Welcome to the student orientation of Physical Hydrometeorology
Please read this page prior to the first week of classes. This page serves to get you started and familiar with this class web page. You will learn where you can find what. It is your orientation map for navigation of the class page. The links lead you either to the respective page or provide further information on a subject. Thus explore them. Have fun hopping around.
Let’s get to know the classmates and professor
I am Nicole Mölders aka Carmen N. Moelders, your professor of Introduction to atmospheric science. You can learn more about me at this link.
Be prepared to introduce you yourself to your classmates on the discussion board. I will send the link via email at the start of the semester. A short elevator type pitch of where you come from, what is the typical weather where you come from, where did you get your education, what is your degree program, what you want to do after graduation, and a fun fact about you. When you are a graduate student also add who is your adviser and what is your research interest.
Course content
You can find a description of the subjects covered by this class at the link. When the various subjects will be covered is listed in the course schedule.
Syllabus
The syllabus of this class can be found at the link at the top of the page underneath the class banner. Please read the syllabus carefully. It will provide you information about this class, its goals, a course description, my expectations on your performance and etiquette, grading and class policies, due dates, academic honor code, plagiarism. In other words, it will give you excellent ideas what you have to do to be successful in this class. There is a downloadable infographic short version of the syllabus in the right sidebar.
The syllabus also provides information on how to contact me, my office location and office hours. Please be aware that I don’t answer email between Friday EoB and Monday BoB. Monday thru Friday I try to answer within 24 h when I am in town. Thus, please plan accordingly.
Minimum requirements
Pre-requisites
The academic minimum requirements for this class upper level geography, physics, geophysics, civil or environmental engineering when taking this class at the 400 level and graduate standing in atmospheric sciences, geophysics, physics or civil or environmental engineering when taking this class at the 600 level. If you don’t meet them, but want to take this class, please contact me. I will talk with you about your educational background and I will give permission to take this class when based on my professional experience your educational background is comparable to the catalog requirements.
IT requirements
You will need a device on which you can access the class pages and watch the movies. You also need internet access. When your band with is small you can download the movies to your device. There is a link to a tutorial how to download movies in the right sidebar of the class page. You also need a laptop with excel installed that you can use in class for application of the learned material to real world data.
Other requirements
You will need a calculator, writing material, and paper for the final exam.
Disclosure statements for required software packages
I expect that you can handle and work with Adobe reader, google forms, google doc, google sheets, and excel. 😉 You can download them from the OIT software catalog. You can find what software you can use to open the MP4 videos at the link. You can find information on the google accessibility and the wordpress accessibility at the links.
FAQ
I have taught this class in traditional lecture mode already several times. I created FAQ sections at the end of each unit based on my experiences.
I taught classes in flipped mode several times and created a FAQ page for IT related question based on my experience. Check that page first when you have a question related to the IT problems, etc.
Class mode
Online. Learn more about this class.
Units
The material of this class is subdivided into units. You will have to prepare the unit prior to the class as a homework so to speak. Just follow the respective unit page. You can find all unit pages under the “unit” button in the main menu as well as the left side menu. You can get there also directly from the class schedule.
How to know which unit is due
You can find out which unit you have to prepare in the schedule that also has links to the units. The link to the schedule is under the class banner as the top of the page.
Textbook
We will use the textbook Physical Hydrology by Dingman as well as other reading material that I will assign in the various units. There is no need to buy a book.
Please note that I will do an open book exam. Students will have to bring a hard copy of the above book to the final exam. Note that the Keith Mather library has the book and it is put on the reserve shelf exclusively for use by the students of this class.
Final exam
You can find out when and where the final exam will be in the UAF exam schedule. For your convenience it is also linked in the left hand side (l.h.s.) sidebar together with a calendar.
Misc
There are various physical hydrometeorology related links in the left sidebar, and links with respect to constants, etc. that you may need for class work in the right side bar.