Turtle Cove is geographically situated in an ideal location for bald cypress and other wetland restoration projects and it serves as an excellent field site for environmental education, teacher workshops and outreach programs sponsored by Southeastern, the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation and other funding sources. A field research station of the College of Arts and Sciences, Turtle Cove is predominately used by faculty and students in the biological sciences department, but also is used by chemistry and physics, visual arts and many other departments. Turtle Cove is available for use by educational, environmental, and civic organizations for day trips, as well as for programs requiring a more extended stay. Turtle Cove s mission is to continue its involvement in and foster improvement in scholarly research, university teaching, teacher training and public service. Although the original focus was on science and mathematics reform, it has expanded to include many other disciplines, including visual arts, music, history and government, English, education and foreign languages.
Connections serves as a liaison between faculty and various environmentally-oriented field sites.
The program offers students a dramatically different way of experiencing and actively participating in their own education and acts as a catalyst to bring together faculty from different departments. Connections offers extensive environmental service-learning opportunities for the creative educator s use. It also administers undergraduate research and artistic endeavor grant programs, brings in outside speakers, provides workshops and informal discussions and serves as a clearinghouse for resource materials on service learning. The Center is dedicated to the establishment of a campus culture that values and pursues powerful teaching, effective re-search, and is committed to service. The goal is to promote and facilitate an environment in which teaching and learning are the subjects of serious discussion, debate, and inquiry among faculty, thereby producing a campus climate where both teaching and research are recognized as significant scholarly work.