, political science, Shakespeare, Milton, Classical Studies, etc. To be successful in biology, you really should learn a @#&$-ton of math and you should read a @#&$-ton of literature too. In fact, not only are math and statistics (and literature, philosophy, art, etc.) important for ecology, but they are also important for being a responsible citizen.I have also seen a number of posts that pass the buck over to collaborators. As somebody who is very interested in collaborative research, I would urge collaborative ecologists to learn as much as possible about their colleagues’ fields of research. I get the most out of working with chemists when I can sit with them and try to make sense out of NMR results as opposed to demanding that they resolve structures for me by some deadline. The same could be said for collaborating with statisticians and modelers – it is far more productive to work WITH them as opposed to asking them to do stuff for you.Cheers, Lee
******************************************************* Lee Dyer Biology Dept. 0314 UNR 1664 N Virginia St Reno, NV 89557 OR 585 Robin St Reno, NV 89509 Email: [email protected] Web: www.caterpillars.org phone: 504-220-9391 (cell) 775-784-1360 (office) > Date: Fri, 12 Apr 2013 14:44:02 +0000 > From: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Calculus for Biology Majors > To: [email protected] > > I would love if more institutions offered math courses tailored to specific > fields of study. > > I can say that as an undergraduate, I did not fair well in my general > calculus course because I did not see the application of it for the natural > resources realm. I also feel that teachers/teaching assistants play a huge > factor. For my one required calculus course, I had a teaching assistant that > was not fluent in English that taught my recitations as well as the teacher, > and it was incredibly difficult to understand concepts and how they might > apply. That opens up a whole different can of worms, but the general > principle is that teachers should try to meet students half-way when it comes > to enthusiasm and real world applications. > > I feel that tailored math courses would help many students realize why math > is so important in the first place. > > Rob > > > ________________________________________ > From: Ecological Society of America: grants, jobs, news > [[email protected]] on behalf of Sarah Shannon [[email protected]] > Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 8:51 AM > To: [email protected] > Subject: [ECOLOG-L] Calculus for Biology Majors > > When I was getting my B.S. in Plant Biology at the University of California, > Davis, we were required to > take a full year of Calculus. They had an excellent course called "Calculus > for Biology Majors". It was > quite rigorous, and required a lot of work from us, but was the best math > course I've ever taken. All > questions were in the form of word problems (e.g., given the following > information, how often must a > patient take the drug to maintain a concentration level above 100ppm in the > blood?). I highly > recommend courses like this for biology programs. I can think of ways to > adapt physics and statistics > courses in a similar manner. > > Sarah Shannon > Indiana University >
