In a non-pandemic year, the opening event for SF is a 24-hour species diversity survey, a BioBlitz, of a specific urban green space. In Fall 2021, as we did in 2020, the required BioBlitz event will be fully remote. The BioBlitz serves many purposes, including being a data collection experience, allowing our students to interact with scientists in the field, and connecting our multi-campus community. We had success achieving these goals with a remote BioBlitz in 2020, so we will be replicating that event in 2021. Students will have the entire month of September to log iNaturalist observations and build our class data set. They will have the opportunity to interact with scientists at one of several webinars. And, new for this year, we plan on leading some OPTIONAL meet-ups all across the city so students and faculty can gather outside, learn about making observations as a group, and explore an urban space together. We will be discussing the 2021 Remote BioBlitz further in our faculty meetings.
A Science Forward seminar will use the BioBlitz data or that experience in some way during their course. We recommend that faculty have students use all or part of the BioBlitz data set for their final poster projects. This route is the one we recommend most as it promotes student ownership of their projects and full engagement in the process of science from data collection through presentation of results. Other faculty may choose to have a discussion about the BioBlitz or have the students write a reflection about the BioBlitz and then use other data (preferably other student-collected data) for the poster project. For more suggestions on using the BioBlitz experience, visit our BioBlitz tools page.
Comments by Lisa Brundage