Learning Objectives

• Students will be able to explain how a wide range of interdisciplinary factors (social sciences, natural sciences and humanities) contribute to environmental issues.

• Students will understand the relationship and connections between diverse natural sciences in the context of environmental issues. For example, what kinds of tools, research methods, and perspectives do the earth sciences vs. the biological sciences contribute to our understanding of climate change?

• Students will develop skills in (1) experimental design, (2) data analysis and interpretation, (3) using scientific instruments and techniques in the context of exploring and solving environmental problems. Examples of problems with an environmental dimension where natural science could be applied include environmental management, ecological restoration, monitoring and assessment, natural hazard response and mitigation, cultural conflicts, the built environment, ethical issues, human health, natural resource extraction, poverty, and war.

• Students will develop skills in detecting and conceptualizing complex connections within and across disciplines in real-world environmental issues based on their experiences with engaged projects. For example, the contributions of botany, zoology, geography and chemistry in tandem with social science perspectives and interpersonal relations could be explored in a watershed restoration project. This implies a capacity to engage in real-world problem solving.

• Students will be able to connect global environmental concerns to local places and communities and address environmental problems with natural science methodologies in a global context and from diverse cultural and geographic perspectives.

Major Requirements

Core Requirements (9 to 9.5 units) for Environmental Science major:

• ENVS 110 - Introduction to Environment & Sustainability
• ENVS 111 - Introduction to Earth Science
• ENVS 112 - Ecology and the Human Future
• ENVS 198 - Conversations Towards a Sustainable Future and ENVS 498 Conversations Towards a Sustainable Future  (.25 units)

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• GEOG 291 - Geospatial Analysis with Desktop GIS and GEOG 292 Geospatial Analysis with Web GIS  [module courses, each worth 0.5 credits] or GEOG 291 Geospatial Analysis with Desktop GIS  and GEOG 369 Remote Sensing of the Environment 

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• GEOG 347 - Human Impacts on the Environment
• BIOL 122 - Organisms and Their Environment (+lab)
• CHEM 110 - General Chemistry I (+lab)
• MATH 105 - Basic Probability and Statistics or MATH 230 Applied Statistics  or MATH 235 Biostatistics  or PSYC 210 Quantitative Methods