Overview
In Environmental Monitoring you will learn the basics of ecosystem science as well as the research and industry skills necessary to carry out surveys and research in natural and impacted ecosystems. Your study will focus on two iconic Australian ecosystems, the Great Barrier Reef and the Brigalow Belt. The field skills you acquire in this unit will enable you to perform both academic research and industry surveys in ecosystems anywhere in the world. You will apply your knowledge of ecosystems, and animal and plant biology to sample collection, vegetation surveys, animal trapping and identification. You will also begin to learn some basic project management skills including how to legally document your work and to prepare and plan for safe field work. The residential school in this unit will involve animal trapping and will abide by the approved ethics proposal that includes the destructive sampling of some fish and, if caught, the euthanisation of pest species (e.g. cats) as required by law. Students are advised to contact the unit coordinator if they have any concerns with regard to this aspect of the unit. There is an additional cost for the off-campus component of the residential school in this unit.
Details
Pre-requisites or Co-requisites
There are no requisites for this unit.
Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework).
Offerings For Term 2 - 2026
Attendance Requirements
All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).
All University policies are available on the CQUniversity Policy site.
You may wish to view these policies:
- Grades and Results Policy
- Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework)
- Review of Grade Procedure
- Student Academic Integrity Policy and Procedure
- Monitoring Academic Progress (MAP) Policy and Procedure - Domestic Students
- Monitoring Academic Progress (MAP) Policy and Procedure - International Students
- Student Refund and Credit Balance Policy and Procedure
- Student Feedback - Compliments and Complaints Policy and Procedure
- Information and Communications Technology Acceptable Use Policy and Procedure
This list is not an exhaustive list of all University policies. The full list of University policies are available on the CQUniversity Policy site.
Feedback, Recommendations and Responses
Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.
Feedback from Student
Video links need to be in one place.
The links to ECHO360 will be removed from Weekly tiles so that all links to weekly video material are in the Virtual Lectures tile.
Feedback from Student
Proof check due dates on Moodle.
Check and recheck dates against the Unit Profile. Reduce due dates to three places on each Moodle page (UP, Assessment Tile summary, and each assessment item).
Feedback from Student
Update video resources.
Lectures will be updated and refreshed, including the Great Barrier Reef, Brigalow Belt, Micrometeorology and Geochemical Cycles lectures.
Feedback from Unit Coordinator
Need to install permanent infrastructure (mainly survey posts) to allow students to make year to year comparisons in their residential school reports.
We will work with Woppaburra and GKI Hideaway to install permanent stakes/benchmarks for the beach profile exercise, the carbon monitoring project and the terrestrial vertebrate trapping module.
Feedback from Unit Coordinator
Invented citations in the Residential School Reports are a growing issue.
All scientific literature citations need to be accompanied by a clickable DOI link to ensure invented citations are minimized. Students will need to indicate the page and paragraph the cited item originates from.
Feedback from Unit Coordinator
Students still need help on report writing basics (making figures and tables, citation, basic report structure.
Bring back the School of Access Education tutorial sessions as in 2023.