Teaching Highlights | Robert Thorson

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Students helping to erode the Pond Path Trail at Walden Pond, Concord, MA. For decades, I guided Honors students around he pond.

Below are seven salient highlights of my college teaching career.

Global Climate Change

(2001). In the spring semester, I pioneered UConn’s first course on the subject as GEOL 495 Global Climate Change. It’s students, then from political science, economics, geology, ecology, and natural resources, are now in their mid-40s and mid-careers. This successful pilot was discontinued by the former Department of Geology & Geophysics as not being relevant enough for a stand-alone course.

Science Communication

(2021-present). Shortly after the pandemic, I developed and piloted GSCI 2050W: Communicating Earth & Environmental Science in the Department of Earth Sciences to highlight the growing importance of science communication in STEM science. This writing-intensive course is now offered in multiple sections by multiple professors each semester.

Thorson standing next to a stone wall. — Teaching outdoors on a field trip to a stone wall in Bolton, CT.

Geoscience Literacy

(1979-present). I’ve devoted nearly five decades to designing and teaching award-winning, high-enrollment courses on introductory geology at three universities: At UConn these include: GSCI 1010: Age of the Dinosaurs — GSCI 102: Earth and Life Through Time — GEOL 101: Environmental Geology — GSCI 1050-1051: Earth’s Dynamic Environment — GSCI 1055: Geoscience and the American Landscape — GSCI 1000E: The Human Epoch: Living in the Anthropocene. This course won the 2023 Teaching, Learning, and Student Success Award from UConn’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. It is our department’s most highly enrolled course in multiple sections are multiple campuses and in High Schools via the Early College Experience program.During the Covid-19 pandemic, my 1000-2000 level online course templates were responsible for 96% of 1000-level departmental enrollment and 72% of total departmental enrollment.

Earth Sciences Curriculum

(1979-present). For my entire career I have worked on developing, piloting, overhauling, teaching, and maintaining upper division undergraduate courses and graduate courses. These include Glacial Processes and Materials, Earth System Sciences, Earth Surface Processes, Earth History, Beaches & coasts,Geomorphology.

McPhee Cover — Book I’ve shared with every class since 1989.

Honors Program

(2002-present). After being nominated in 2002 by the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences to serve as director of the Honors Program, I’ve remained heavily engaged. I’ve created and teach two courses for its Honors Core curriculum, three first-year seminar courses, and serve as the departmental liaison and advisor. Two thirds of my teaching load is designated to the Honors Program.

Graduate Program

(1984-present). Though it is not now my speciality, I have been advising and co-advising graduate students at the M.S. and Ph.D. levels in the departments of Earth Sciences, Anthropology, Ecology, and History.

Earth College Experience

(2019-present). This is a high school program that take the place of “teach-to-the-test” Advanced Placement (AP) courses taught in many Connecticut High Schools. Students earn college credit by taking courses that follow our syllabi from teachers that are certified and trained by us. Since initiating the program in Earth Sciences, I have been its coordinator and overseer.