Education & Outreach
Education
Our innovative education program combines international collaboration with interdisciplinary training in earth system science, in which graduate and undergraduate students will:(1) work in the Amazon rainforest, first as students in an annual field course in tropical ecology and biogeochemistry, and then (for graduate students), as teachers in a structured graduate mentoring of field research projects;
(2) develop intensive collaborations with Brazilian scientists and students through exchanges at Brazilian scientific institutions, and develop projects leveraging the extensive datasets and facilities available only as a result of close international PIRE collaboration;
(3) acquire rigorous training in key disciplines for the scientific study of Amazonia, and the environment generally (ecology and biogeochemistry, hydro-meteorology and climate) using state of the art tools in remote sensing and modeling.
Outreach and Broader Impacts
* The proposed partnership will impact broader society through:International collaboration to improve scientific understanding of the future of the Amazon, including the role of Amazon forests in global biogeochemical cycling and climate change.* Education of undergraduate and graduate students that integrates a rigorous interdisciplinary curriculum with experience-based international field work that will foster intensive international collaborations between U.S. and Brazilian research groups.
* Hands-on projects in an Amazon forest that will sustainably advance education of both Brazilian and U.S. students, including those from underrepresented groups, in international contexts..
* Intensive collaboration between U.S. and Brazilian partners, leveraging significant added value from Brazilian support of Brazilian partners, and from extensive infrastructure and sophisticated field instrumentation, a result of past NASA and Brazilian support..
* Foundations for a sustainable international collaboration that will foster a new generation of culturally experienced scientific leaders prepared to address global environmental problems.
* Recruitment and training of underrepresented groups including minorities and women.