This course will introduce students to the fundamental concepts and tenets of global climate change. We examine natural systems and human activities that have altered, and continue to alter, global climate systems and other Earth/environmental systems. Students will survey how the changing climate and Earth/environmental systems are impacting human activities (i.e., social and economic systems). Topics to be surveyed include physical geography, biological, economic, policy, social. Students will learn about, and engage in, actions and activities related to the broader concepts of sustainability and the three pillars of sustainability (i.e., social, economic, and environment) as they relate to human-induced global climate change.

Course Structure

-16 weeks, 3 Credits

Learning Objectives

• Students will have a solid quantitative understanding of the basic physical and chemical principles that control the system and be able to apply that knowledge to reasoning about the Earth’s climate system and its response to natural and anthropogenic forces.
• Students will have a solid scientific understanding of what social and physical scientists know, what they don’t know, and how they know what they know about how climate systems work, how and why Earth’s climate systems have changed in the past, and how they may change in the future.
• Students will be able to evaluate the evidence about how human activities (i.e., social systems and economic systems) are resulting in the warming of the planet and assess the scientific evidence.
• Students will gain a multidisciplinary understanding of how interactions within and between the pillars of sustainability (social systems, economic systems, and environmental systems) relate to understanding past and possible future climates on Earth.