JoinAll Case Studies
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In keyword search, list the criteria you would like to find cases. Multiple criteria can be listed separated by commas (i.e. directed, high school)
Educational levels are defined as follows: Elementary, Middle, High School, College
Types of cases are defined as follows: Analysis/Issues, Clicker, Debate, Intimate Debate, Demonstration, Dilemma/Decision, Directed, Discussion, Interrupted, Jig-saw, Journal Article, Laboratory, Student Presentations, Mini-case, Problem-Based Learning, Public Hearing, Role-Play, Trial, Flipped, Game
By Nancy M. Boury
This "clicker case" focuses on the invasive aquarium strain of Caulerpa taxifolia as a way of introducing students to issues about invasive species. Specifically, students learn to identify some of the traits that make a species potentially invasive ...
Eating PCBs from Lake Ontario - The Clicker Version
By Eric Ribbens
This is a “clicker” adaptation of another case in our collection, “Eating PCBs from Lake Ontario: Is There an Effect or Not?” (2001), written by the same author. It encourages students to examine how scientific results get presented and inter...
By Keely Roen
In this interrupted case study, students view a documentary film about a coyote hunting contest and then assume the role of various stakeholders in coyote management in the western United States to explore issues associated with wildlife management. ...
Global Climate Change: Evidence and Causes
By Maureen Knabb, Timothy M. Lutz, G. Winfield Fairchild
This “clicker case” begins by assessing students’ impressions of global climate change and the role that human activities play in recent global warming trends. Students assume the role of an intern working for a U.S. senator. They need to under...
Global Climate Change: Impact and Remediation
By Maureen Knabb, Timothy M. Lutz
This “clicker case” is a continuation of another case in our collection, “Global Climate Change: Evidence and Causes,” in which students assumed the role of an intern working for a U.S. senator so that they could advise the senator on future ...
The Ecological Footprint Dilemma
By Bruno Borsari
Is it better to have a new parking lot on campus or use that space to develop a community garden? This is the issue presented in this "clicker case," which pulls students into the decision-making process. Students learn about concepts related to sust...
By Frank J. Dinan, Thomas R. Stabler, Renee Larson
This interrupted case study highlights the importance of energy considerations within food chains by examining the population decline of Steller sea lions along the western Alaskan coast. A ban on commercial fishing of pollock in the 1970s caused a s...
By Courtney E. Quinn, John E. Quinn
This PowerPoint case (~2.4 MB) was developed for an undergraduate, non-majors course in conservation biology. It explores the controversy surrounding land purchases in the Patagonia region of Chile and Argentina. According to local indigenous peoples...
By Claudia Bode, Alan Gleue, Carolyn Pearson
This case study follows a family’s dilemma about how to save money on gasoline. Should they keep their SUV and trade in their Corolla for a hybrid sedan? Going from 28 (Corolla) to 48 (Hybrid) miles per gallon (MPG) should really save money on gas....
By Melanie K. Rathburn, Karina J. Baum
Many students take the availability of water for granted. This case study, which focuses on the Cochabamba water revolt in Bolivia, is designed to encourage students to think about water as a limited natural resource. Students learn about the limited...
By Kathleen Archer, Lauren Sahl
This interrupted case study focuses on the seasonal hypoxic area in the Gulf of Mexico known as the Dead Zone. It follows Sue, a college student, whose father is a commercial fisherman affected by the lack of fish in his usual fishing grounds in the ...
By Elizabeth Clark
In this case study, students hear arguments on both sides of a debate over wildlife management and must integrate ethical and scientific perspectives to formulate their own opinions. The case as written is most appropriate for an environmental ethics...
By Mark L. Kuhlmann
In this case study, students examine data from a number of published studies of the effects of Pacific salmon on freshwater and riparian ecosystems. The case focuses on the interesting phenomenon of spawning salmon acting as nutrient conveyor belts, ...
By Juanita Constible, Luke Sandro, Richard E. Lee, Jr. (rr)
As the carbon dioxide concentration of our atmosphere increases and our climate warms, the hay fever season seems to be getting longer and more severe. In this case study, students assume the a role of a public relations specialist contracted to comm...
By Janna R. McLean
In this interrupted case study, two students explore evidence suggesting that environmental estrogens leach out of some plastic containers and that these chemicals have a negative impact on the development of mammals. Students analyze data, consider ...
The Klamath Basin Water Crisis
By MeghanMarie Fowler-Finn
In this case study, students examine global water shortage problems in the context of the current Klamath Basin water crisis. Two main perspectives are addressed, agriculture and the environment, along with multiple other perspectives including Nativ...
By Joy M. Branlund
Most students are aware that asbestos is a health hazard, but don’t know that “asbestos” refers to a variety of minerals with both useful and harmful properties. In this case, students answer questions they have about asbestos in the context of...
By Matthew S. Kaufman
This case study uses a PowerPoint-driven approach combined with role-playing to explore issues surrounding the grey seal population off the coast of New England, specifically Chatham, Massachusetts. After gathering information, the students take the ...
By Thomas R. Stabler, Frank J. Dinan
In this case study, two students have been asked to conduct a “systems analysis” study to determine whether ethanol derived from corn or biodiesel prepared from soybeans is the more energy efficient alternative fuel. The students must investigate...
By Laurie LeBlanc, Robert Mazalewski, Jonathan Cook, Jasmine King
This case study, developed for a general chemistry course, is intended to teach students the interdisciplinary nature of environmental science. Students take on the role of environmental chemists. Using atomic absorption spectroscopy, they test...
By Conrad Toepfer
In this interrupted case study, students apply the scientific method to probe possible reasons behind declining marine iguana populations in the Galapagos Islands. Initially students are given rudimentary information and encouraged to generate wide-r...
The Case of the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker
By Kathrin F. Stanger-Hall, Jennifer Merriam, Ruth Ann Greuling
Based on the disputed rediscovery of the ivory-billed woodpecker in April 2005, this interrupted case study tells the story of a fictional character, "Brad Murky," a student and research assistant who must decide whether the current evidence is suffi...
The Fate and Transport of Toxic Releases
By David W. Kelley
The release of toxins into the environment and the federal government's tracking of that using the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) compiled by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are the focus of this case study, which uses GIS to explore th...
By Richard Cowlishaw, Charles Hunter, Jason Coy, Michael Tessmer
This case is a classroom simulation of the types of negotiations that went into the Kyoto Protocol agreement on limiting global greenhouse gas emissions. It was developed for an environmental science course for first-year college students with minima...
By Linda Markowitz, Catherine Dana Santanello
The main objective of this case is to have students critically examine the costs and the benefits associated with ecotourism, a form of tourism usuallly involving visiting fragile, pristine, and relatively undisturbed natural areas intended as ...
By Susan M. Galatowitsch, Barbara A. Peichel
The essential elements of this dilemma case are based on a real-life wetland mitigation problem. A biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has to decide whether to improve a wetland adversely impacted by toxins or restore another site inste...
By Frank J. Dinan
This case study explores the unintended side effects of chemicals introduced into the environment, specifically organic compounds that can act as environmental estrogens (chemical castration agents that can interfere with the sexual development of em...
Can Suminoe Oysters Save Chesapeake Bay?
By Valerie Nieman, Zhi-Jun Liu
This dilemma case explores the controversy over introducing non-native oysters to the Chesapeake Bay as a means of improving its ecological and economic health. Developed for use in an interdisciplinary doctoral program in energy and environmental st...
By Thomas A. Davis
The topic of this debate case, developed for a course in “Issues in Environmental Biology,” is clear-cutting, a controversial method of harvesting and regenerating trees in which all trees are cleared from a site. Students debate the issue, assum...
By Thomas A. Davis
In this case, developed for a course in Issues in Environmental Biology, students learn that water samples collected from a local river show elevated levels of fecal bacteria and atrazine, one of the most commonly used herbicides in the United States...
But It's Just a Bottle of Water
By Lindsey May, Jessica Kotke, Charles R. Bomar
Bottled water, popular among students, is big business even though issues surrounding it related to health and safety as well as its environmental impact have stirred up controversy. Designed for an introductory non-majors environmental science cours...
Rising Temperatures, Differing Viewpoints
By Christopher Hollister
In this case, students work in small groups to analyze and critically evaluate the often political nature of news stories. The case was developed from two newspaper articles published in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal about the release of...
By Laurie A. Parendes, Scott H. Burris
By simulating a public hearing, this case study requires that students sift through and organize information on pesticide use presented to them from the perspective of different stakeholders. The case asks a fundamental question, Can we do without pe...
By Thomas Horvath
In 1986, Lake Nyos, a volcanic lake located in Cameroon, Africa, released a huge amount of carbon dioxide gas, killing over 1,700 people and countless livestock and other animals in the area. This case, intended for use in a limnology or an aquatic b...
By Michael Tessmer
This interrupted case study is based on current research involving the global transport of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Students are asked to propose several hypotheses and experiments in an attempt to determine how PCBs are transferred globally...
On a Clear Day You Can See Forever
By David W. Kelley, Rebecca Helgesen
In this case study, developed for an introductory environmental studies course, students grapple with the issue of air pollution, specifically the causes and effects of haze and smog as ubiquitous, persistent air quality problems that plague urban an...
By Erica F. Kosal
In this case study, students speculate on what may have caused a major fish kill in an estuary in North Carolina. In the process, they explore how land runoff and excess nutrients affect aquatic communities, and learn about the complex life cycle of ...
By Pauline A. Lizotte, Gretchen E. Knapp
This case is based on the controversy that surrounded harvesting of the Pacific yew from 1989 to 1997 to develop paclitaxel (Taxol), a revolutionary anti-cancer drug. The case was designed to expose students to basic conservation biology concepts by ...
First in Flight, Last in Wetlands Preservation?
By John Petersen, Nancy London
Developed for an introductory environmental studies course, this case study explores the ecological, economic, and legislative issues associated with land development and wetland loss. Students role-play the points of view of four different stakehold...
By Dennis Kingery
In 1958, black bass were introduced into Lake Atitlan in the highlands of western Guatemala as a way to attract tourism and boost the local economy, but unforeseen complications resulted in an ecological disaster. Developed for an introductory course...