One idea for engaging students who are more medically oriented is to leverage current events. If you can flex enough in your class, you can "ride the waves" of current events to good effect in most semesters. Sadly enough, there are enough ongoing crises with Ecological underpinnings that material is plentiful.
As an example, the current global concern over Zika virus provides a real natural bridge for medically oriented students into Ecology. Zika is vectored by mosquitoes, which have an aquatic life phase, so the disease dynamics are linked to basic ecology: population dynamics, symbiosis, terrestrial-aquatic linkages and subsidies, land-use change, and really a whole suite of aquatic biology issues related to macroinvertebrate populations. Start a lecture with Zika and end up talking about aquatic food webs, or even River Continuum Concept, etc. Good luck, Ryan ---- *Ryan W. McEwan, PhD* *Associate Professor of Ecology* *Environmental Biology Program Director* *Department of Biology University of Dayton 300 College Park, Dayton, OH 45469-2320 * *Lab: mcewanlab.org <http://www.mcewanlab.org/>Email: [email protected] <[email protected]>* *Office phone: 1.937.229.2558**Office Location: Science Center 223D* On Mon, Feb 1, 2016 at 11:23 AM, Kay Shenoy <[email protected]> wrote: > Does anybody have ideas on how to promote Ecology among Biology > undergraduates? We are finding that Biology majors are increasingly > focused on health-care fields; many students consider Ecology > “unimportant” for their future careers, and it is not addressed in the > MCAT exams, so they give it a low priority. How does one increase > enrollment in Ecology courses, and particularly in schools that do not > have dedicated Ecology departments? Any thoughts would be welcome! >
