University of Washington SAF Accreditation Review, 2006

Standard II: Curriculum

The curriculum for which accreditation is being sought is the Master of Forest Resources (MFR) in Forest Management. The curriculum will be discussed below; this section includes narrative materials and all required documentation (Documents A and B). It is expected that students will have fulfilled the Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) Pathway for the undergraduate degree in Environmental Science and Resource Management (ESRM) prior to enrolling in the MFR. For students who completed their undergraduate degree elsewhere, the expectation is that they will have earned a comparable education; each student will be carefully considered prior to their admission to the program. The admissions process is described in Standard III.

Overview
The MFR (Forest Management) degree option will fill the existing need to educate, train, and prepare graduate professionals who can serve public agencies, non-governmental organizations, and the private sector forest industries. A professional program, leading to a MFR (Forest Management) with accreditation by the Society of American Foresters (SAF), will provide the necessary skills and knowledge base to address such issues.

Curriculum Objectives
The curriculum is designed to integrate knowledge and skills from technical disciplines with those from policy and management subjects in ways suitable for professional leadership in the public, non-governmental, and private sectors; to create a collaborative and interdisciplinary learning environment that develops team approaches and leadership skills; and to present experiences needed for complex decision-making and create future managers capable of addressing the complex issues facing society and industry in the forest resources arena.
The objectives for the MFR (Forest Management) are to:

1. Ensure that students have essential knowledge and basic skills required for careers in sustainable forest management.
1a. Students will have knowledge of ecological, biometrical, policy, silvicultural, and management skills.
1b. Students will demonstrate the ability to use the techniques, skills, and modern technology necessary for a modern forest management profession.
1c. Students will understand the design and conduct of experiments, and be able to statistically analyze and interpret data.
1d. Students will have the ability to communicate effectively, both orally and written.

2. Develop students’ ability to creatively solve problems and exercise sound professional judgment in complex land management decision-making.
2a. Students will be able to pose well-defined, solvable problems from complicated and loosely-defined scenarios similar to those found in forest management.
2b. Students will be able to apply biological, managerial, and mensurational principles in open-ended projects, such as the design and implementation of land management plans.
2c. Students will be able to generate alternative solutions and designs, and then use sound professional judgment to choose between alternatives in open-ended projects.
2d. Students will be able to evaluate and communicate the results of completed tasks in open-ended projects.

3. Provide students with a broad education that will promote intellectual maturity and allow contributions to society.
3a. Students will have the ability to lead interdisciplinary teams.
3b. Students will have an understanding of professional and ethical responsibilities.
3c. Students will understand the impact of land management decisions and policy in a global and societal context.
3d. Students will have knowledge of contemporary regional, national, and international issues relevant to forest management.
3e. Students will recognize the value of life-long learning as a necessity for continued professional competency.

Program Description
The MFR (Forest Management) program is designed to be completed in one calendar year. It is a non-thesis program with emphasis on relevant course work to develop the technical and managerial skills required of today’s professionals and a capstone experience to reinforce and apply the material learned in the earlier courses. The flow of the academic program is diagrammed below.

The program is structured into four broad categories:

All entering students are required to take the graduate orientation seminar (CFR 500), Natural Resource Issues (CFR 509), and Seminar in Advanced Silviculture (CFR 526) for a total of seven credits. Students must take at least two classes in each of the following four topic areas that coincide with those required for SAF accreditation:
1. Forest Biology/Ecology
2. Forest Management
3. Forest Measurements
4. Forest Policy and Administration

Students will choose relevant course work with the approval and under the supervision of a designated faculty advisor. Each topic area has a list of courses that has been approved by the faculty.

In addition, students take 12 unrestricted credits to add depth and breadth to their education.

To round out their educational experience, the students will collaborate in a capstone project class (5 credits) where they bring their different skill sets to bear on a real-life project in collaboration with an outside client. They will act as an interdisciplinary team. This capstone course is seen as the crowning experience, preparing them for real-life situations they will encounter after graduation. Example capstone projects are given in Appendix II-A.

Forest Management, though it is the name of one of the four topic areas, is also a general enough term to be the appropriate title for the MFR program. There is no “program area” within the option that has the same name. There are four areas of course selection, one of which is called forest management, but the MFR in Forest Management includes requirements in all four topic areas to remain professionally accredited.

General Education

Courses within the general education requirements are expected to have been fulfilled at the undergraduate level. This section describes the anticipated backgrounds of students enrolled in the program.

Oral and Written Communication Skills
Students entering the MFR program are required to have fulfilled significant prior work in oral and written communication skills development; those who have taken the Sustainable Resource Management Pathway at the College will have taken a minimum of 22 credits in writing, communication, and public speaking. Courses for this component are listed on document A-1. This work focuses on developing effective writing skills, methods, and principals of organizing, developing, and writing technical information. Students learn how to create report forms and rhetorical patterns common to scientific and technical disciplines. Technical writing courses focus on the presentation of technical information to various audiences. Students develop skills in the style of writing required for proposals, reports, and journal articles. Oral presentation principles, including use of visuals, as well as organizing and presenting an effective talk are also developed in these courses. Oral communication courses are designed to increase competence in public speaking and the critique of public speaking.

Science and Mathematics
Students entering the MFR program are required to have fulfilled significant prior work in science and mathematics; those who have taken the Sustainable Resource Management Pathway at the College will have taken a minimum of 39 credits in science and mathematics. Courses for this component are listed on document A-1. Courses in this category focus on biology, chemistry, and quantitative sciences. Biology courses inform students about living systems at the subcellular and community levels, emphasizing the diversity, functioning, and interaction of whole organisms. Topics include cell structure and function, energy, genetics, animal physiology and development, plant and animal diversity, plant structure and function, general ecology, and evolution.

Elementary chemistry courses cover matter and energy, chemical nomenclature, chemical reactions, stoichiometry, modern atomic theory, chemical bonding, gases/liquids/solids, solutions, acids and bases, equilibrium, oxidation-reduction, electrochemistry, organic compounds, hydrocarbons, aromaticity, and stereochemistry. An introductory soils course covers the physical, chemical, and biological properties that affect distribution and use patterns of this important ecosystem component, including soil morphology and genesis, plant nutrition and nutrient cycling, soil water, microbiology, and application of soil properties to environmental concerns.

Quantitative sciences courses provide an introduction to differential and integral calculus, emphasizing the development of basic skills, promoting an understanding of mathematics and applications to modeling and solving biological problems. Examples promote understanding of mathematics and applications to modeling and solving biological problems. Introductory probability and statistics courses provide applications to biological and natural resource problems stressing the formulation and interpretation of statistical tests. Students are also exposed to the processes of measuring, monitoring, and assessment, as illustrated in diverse environmental and resource case studies. These courses focus on exploring the scientific method, hypothesis testing, sampling, and experimental designs, the role of questionnaires and polling techniques, remote sensing techniques, and population measurements.
Social Science and Humanities

Students entering the MFR program are required to have fulfilled significant prior work in social sciences and humanities; those who have taken the Sustainable Resource Management Pathway at the College will have taken a minimum of 20 credits in social sciences and humanities. Courses for this component are listed on document A-1. Courses within this category provide students with a background in understanding the unique challenges surrounding conservation, restoration, and management of nature in highly human-impacted environments. Teams of students work on real Pacific Northwest problems with stakeholders and experts to understand patterns, processes, and drivers of these systems. They also learn about the role of farming, forestry, grazing, dams, water extraction, and fishing, and their ecological and environmental effects, and the remediation and restoration of negative impacts. These courses utilize field trips, studios, and problem-solving exercises to understand, integrate, and generalize processes and issues across diverse production systems. Students learn about the importance and often contentious nature of stewardship of pristine terrestrial environments. These courses cover topics such as pollution, invasive organisms, mining, burning, grazing, logging, hunting, and skiing to understand patterns, structure, processes, and drivers of these terrestrial environments.

Computer Literacy
It is expected that students entering the MFR will have some baseline background in computer literacy. There are no significant computer literacy requirements of undergraduate students. Students will have fulfilled at minimum an introductory Geographic Information Systems (GIS) course. This introductory course covers the fundamentals of GIS systems: data sources, preprocessing, map analysis, output, remote sensing as a source of GIS data, image analysis, and classification. This 5-credit course emphasizes GIS as a source of management and technical information requests.

Professional Education
Courses within the professional education requirements are expected to be fulfilled in the MFR program. This section describes the anticipated skills and knowledge that courses will provide to students enrolled in the program.

Ecology and Biology
Students must take a minimum of 7 – 10 credits in courses addressing issues covering ecology and biology. The courses students may select from cover a broad range of ecological and biological issues; many of these courses contain significant field components, providing students with the appropriate opportunity for field application. Courses in this field require students to understand taxonomy and have an ability to identify forest and other tree species, and understand their distribution and associated vegetation and wildlife.

Courses in wildlife ecology and conservation cover advanced principles of wildlife ecology, such as habitat selection, population viability, and landscape ecology, and illustrate how these principles apply to wildlife conservation problems with terrestrial, aquatic, and marine wildlife. Other ecology courses address community ecology of forest ecosystems, fire ecology, and stream and river ecology. These courses demonstrate quantitative methods of community description, the role of limiting factors, competition and disturbance in determining community composition, structure, and stability; they also provide an introduction to forest ecosystem productivity and history and application of successional theory. Fire regime concepts are described as they apply to ecology. Students are inculcated with an understanding of the methodology for fire history research and presented with the history and function of forest fire in the western United States with emphasis on the Pacific Northwest. Students learn characterizations of stream and river ecosystems from a watershed perspective; here the emphasis is on fundamental processes affecting the structure and dynamics of aquatic communities and the riparian zone. Issues in resource conflict and new technologies are also discussed. Courses in plant eco-physiology explore physiological mechanisms that underlie ecological observations.

Courses in soils, site productivity, and land use problems consider unique properties and processes occurring in forest soils throughout the world with emphasis on soils of the Pacific Northwest and aspects of forest soils that affect productivity. These courses describe environmental concerns of soils and how soil properties are related to land use. Factors controlling soil stability, hydrology, fertility, and movement of pollutants are addressed. Course work in advanced soil fertility and chemistry inform students about the chemical properties of soil, nutrient, and toxic elements is included. Courses also address supply, retention, and loss of nutrients in soils, as well as utilization of geochemical and ecosystem models.

Measurement of Forest Resources
Students must take a minimum of 6 – 10 credits in courses addressing measurement of forest resources. These courses enable students to develop skills in identifying and measuring land areas and conducting spatial analysis; designing and implementing comprehensive inventories that meet specific objectives using appropriate sampling methods and units of measurement. Students will be able to analyze inventory data and project future forest, stand, and tree conditions. Courses address the use and application of aerial photos and remote sensing cover principles of photogrammetry, interpretation, and remote sensing as they apply to the management of natural resources and wildlands. Students may also take courses in GIS. Advanced forest biometry addresses classical problems in analysis of forest populations and growth theory, and principles of parametric analysis and estimation processes. Wildlife investigations are designed for the purposes of impact assessment and research. Resource management is integrated with estimation schemes and demographic models in a quantitative framework. Courses in statistical inference for applied research and experimental design have special focus on the application to biological problems. Ecological modeling and spatial analysis describe the principles of ecological modeling, and the theoretical and methodological issues involved in their design and implementation.

Management of Forest Resources
Students must take a minimum of 7 – 9 credits in courses addressing management of forest resources. These courses provide students with a background in developing and applying silvicultural prescriptions appropriate to management objectives, including methods of establishing and influencing the composition, growth, and quality of forests, and understanding the impacts of those prescriptions. Classes examine the biological, social, and economic links with forest practices around the world by focusing on examples of how forests and renewable resources are managed, with emphasis on how these resources can be sustainably managed. Entomology courses provide an historical perspective of the discipline, introduction to general entomology and taxonomy, forest insect ecology, and integrated pest management concepts. Wildland hydrology provides an introduction to the hydrologic cycle and basic hydrologic methods, particularly examining the effects of forest management activities on hydrologic processes. Ecosystem management provides a scientific and social basis for ecological forestry. Students are instructed in forest practices to achieve integrated environmental and economic goals based upon material models of disturbance and stand development including alternative harvesting methods, adaptive management and monitoring, and certification and global issues.

Students develop an ability to analyze the economic, environmental, and social consequences of forest resource management strategies and decisions, and develop management plans with specific multiple objectives and constraints. They will also have an understanding of the valuation procedures, market forces, processing systems, and transportation and harvesting activities that translate human demands for timber-based and other consumable forest products into the availability of those products. They will have an understanding of the valuation procedures and market and non-market forces that provide humans the opportunities to enjoy non-consumptive products and services of forests. Business courses focus on forest management and economics with basic concepts of timber harvest scheduling, sustained-yield models, contemporary analytical techniques, timber supply, and forest product markets. These courses enable students to gain an understanding of the administration, ownership, and organization of forest management enterprises.

Forest Resource Policy, Economics, and Administration
Students must take a minimum of 8 – 10 credits in courses addressing policy, economics and administration. Courses in this field cover topics in natural resource conflict management, natural resource policy administration and planning, conservation economics, forest products marketing, institutionalizing sustainable ecological practices, and environmental sociology. Through these courses, students will gain a nuanced understanding of forest policy, laws, and regulations in the context of historical and contemporary decision-making processes. In turn, they will have an integrated comprehension of the technical, financial, human resources, and legal aspects of public and private enterprises.

Distance Learning
There is no distance learning component to the program.

Required Documents: A-1, A-2, B-1, B-2

Appendix II-A

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