We present the case for introductory geoscience courses as model venues for increasing the quantitative literacy (QL) of large numbers of the college-educated population. The geosciences provide meaningful context for a number of fundamental mathematical concepts that are revisited several times in a single course. Using some best practices from the mathematics education community surrounding problem solving, calculus reform, pre-college mathematics and five geoscience/math workshops, geoscience and mathematics faculty have identified five pedagogical ideas to increase the QL of the students who populate introductory geoscience courses. These five ideas include techniques such as: place mathematical concepts in context, use multiple representations, use technology appropriately, work in groups, and do multiple-day, in-depth problems that place quantitative skills in multiple contexts. We discuss the pedagogical underpinnings of these five ideas and illustrate some ways that the geosciences represent ideal places to use these techniques. However, the inclusion of QL in introductory courses is often met with resistance at all levels. Faculty who wish to include quantitative content must use creative means to break down barriers of public perception of geoscience as qualitative, administrative worry that enrollments will drop and faculty resistance to change. Novel ways to infuse QL into geoscience classrooms include use of web-based resources, shadow courses, setting clear expectations, and promoting quantitative geoscience to the general public. In order to help faculty increase the QL of geoscience students, a community-built faculty-centered web resource (Teaching Quantitative Skills in the Geosciences) houses multiple examples that implement the five best practices of QL throughout the geoscience curriculum. We direct faculty to three portions of the web resource: Teaching Quantitative Literacy, QL activities, and the 2006 workshop website - Infusing Quantitative Literacy into Introductory Geoscience Courses. These portions of the website are designed to give geoscience faculty the resources they need to infuse quantitative content into their entry-level courses, thereby building the QL of the students who enroll. The infusion of QL in the introductory geoscience classroom allows faculty to realistically represent the quantitative nature of the science to the students who may need it most. Ultimately, the inclusion of pedagogically sound quantitative activities and exercises will serve to increase QL of our educated citizenry.

The Math You Need, When You Need It (TMYN) is a set of online tutorials designed to help students develop and review mathematical skills that are applied in undergraduate geoscience courses. We present results of a three-year study of more than 4000 students in 106 geoscience courses at a variety of post-secondary schools who were assigned TMYN tutorials as supplemental mathematics instruction. Changes in student scores from pre- to post-test suggest that the support provided by programs such as TMYN can begin to reduce the gap between mathematically well-prepared and underprepared students; in essence, TMYN levels the quantitative playing field for all geoscience students. On average, both high- and low-performing students who fully participated in the use of TMYN as a part of their course showed learning gains, although gains were larger for students who performed poorly on the pre-test. Our findings emphasize the conclusion that students who interact with context-specific quantitative problems can potentially improve their mathematical skills, regardless of initial level of mathematical preparation. We suggest that this type of support could generalize to other science courses.

While the role of affective factors in learning is well understood in geoscience, math attitudes have been overlooked. This study sought to explore the relationships between math attitudes and geoscience attitudes, namely math anxiety, self-efficacy, and geoscience interest. Baseline data were collected from 245 undergraduate students enrolled in introductory geoscience courses at three colleges and universities in the United States, with self-report measures of math anxiety, math self-efficacy, geoscience self-efficacy, geoscience interest, and demographic information. Results show strong relationships and predictive values of math attitudes for students’ geoscience attitudes, particularly for female-identifying students. This research provides important empirical support for the study of math attitudes in geoscience; additionally, educators can use this knowledge to inform their understanding of their students’ math attitudes and possible interest in geoscience.

Many factors may contribute to women being underrepresented and marginalized in college-level geoscience majors. Limited research has examined students’ math anxiety as a possible factor. To address the dearth of research, we conducted a qualitative study to explore the math anxiety experiences held by students in college-level geoscience classes. Through analysis of students’ written math narratives, we identified three themes capturing students’ integrated math anxiety experiences (IMAEs), which integrated students’ feelings, physiological reactions, and thoughts. Students with Thriving IMAEs liked math and had positive assessments of themselves in math. Students with Agonizing IMAEs had negative feelings and thoughts about math and experienced negative physiological reactions. Students with Persisting IMAEs had positive and negative feelings and thoughts, but thought that, ultimately, they could persist in math. A higher percentage of women than men held Agonizing IMAEs, and a lower percentage of women than men held Thriving IMAEs. Students in introductory geoscience classes had a range of IMAEs, which may have an important role in their success in class and in their decisions to take additional geoscience classes.

New zircon U-Pb ages for the Alabama Hills Granite in Owens Valley, eastern California, range from 103 to 102 Ma, nearly 20 Ma older than previously published zircon ages. The data preclude previously implied links between the pluton and the adjacent Late Cretaceous Mount Whitney Intrusive Suite. Geochronologic and isotopic data indicate a connection between the Alabama Hills Granite and leucogranites to the northwest on the Sierra Nevada crest, as well as a pluton to the southeast in the Coso Range. We refer to these units as the Kearsarge plutons. The suite was intruded from 103 to 100.5 Ma with $S87r/S86ri=0.7045$ to 0.7060 and $εNdi=−2.4$ to -4.5 and has distinctive enrichments in high field strength, middle, and heavy rare earth elements, as well as negative Eu anomalies and high Y/Sr. We suggest the Alabama Hills block could not have moved more than 10 km dextrally relative to the Sierra Nevada batholith since the Middle Jurassic and is thus a suitable piercing point for offsets across Owens Valley. The Kearsarge plutons, like other markers on either side of Owens Valley, support approximately 65–75 km of dextral offset across the valley. The suite’s location east of other middle Cretaceous suites, coupled with its mantle-like isotope geochemistry, suggests it could represent backarc magmatism, perhaps controlled by preexisting shear zones or fractures.

Geoscience relies on numbers, data, equations, graphical representations, and other quantitative skills; therefore, introductory geoscience courses need to accurately portray the science as quantitative [e.g., Wenner et al., 2009]. However, up to 57% of students arrive at college underprepared to perform mathematics at the level necessary to succeed in introductory courses [ACT, 2011]. Although some institutions have turned to prerequisites as a way to ensure appropriate preparation, these extra courses can place undue financial, temporal, and academic burdens on interested students, keeping them from enrolling in science courses that may interest them. As an alternative to mathematics prerequisites, geoscience faculty at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh and Highline Community College in Des Moines, Wash., funded by the National Science Foundation, developed a model of successful integration of discipline-based mathematics remediation into an introductory geoscience course: The Math You Need, When You Need It (TMYN; http://serc.carleton.edu/mathyouneed/).