A hands-on education of Pennsylvania and New Jersey ecology
Sally Willig has been teaching Regional Field Ecology at Penn since 1999, educating students about plants, soils, and more at sites such as Ringing Rocks County Park and the Pine Barrens. Read about the course with a feature of EII's Program Coordinator, Kate La Spina.
On a humid, 81-degree Sunday morning in late June, Sally Willig and the students in her Regional Field Ecology course emerged from a wooded trail at Ringing Rocks County Park in upper Bucks County onto a sea of sunlit boulders.
Willig, a lecturer and academic advisor in the Master of Environmental Studies (MES) program, provided an overview of the weathering and erosion that gave rise to the diabase—igneous rock—boulder field. With hammers and pliers, students then tapped the rocks and created a euphony of tones—some reverberant, some tinny, and some sounding like a locomotive bell. Read more about the Regional Field Ecology course within Penn Today, with a feature of EII's Program Coordinator Kate La Spina.