ENVST Minor - 18 credits:
Environmental and Sustainability Studies students develop an understanding of ecological systems and the consequences of human-environment interactions, with grounding in earth systems and social science. The curriculum emphasizes human impacts on the environment, policy and decision making, ethics, and historical approaches to the human-environment relationship. This interdisciplinary program is unique in its emphasis on peer learning and community engagement regarding the environment, social responsibility, and sustainability.
ENVST 2050 (or AP Environmental Science with a score of 3 or higher) & 2100 are required prerequisites before ENVST 3364 & 3365 are taken.
Required Courses:
The goal for this class is to have students versed in the topics of: 1) Ecology and Sustainability, 2) Biodiversity, and 3) Earth Resources and Environmental Quality. The course consists of lectures, participation exercises, which will require critical thinking and data analysis. The materials have been designed to step you through the topics and if you already have some science background this class will help you make connections among scientific disciplines and ESS.
How can we better understand and respond to the complexities of contemporary environmental problems? The course begins to answer that question by examining several key perspectives that shape our understanding of the dynamic interplay between human societies and the environment. A central premise of this course is that every environmental issue is simultaneously a social issue, so if we analyze them separately, we cannot address them well. This course challenges students to cultivate a critical perspective on the relationship between humans from different societies and the non-human world, what we often call ‘the environment.’ We will explore how people conceptualize, interact with, and manage the environment differently, centering issues of equity and global disparities in environmental (in)justice. The first part of the course is dedicated to learning nine key analytical perspectives that serve as our foundation for interpreting environment-society relations. For example, environmental ethics, political economy, race, social construction, and gender are among the conceptual tools that illuminate contemporary environmental issues. The second part of the course transitions toward application, as we examine various objects—trees, French fries, water, e-waste, and uranium—through the analytical frameworks introduced in the first part. Topics span climate change, population and consumption, environmental hazards, governance, environmental racism and justice, conservation, forest management, waste, mining, and more. Our central goal in this course is to develop critical thinking skills and an expanded toolbox with which to interpret and address some of our most pressing environmental problems.
Earth's climate is changing more rapidly than in any point in human history, making climate change one of the most significant threats to current and future generations. We currently have the solutions needed to address climate change, but it is imperative that we put these solutions into action before a tipping point is reached. This class will look at the 4.5 billion years of the Earth’s history to learn about past climate changes, and the scientific tools we use to reconstruct them. Students will learn about what causes climate change across different time scales, how humans are contributing to current and future climate change, and the personal and collective actions they can take to address climate change.
With the recent upswings in economic, political, cultural, and technological globalization, human societies around the globe are increasingly interconnected in various ways, often unequally. At the same time, forms of globalization pose both challenges and opportunities for addressing the most fundamental sustainability challenges facing the world today. This course provides a multidisciplinary overview of the human causes, environmental and ecological consequences, and potential policy solutions to various sustainability challenges in global contexts.
*ENVST 2050 & ENV 2100 are prerequisites for this course
Environmental Justice is concerned with the potential for the disproportionate impact of environmental harm on communities of color and the poor. This could include, for example, the citing of toxic waste-producing facilities in poor or minority communities, the impact of high energy prices on low-income people, the confiscation of land and water from native communities, the concentration of air and water pollution in communities that lack the political access and funding to fight them, the role of racism as a factor in determining who should bear the brunt of negative environmental externalities, and an overall concern that all policies affecting the environment be formulated and implemented in a manner that does not victimize people because of their race, ethnic heritage or income. This course will explore the theories and concepts of environmental justice, assess the empirical research on the subject, and examine specific case studies. And finally, the course will explore ways to achieve environmental justice for all people regardless of race, gender, ethnic heritage, and income level. The overall objective of the course is to understand how a multi-cultural democratic society can achieve environmental sustainability within a framework of justice and equality for all.
*ENVST 2050 & ENVST 2100 are prerequisites for this course