Geology 102C Syllabus

Geology 102C Metamorphic Petrology! Fall Quarter

This class focuses on understanding metamorphism and metamorphic rocks, which are the heart of geology.
Roughly 99.5% of Earth is made of metamorphic rocks. The plate-tectonic engine, climate, oil maturation, gold crystallization, etc. are all driven by metamorphic processes.

Earth-science employers tell us that the most important things they look for in recent graduates are the ability to interpret rocks, synthesize information, think critically, and communicate. This class is designed to help you develop those skills.

Related Web Sites
You may find the following webpages useful in this and other classes:
Mineralogy Database
WebElements Periodic Table
Geochemical Earth Reference Model
Molecular Calculator
Physical Constants

Professor
Dr. Bradley Hacker
Webb 2120.
Office hours: anytime. Please come and talk to me when you want help--I care deeply about your education and want to help you attain your educational goals.

Teaching Assistant
Francisco Apen

Lecture
Lecture material is here.
T,R 9:30-10:45, PSBS 2711.
Please be in the classroom and ready to learn before class starts. If you must come in late, enter quietly.

Background Material
You should know the minerals and their compositions in this list.

Laboratory Sections
PSBS 2711; Wed 14:00-17:00

Quizes
There will be one quiz each week based on material given to you or on reading assigned from the textbook.

Homework
There will be a series of homework assignments.

Lecture exams
Midterm: Tuesday Nov 5
Final: Thurs Dec 5, 9:30-10:45

Lab exam
Wed Dec 4

Textbook
Principles of Igneous+Metamorphic Petrology by Philpotts & Ague

Field Trip
There will be a great field trip on Nov 2 during which you will learn a great deal. Information about how to write your report follows below.

Grading
Letter grades will be assigned according to total points earned.

Quizes: 10%
Homework: 10%.
Midterm exam: 15%
Final exam: 15%
Lab exercises: 20%
Lab exam: 15%
Field trip report: 15%

Course Fees
<$40

Part of the professors' and the teaching assistants' jobs at the University are undergraduate education; the bulk of their time is used to conduct research and mentor graduate students. The professor and teaching assistants are committed to your education and are here to help you get the most from your investment, but you must also play an active role.
Like all your University classes, you must commit the time and effort required to learn the material. Most people learn by working hard, asking questions, and thinking. Do not expect to learn if you do not attend lecture, leave the lab before you have answered and understood the questions, or do not make strong efforts outside of class to learn the material.
Most people learn best by repeated exposure to the same topic in increasing depth.
Take detailed notes during lecture, condense those notes to the most-important bits, and write your own exam questions. Writing, with your hand, is a key method for storing information in your head.
Read the book once relatively quickly, re-read it and mark key data/sentences, transfer those key data to your class notes, and, again, write your own exam questions.
You may with to go to an Academic Skills Workshop to improve your learning skills.
You must understand the concepts covered in the lecture, labs, quizzes, and the textbook; you are not guaranteed a passing grade in this class just because you are a Geology major. Do not expect to get a good grade if you do not attend lecture, or leave the lab before you have answered and understood the questions, or do not understand the quiz preparation questions before the quiz.
Late work will not be accepted without prior notification; accepted late work will be marked down 20% for each working day late.

Field Trip Report
Due one week after the trip, by electronic submission.

Introduction

Purpose of study
Location, physical and geological

Field Methods

Observations

Outcrop size
Types and distribution of rocks
Foliation attitude, coherence, relation to rock types and minerals
Vein composition, location, and relation to minerals and foliation
Fault locations and features
Fold locations and features

Interpretation

Metamorphic facies, PT conditions and history
Tectonic setting
Tectonic history

Conclusions or Summary

Field + Laboratory Report Due two weeks after the trip

Introduction

Purpose of study
Location, physical and geological

Field and Laboratory Methods

Field Observations

Outcrop size
Types and distribution of rocks
Foliation attitude, coherence, relation to rock types and minerals
Vein composition, location, and relation to minerals and foliation
Fault locations and features
Fold locations and features

Laboratory Observations

Description of each hand sample: color, grain size, foliation, minerals
Description of each thin section:
Minerals: name, size, habit, modal abundance, relationship to foliation, veins, and other minerals
Veins: constituent minerals, size, relationship to foliation and host rock
Foliation: constituent minerals, description, relationship to veins

Interpretation

Metamorphic facies
Pressures and temperatures and fluids during metamorphism
Reconstruction of pressure-temperature-deformation path
Tectonic setting
Tectonic history

Conclusions or Summary

General notes on your report
One of the most important things you are in University to learn is how to communicate. If you work hard to produce an excellent report on the field trip, I will work hard to help you become a better writer.

Proofread your paper before submitting. Misspelled and missing words are NOT OK. Demonstrate to the reader that you respect them and wish to be taken seriously.

Do NOT include words for which you do not know the meaning or spelling. Look them up. Be a scholar.

Use complete sentences, including verbs. I will not consider acceptable papers that contain one-sentence paragraphs or sentences without verbs.

Run a spell check on your finished text before submitting it. You must spell correctly even words you may not have heard before--don't just guess some random phonetic spelling. I will not read papers that are rife with misspellings.

Use past tense for things that happened in the past. Use present tense for things that are still true. For example, "Below the sandstone is a bluechist-facies volcanic rock, whose fragmentary texture suggests it was deposited as a debris flow." Or, "The rock has a white mineral". Or, "The rock was deposited".

Words that end in "ing" (e.g., fracturing) are actions or processes--and we did not see that. We saw things (e.g., fractures). Boudinage is a process; boudin is a thing.

Avoid use of the word "very"--unless it is a specifically defined term such as "very fine grained". One person's "very" is another person's ordinary. Be quantitative instead.

"Outcrop" is a noun; "to crop out" is a verb. For example, "the outcrop is dominantly quartzofeldspathic gneiss" or "quartzofeldspathic gneiss crops out throughout the region".

Use Late, Middle, Early for volcanic rocks and times; use Upper, Middle, and Lower for sedimentary rocks. Weirdly, epochs are lowercase--e.g., middle Miocene--and everything else is uppercase.

Write a scientific report, not a travel log. For example "the northernmost outcrop is chert"; not "the first rock we walked up to and saw was a rock that appeared to be chert". Do not write "First we saw a green block..., 2nd we saw a red block..." Instead, use geological context: "The Franciscan is in fault contact with the Matilija Fm. The latter unit is... The Franciscan is a broken formation and melange. The matrix consists of ... The blocks in the melange consist of ..." etc

Use the metric system; no miles or feet. Even though Ronald Reagan disbanded the U.S. Metric Board in 1982, nine years later George Bush The Smarter signed Executive Order 12770 directing all executive departments and federal agencies to implement the use of the metric system so that the US would not be the only country mired in the dark ages. Unfortunately, this didn't work, and the rest of Earth is moving on without us. Converting English measurements into metric units isn't exactly rocket science, but NASA blamed the loss of its $125 million Mars Climate Orbiter on Lockheed Martin Astronautics, which submitted acceleration data in English units instead of metric units.

Use directions "north, west, etc" and not "next" or "after"

Be quantitative; do not write "big" when you can write "2 x 3 m"

Have a non-geologist whose English skills you admire read and criticize your paper or go to Campus Learning Assistance Services and have them read your paper.