BIOL 327Population and Community Ecology
This course will cover practical and conceptual approaches to the study of plant and animal ecology covering population dynamics, community structure and ecosystem ecology.
On this page
Course details
- Dates
- 24 Feb 2025 to 22 Jun 2025
- Starts
- Trimester 1
- Fees
- NZ$1,377.60 for
- International fees
- NZ$6,362.40
- Lecture start times
- Monday 9.00am
- Tuesday 9.00am
- Thursday 9.00am
- Campus
- Kelburn
- Estimated workload
- Approximately 200 hours or 12.5 hours per week for 16 weeks
- Points
- 20
Entry restrictions
- Prerequisites
- BIOL/GEOG 222, 15 200-level BIOL, ENVI or STAT pts
- Corequisites
- None
- Restrictions
- None
Taught by
School of Biological Sciences—Faculty of Science
About this course
A 20 point course that extends students’ conceptual and practical understanding of modern approaches to population, community and ecosystem ecology. Students will examine the variety of factors that influence the abundance, diversity and distribution of plants and animals. Approaches utilised range from theoretical ecology and literature search through to techniques of experimentation, sampling and data analyses.
Course learning objectives
Students who pass this course will be able to:
Examine, explain and critique important, and often times unresolved, concepts and issues in ecology.
Demonstrate problem-solving abilities informed by critical literature research, problem identification, sound data analysis, and appropriate interpretation of results, communicated in a clear manner that adheres to modern standards of scientific communication.
Identify the strengths, weaknesses and requirements of different approaches to "doing ecology", including observation & description of natural patterns, model-building and laboratory & field experiments.
How this course is taught
This course requires attendance for some of its activities, for which there are no online alternatives. These include a half-day field trip and workshop-style laboratories.
Some assessment items will require in-person attendance, specifically a final exam in the examination period.
Further information
Lectures for this course will be delivered in-person and recordings of these will be available for students who need to attend remotely. Recordings of lectures will be available for preparation for assessment.
In-person attendance at scheduled times is required once per week for labs (choice of two streams), one field trip in week two and the final exam.
If you are unable to attend an in-person component due to exceptional circumstances (e.g. illness), you should contact the course coordinator at the first opportunity, explaining your circumstances.
Assessment
- Online quiz Mark: 5%
- Introduction (to Project Report) Mark: 5%
- Analytical Exercise I (parts a and b) Mark: 10%
- Analytical Exercise II Mark: 25%
- Project Report Mark: 25%
- Final Exam Mark: 30%
Assessment dates and extensions
Once you've signed up to this course, you can use to see due dates for assessments and information about extensions.
Mandatory requirements
Find out what you must do to pass this course.
In addition to achieving an overall pass mark of at least 50% students must:
- Achieve at least 40% in the final exam.
If you believe that exceptional circumstances may prevent you from meeting the mandatory course requirements, contact the course coordinator for advice as soon as possible.
Group work
Group Work Assessments are idnivdual in nature. Exploring concepts and practising methods may be done in groups during workshops.
Lecture times and rooms
What you’ll need to get
Appropriate outdoor clothing and footwear is required for the field trip in week two (see separate hazard assessment on Nuku).
Who to contact
Selected offering
BIOL 327
24 Feb–22 Jun 2025
Trimester 1 · CRN 9218