ABSTRACT Earthquake recurrence intervals, surface-rupture extents, and interactions between faults provide insight into how faults behave and are critical for seismic hazard mitigation and earthquake forecasting. Investigating the paleoseismology of spatially related faults can reveal strain distribution and whether faults rupture as a system or independently. Summer Lake basin, a graben in the northwestern Basin and Range with four active faults (three of which have prior paleoseismic investigations), provides an opportunity to investigate fault interactions. To expand the paleoseismic record, two trenches were excavated across the previously undocumented Thousand Springs fault, exposing a normal fault zone that offsets a sequence of deep- to shallow-water lake sediments, sand dunes containing reworked Mazama ash, and other Cascades-sourced tephra. Tephra units were correlated to known units by their physical characteristics, stratigraphic sequence, glass chemistry, and two new radiocarbon dates from the uppermost lake sediments. Using trench exposures, measured vertical separations through auguring, colluvial wedges, and extrapolated offsets based on a constant sedimentation rate, we identified at least five surface-rupturing earthquakes with a total offset of 3.4 + 2/−1 m in the past ∼65 ka. The oldest event (EH5) occurred at 63.8 ± 1.5 ka, event horizon 4 at 36.2 ± 12.7 ka (which could be more than one event), and event horizon 3 at 24.6 ± 0.3 ka. Event horizon 2, a warping event at our site, is likely more than one event and occurred between 7.5 and 10 ka; and the most recent event (EH1+), most likely more than one event, occurred between 3.3 and 7.7 ka. Several events correlate, within error, with events on other faults in the Summer Lake basin, suggesting that (1) the faults generally rupture together as a system, (2) the most recent earthquake may have ruptured all faults in the region, and (3) fault rupture is influenced by the rapid regression of Lake Chewaucan (∼13 ka).

Earthquake recurrence intervals, surface-rupture extents, and interactions between faults provide insight into how faults behave and are critical for seismic hazard mitigation and earthquake forecasting. Investigating the paleoseismology of spatially related faults can reveal strain distribution and whether faults rupture as a system or independently. Summer Lake basin, a graben in the northwestern Basin and Range with four active faults (three of which have prior paleoseismic investigations), provides an opportunity to investigate fault interactions. To expand the paleoseismic record, two trenches were excavated across the previously undocumented Thousand Springs fault, exposing a normal fault zone that offsets a sequence of deep- to shallow-water lake sediments, sand dunes containing reworked Mazama ash, and other Cascades-sourced tephra. Tephra units were correlated to known units by their physical characteristics, stratigraphic sequence, glass chemistry, and two new radiocarbon dates from the uppermost lake sediments. Using trench exposures, measured vertical separations through auguring, colluvial wedges, and extrapolated offsets based on a constant sedimentation rate, we identified at least five surface-rupturing earthquakes with a total offset of 3.4 + 2/-1 m in the past similar to 65 ka. The oldest event (EH5) occurred at 63.8 +/- 1.5 ka, event horizon 4 at 36.2 +/- 12.7 ka (which could be more than one event), and event horizon 3 at 24.6 +/- 0.3 ka. Event horizon 2, a warping event at our site, is likely more than one event and occurred between 7.5 and 10 ka; and the most recent event (EH1+), most likely more than one event, occurred between 3.3 and 7.7 ka. Several events correlate, within error, with events on other faults in the Summer Lake basin, suggesting that (1) the faults generally rupture together as a system, (2) the most recent earthquake may have ruptured all faults in the region, and (3) fault rupture is influenced by the rapid regression of Lake Chewaucan (similar to 13 ka).

Individuals with physical disabilities are largely underrepresented in the geoscience workforce. In this study, we analyzed over 2,500 job advertisements (ads) for entry-level geoscience positions across 19 industries to assess how inclusive the United States job market is for people with physical disabilities. We evaluated each ad’s Equal Opportunity Employer (EEO) and accommodation statements to create a measure of geoscience employers’ inclusive practices for people with disabilities. We coded each ad for instances where physical abilities (e.g., traversing rough terrain, driving a vehicle, lifting heavy objects) were listed as required or preferred qualifications and whether these abilities matched the core job function. A significant proportion of job ads (44%) did not include EEO statements, and of those that did, the language used was minimal or abbreviated. Additionally, only 18% of ads mentioned accommodations for people with disabilities. Of the ads that required physical abilities, only 19% requested physical abilities that matched the core job function. Students exploring their career options or applying for entry-level jobs may feel disadvantaged, restrict their applications, or dismiss geoscience careers if they have physical limitations, or if they perceive that the work environment is not inclusive. Overall, online geoscience ads could benefit from adding or modifying equal opportunity employment and accommodations statements to reflect a more inclusive workplace and could explicitly link requested physical abilities to the job description. These results could help employers consider possible modifications to their job advertisements and explore alternative strategies to promote a more inclusive geoscience workforce.

The COVID-19 pandemic differentially disrupted daily activity in higher education during the spring of 2020, with ramifications for geoscience instructors' teaching practices. Though facing similar challenges in this transition to many faculty nationwide, disciplinary specific coursework, such as field work and field trips to observe geological structures and processes posed unique challenges. To better understand this phenomenon, we surveyed and interviewed geoscience instructors about their lived experiences during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. We identify dilemmas faculty experienced as they transitioned from in-person to online teaching. Findings give us a glimpse into faculty respondents' thinking about teaching as they managed their work and personal responsibilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Survey participants discussed teaching most frequently in their responses (38.6%) and 95.4% of survey participants expressed a teaching dilemma in their survey responses. In coding these dilemmas, we expand on Windschitl's dilemmas framework of conceptual, pedagogical, cultural, and political dilemmas to include personal and technological dilemmas. Results indicate that faculty experienced personal dilemmas most frequently (82.7%). Online resources and discussions with faculty within and beyond their institution were most helpful in supporting the transitions to online learning. Participating faculty specifically mentioned communities designed to support geoscience teaching and learning, such as those facilitated by the NAGT, indicating the importance of discipline-specific faculty learning. We believe these insights can help understand what supports faculty in making and navigating future instructional changes and offer suggestions for faculty and administrators.

Teaching with Investigation and Design in Science (TIDeS) envisions that future teachers will learn science as undergraduates the way they are expected to teach science in the K-12 classroom: engaging all students in science investigation and engineering design in a discourse-filled, context-rich, inclusive learning process.The TIDeS project seeks to catalyze transformation of introductory undergraduate science courses by supporting faculty in the development and implementation of high-quality, rigorously tested curricular materials.To fully support faculty in the development and implementation of their new materials, we review analysis of baseline observational and interview data of 15 materials developers to better understand and address the needs of TIDeS instructors.

Understanding the skills bachelor-level geoscientists need to enter the workforce is critical to their success. The goal of this study was to identify the workforce skills that are most requested from a broad range of geo science employers. We collected 3668 job advertisements for bachelor-level geoscientists and used a case-insensitive, code-matching function in Matlab to determine the skills geoscience employers seek. Written communication (67%), field skills (63%), planning (53%), and driving (51%) were most frequently requested. Field skills and data collection were frequently found together in the ads. Written communication skills were common regardless of occupation. Quantitative skills were requested less frequently (23%) but were usually mentioned several times in the ads that did request them, signaling their importance for certain jobs. Some geoscience-specific skills were rarely found, such as temporal understanding (5%) and systems thinking (0%). We also subdivided field skills into individual tasks and ranked them by employer demand. Site assessments and evaluations, unspecified field tasks, and monitoring were the most frequently requested field skills. This study presents the geoscience community with a picture of the skills sought by employers of bachelor-level geoscientists and provides departments and programs with data they can use to assess their curricula for workforce preparation.

The COVID-19 pandemic provided education researchers with a natural experiment: an opportunity to investigate the impacts of a system-wide, involuntary move to online teaching and to assess the characteristics of individuals who adapted more readily.To capture the impacts in real time, our team recruited college-level geoscience instructors through the National Association of Geoscience Teachers (NAGT) and American Geophysical Union (AGU) communities to participate in our study in the spring of 2020.Each weekday for three successive weeks, participants (n = 262) were asked to rate their experienced disruption in four domains: teaching, research, ability to communicate with their professional community, and work-life balance.The rating system (a scale of 1-5, with 5 as severely disrupted) was designed to assess (a) where support needs were greatest, (b) how those needs evolved over time, and (c) respondents' capacity to adapt.In addition, participants were asked two open-response questions, designed to provide preliminary insights into how individuals were adapting-what was their most important task that day and what was their greatest insight from the previous day.Participants also provided information on their institution type, position, discipline, gender, race, dependents, and online teaching experience (see supplemental material 1 ).When it was evident that disruptions would continue through the 2020-2021 academic year, we issued a one-time follow-up

Efforts to promote diversity in the geosciences are widespread. Despite these efforts, people with physical disabilities remain significantly underrepresented. Many geoscience workforce positions include a field component that may present a real or perceived barrier for people with physical disabilities. In this study, we analyzed 1546 bachelors-level geoscience job advertisements from 569 different employers to determine how inclusive the current job market is to people with physical disabilities or limitations. We coded each advertisement for instances where physical abilities (i.e., traversing rough terrain, driving a vehicle, frequently lifting heavy objects) were listed as required or preferred qualifications. Additionally, we recorded if employers indicated they could make accommodations for qualified candidates. We coded for 33 additional workforce skills (i.e., field skills, data collection) to identify any relationships between those skills and physical abilities. Preliminary results show nearly half of all advertisements required the applicant to possess some form of physical ability, with few stating that accommodations could be made. Most environmental scientist and geologist positions required physical abilities. Our results provide insight into the expectations of potential employers. Students exploring their career options or applying for entry-level jobs may feel disadvantaged, restrict their applications, or dismiss geoscience careers if they have physical limitations. We hope our results will prompt employers to consider possible accommodations, make them prominent in job advertisements, and to explore alternative strategies to promote a more inclusive geoscience workforce.