Earth Science
Plate Tectonics - 30%
The following topics will be tested:
- Identification of Earth’s layers
- Crust, mantle, core, lithosphere, asthenosphere, etc.
- Types of plates, boundaries, and margins
- Convergent, divergent, transform, etc
- Examples of each
- Driving forces behind plate tectonics
- Mantle convection, mantle plumes
- Plate movement and The Wilson Cycle
- Isostatic adjustments
- Magma chemistry and formation
Glaciers - 20%
- Glacial formation, mass-balance, and flow
- Glacier and ice sheet types and forms (alpine and continental)
- Glacial erosion, erosional landforms, and sediment transport
- Glacial depositional landforms and sediments
- Glaciers in the hydrological cycle - impacts on climate, streams, lakes, and oceans, sub-glacial hydrology, isostatic effects on Earth’s crust
- Theories explaining glacial and ice sheet advance and retreat (ex: Milankovitch)
Oceanography - 10%
- El Nino and La Nina
- Underwater structures
- Continental slope, rise and shelf
- Mid Ocean Ridge
- Upwelling
- Ocean Currents (Global Conveyor Belt)
- Global Energy Budget
- Tsunamis
Water Quality - 20%
The following topics will be tested:
- General Principles of Ecology
- Aquatic Food webs and trophic pyramids
- Nutrient/Biogeochemical Cycles
- Community Interactions
- Population Dynamics
- Human Impact on Ecosystems
- Pollution
- Remediation
- Aquatic environments
- aquatic ecology
- Water cycle
- Aquatic chemistry (and its implications for life),
- potable water treatment, waste water treatment, watershed resource management issues
Geologic Mapping - 10%
- Basic geologic formations
- Syncline, anticline, dome, basin,
- Geologic maps
- Strike and Dip
- Be able to give the relative ages of rocks given a diagram of rock layers and intrusions.
- Topographic maps
Herpetology and Fossils
- Herpetology is based on reasoning, as opposed to memorization.