Embedding Soils in the General Education Undergraduate Curriculum.

This paper describes embedding soil science in an undergraduate level course titled “Environmental Quality”, an approved course for University General Education credit at Kansas State University.  This course is required for the students in Soil and Environmental Science Option in Agronomy, and it is also a block elective for Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences secondary majors.  The course mainly focuses on examination and survey of various topics in environmental quality.  Course objectives include: Understanding the philosophical approaches to environmental issues and the role of the scientific method in evaluating environmental issues; understand some major environmental issues; understand the fundamentals of soil, water and atmospheric sciences; be able to identify the major classes of environmental pollutants and to understand the fate and transport for each in the environment; and understand the basics of remediation. This course is designed to cover these topics from the perspective of a soil scientist.