Experience with Active Learning: The Charleston, SC, USA Urban Heat Island Effect

The urban heat island (UHI) effect is not well understood, especially within the cityscape. This editorial is from the perspective of an undergraduate student Cadet Emma Larsen, as she comes to understand the UHI through mentorship from professors Simon Ghanat and Scott Curtis, personal experiences as a cadet at a military academy in Charleston, SC, USA, and active learning through participation in a national heat observation campaign, the NOAA HeatWatch, and related independent research. HeatWatch seeks to understand the spatial variability of heat and humidity through citizen science. Volunteers fan out over a city three times in one day and collect information through car-mounted sensors. All the authors participated in data collection and team meetings, but this was the first time the student was exposed to project development across multiple institutions and realized the benefits a coordinated scientific endeavor has on her community. Finally, the student participated in her own heat study on the campus of The Citadel and gained a better appreciation of the relationship between land cover and geography on micro-scale temperature variability.