Field Studies was a new course being offered at Hogwarts beginning this term, and had been approved by both the Department of Education at the Ministry, the Hogwarts Board of Directors, and Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt himself. The class was meant to provide magical students with the opportunity to study magical creatures out in the field, their natural environment. Luna liked to view it as a more advanced offshoot of Care of Magical Creatures, which Professor Rubeus Hagrid still taught, its emphasis still being on the study and care of magical creatures who were in captivity.