Makarora Valley, Titea Mt Aspiring National Park

We are offering a local field ecology and data analysis course in the Makarora Valley, South Island in January, for students who want to see what real field biologists and geographers do and learn how to collect and analyse biodiversity data. The expedition will be run in conjunction with the Aspiring Biodiversity Trust, partly located in the Titea Mt Aspiring National Park and in a UNESCO World Heritage Area so it is a truly a wonderful location for field research opportunities and is the perfect time of year for biodiversity monitoring.

We are offering a 6 day field course where students will have the opportunity to learn many different field research techniques focused on the key topics of New Zealand conservation including threatened species monitoring and ecology, predator control initiatives and the special opportunity to collect data in unique and valuable habitats such as the braided river and the botanically rich beech/podocarp forest. During this week, they will also be trained in data analysis where they will work on a large dataset from one of our other sites (research areas include coral reef structure, spider monkey behaviour, savannah mammal distribution and many more), and learn how to use R (the open source data analysis package now used by most international universities) for graphing, GIS and statistical analysis.

For more information, please visit https://www.opwall.com/schools/educational-benefits/local-ecology-field-trips/new-zealand/ and/or contact newzealand@opwall.com.

Please note we only have (60 or possibly 90 places if the third week runs) for this field course in the summer holidays. Students over 16 years old with parental consent can attend the course independently or as part of a school group with teachers.