Former MSI employee Emily Olson and Fort Lewis College intern Rica Fulton worked alongside Catherine Naud of Columbia University, and researchers Imtiaz Rangwala and Jim Miller with funding from the National Science Foundation grants #1064281 and #1064326 to create a series of lesson plans on climate change in mountains, with a focus on the San Juans.
The lesson plans are based, in part, on their research on processes that can cause enhanced rates of future warming at higher elevations, such as in the San Juan Mountains and other mountain ecosystems. These lessons are created for high school students to fulfill the Colorado Earth Science Standard #4: Climate is the result of energy transfer among interactions of the atmosphere, hydrosphere, geosphere, and biosphere. This curriculum consists of four lessons including: Climate Change and Tourism in La Plata County, Climate and Energy Systems, Analyzing and Interpreting Climate Data, and Climate Change and Mountains.
