Strategies for Engaging Undergraduate Students in International Socio-Ecological Research – a Soil's Perspective.

Soils provide an important context for teaching undergraduate students about complex socio-ecological challenges. Strategies for integrating soil science into the undergraduate curricula are crucial to enhancing the understanding of global challenges such as food security and biodiversity. But, preliminary data from the Penn State’s Parks and People (P&P) Initiative showed that not only do soils have to be intentionally integrated into the curricula but it has to be done creatively to foster student interest, especially for non-science disciplines. Since 2010, Penn State students have been participating in the P&P Initiative, a spring semester program that takes a multi-disciplinary group of undergraduate students to South Africa. One of the objectives of this initiative is to engage these students in research that highlights the importance of soils in understanding complex socio-ecological challenges. This is achieved as students travel across South Africa engaging with different socio-ecological landscapes and the associated soil types as they focus on a variety of issues including but not limited to sustainability, biodiversity, conservation, poverty, and food security. To implement this objective, we have used strategies which involve participation in active research, creation of innovative forms of science communication (e.g. meaning-making images), and interaction with non-traveling soil science students using social media. This presentation will highlight the successes and implications of using these strategies to collaboratively make decisions regarding real world problems while working in culturally diverse environments.