Course Descriptions

HS 264F — Environment and Development

Meets for one-half semester and yields half-course credit.

Three pillars -- economy, society, and environment -- are the foundation of sustainable development. Practitioners benefit from basic environmental literacy concerning the primary threats to human and planetary well-being including climate change and its direct and indirect impacts, air and water pollution, ocean acidification and other global changes to the seas, alteration of Earth's major nutrient cycles, and loss of biodiversity, among other topics. The module includes a special focus on agriculture and human diets, because our crops, livestock, and associated deforestation are the most extensive sources of environmental harm and of freshwater depletion world-wide, and a significant contributor to climate change. Usually offered every year.
Eric Olson