Environmental Studies

At Prescott College, we believe that a classroom is more than just four walls. Our classrooms are places, like mountains, forests, cities, and farms. With a mission to create a healthy, just, and sustainable world, we solve problems by getting into the field and taking action. Our students are educators, activists, counselors, researchers, innovators, and entrepreneurs. We are inspired by all those we meet, while making a difference in our local and global communities. We don't only learn within the classroom. At Prescott College, we take it outside.

The aim of this degree is to develop ecologically and scientifically literate, informed, and responsible citizens who are prepared to offer solutions to environmental problems, and to help develop sustainable relationships between people and nature. Students gain a deep interdisciplinary understanding and experience of the scientific, political, economic, community-based, and social justice aspects of contemporary environmental problems. Through field-based application of knowledge, they develop the skills to be part of the solutions in a variety of fields ranging from field ecology to resource management to community-based conservation and science communication.

Students pursuing a BA in Environmental Studies will be able to address the values, processes, inquiry- and solution-generating abilities, and applications required to develop a philosophical understanding of, and ethical stance regarding, human-nature interactions and relationships.

The Department advances and integrates understanding across many disciplines, including the biological, physical, and social sciences, and the humanities. Students use these insights to illuminate the interrelationships between human and non-human realms, meanwhile learning specific skills in community development, application to real-world situations, critical thinking, field and laboratory methods, and oral and written communication.

Related Degree Tracks:

• BA in Sustainable Community Development (SCD)
• BA in Sustainable Food Systems (SFS)
  

Learning Outcomes:

All students graduating with a degree in Environmental Studies will be able to demonstrate the following outcomes:

• Values: Learners will identify, compare, contrast, and apply the historical, philosophical, and ethical foundations of how humans’ value, use, and manage nature and natural resources.
• Processes: Learners will identify and apply abiotic, biological, ecological, and evolutionary processes, from molecules to the biosphere across a variety of temporal and spatial scales.
• Inquiry and Solution Generation: Learners will use appropriate methodologies to address a range of research questions, to interpret landscapes, to test hypotheses where appropriate, and to analyze and communicate the results to diverse audiences.
• Application: Learners will apply understandings of the reciprocal influences between people and nature through meaningful analysis of complex relationships among ecological, cultural, socio-political, and economic systems in the creation of effective and creative approaches to meeting environmental and human challenges.