Abstract: A hand-on lab during which participants will examine the various members of the rock cycle and learn to distinguish each type based on texture and composition. With careful examination, constituent minerals and textures in rocks can be identified facilitating proper classification.  Once correctly identified, each rock's 'story' can be read allowing interpretations of emplacement or eruption, environments of deposition, pressure and temperature conditions, and ultimately, the tectonic setting where each rock was formed. With basic identification skills honed, hopefully participants will be able to predict expected changes in specific rocks as they travel through the rock cycle.

Biography: Jeff Thole is the Geology Laboratory Supervisor at Macalester College.  He teaches laboratory sections of the Introductory Geology courses and runs the Keck Laboratory which includes a X-ray diffractometer, a micro-XRF (x-ray spectrometer), a low vacuum scanning electron microscope with EDS and WDS X-ray spectrometers, a gamma-ray spectrometer and an atomic-force microscope. Jeff graduated from the University of Minnesota - Duluth and worked for the US Geological Survey in Reston, Virginia, before obtaining a M.Sc. in Geology at Washington State University.  He worked as an environmental consultant for 5 years before joining Macalester College in 1996.