Are Students Academically Ready to Take an Introductory Meteorology Course?

Many students take an “Introductory Meteorology” course to satisfy their university’s science requirement. So students from a variety of different majors may be taking this kind of class. For meteorology majors at some institutions, the introductory course is also the first meteorology class. This means the students’ expectations and academic preparations will vary significantly. The instructor must adjust the content, level of instruction, and type of assessment to challenge all the students and provide the essential background for students in the sciences and life skills to help them thrive in the ocean of air called home. The University of the Incarnate Word introductory course uses a multi-media rich presentation approach with hands-on “laboratory sessions”, both indoors and outdoors to capture the interest of students and provide experiences that can be retained after the end of the class.

The Introductory Meteorology course must be challenging, science rich, and engaging to meet the needs of students of varied backgrounds and interests. The course design, material delivery, instructor/student expectations, and student preparedness must be at the similar levels to be effective while adapting to the varied student’s needs

The study examines the students’ academic background (previous math and science experience) to determine how to better design and deliver the curriculum for an Introductory Meteorology course. It reports on information gathered about what the students expect to learn from the course, their academic background and the course assessments of what they retained during such courses. The to be answered is “does the course effective cover the complexity of weather systems, forecasting and issues like climate change based on the instructors' and student's expectations and preparedness?”