Evaluating the introduction of unmanned Aerial Vehicles for teaching and learning in geoscience fieldwork education

Abstract

ABSTRACTIn the last decade, commercial Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have become more accessible for use in civil roles such as scientific research. Despite their increasing use in research, there has been little investigation of their potential use as an educational tool in Geoscience. This small-scale mixed methods research investigated the potential benefits and challenges of using UAVs in fieldwork at two North West of England Universities. UAVs have shown to have the potential to be a useful tool for use in Geoscience fieldwork by offering students many learning benefits such as; providing different perspectives of a landscape, the ability to collect data from inaccessible locations and to enhance student data collection skills. However, there are substantial barriers to introducing UAVs in fieldwork such as laws and licencing, privacy, time, cost and a lack of students being allowed to fly the aircraft legally.