#ClimateCitizen Course Selections Spring 2016
Need to register for classes for Spring 2016? We've got a list of all #ClimateCitizen Courses prepared for you.
The New School has a long history of engaging in and offering creative solutions to society’s most pressing issues. Climate change is one of the greatest challenges we are facing in the 21st Century. With our diverse community, and formidable talents in design and the social sciences, our university sets the course for leadership in the field. This is our call to the student body to come together and respond to the climate crisis by creating a more sustainable future.You can connect your studies to sustainability this Spring 2016 with this guide of interdisciplinary courses. Find something for you and your area of study or interest!Key: *=Affiliated Faculty; (N) = NSSR; (C) = COPA; (E) = Public Engagement(Milano); (L) = Lang; (P) = Parsons
Community
Youth Urbanism: Arts, Education & City Planning (L): This course targets youth as a necessary cog in citizen participation in making cities more sustainable, resilient, and just. The course dives into how youth in NYC and throughout the country are working on building a better, beautiful cities.Sustainability Perspectives and Practices (E)*:This course shows multiple perspectives from which sustainability issues are viewed. Students will be introduced to specific competencies for sustainability practice. The goal is to inform professional practice by broadening students views on relevant issues, problem-solving, and seeking to balance knowledge generalization and specialization. Community Development (E)*: Student will learn the disciple of community development by understanding the development of the social organizations and institutions, such as community development corporations (CDCs), community based organizations, and informal voluntary associations and the importance of all of this in revitalizing poor urban and rural communities.Economic Development 1 (N): This course dives into development economics at the advanced level, aiming to provide exposure to historical and current debates, preparing student for independent research. Students are able to choose from a of topic of their choice.Foundations of Organizational Change (E): This course explores the contribution of the discipline of organizational development to current change management practice, defining models, approaches, and understandings of the way organizations can be helped to achieve successful change. Management & Organizational Behavior (E): The course examines organizations from different with a focus on human behavior and organizational structures/processes. Students learn the critical thinking and practical applications required to solve organizational problems.Organizational Assessment & Diagnosis (E): The course explores the theory and practice of Organizational Assessment with an intensive team project in a client organization. Students use a range of methodologies to collect and analyze data from their clients, and present feedback.Collaborating with Urban Communities Through Design (P): In this course students will learn, and practice, the skills and concepts needed to collaborate with marginalized communities towards socially just urban development. The course will prepare students to work with marginalized populations and grassroots initiatives in urban settings by developing social impact projects through needs/asset-based capacity building, project design and development, and by establishing networks of collaboration.
Sustainability
Economics and Ethics of Sustainable Design (P): Students will learn the meaning of sustainability and how it applies to those in design and business/ Globalization puts multiple pressures on the ideals of sustainability, but encourages students to learn what kind of standards and regulations that designers and industries may want to use to evaluate their relationship with these ideals. This will be done by learning about economic and ecological impacts of “business as usual;” as a baseline to develop a deeper understanding of why alternatives are crucial.Sustainable Systems (P)*: This course provides students an opportunity to acquire a foundational understanding of the scientific and social issues related to the design of resilient urban futures. This will expand the mindset to being a professional expert making decisions as well as learning about the material flows. This will help to adapt to a diverse, adaptable, and resilient works.Climate Change & Cities (E)*: Climate change is altering the ways our cities are planned and managed; affecting more than half the world’s households and most firms. United Nations estimates that three billion people will be added to cities by 2050, predominantly in slums of Africa and Asia. In this course students learn about this critical global environmental challenge and explore city responses to climate change. Food & Emerging Technologies (E):This courses explores the role of emerging media and new technology on the exploration and articulation of topics focusing on the many facets of the Food System. Students will gain insight into how our Food System is influenced, as well as the food we eat. Students will also be tasked with investigating the issues raised in class to address and improve upon issues that plague our Food System.Business Practices for Media (P): This course will introduce the key management concepts necessary to understand, work in, and run a successful creative media company. Students will learn about markets, revenues, financing, sustainability, etc.Food and The Environment (E): The course will explore how different frameworks, from urban ecology to environmental justice, and different analytical methods, from risk assessment to lifecycle analysis, help us to identify strategies for making the food system more sustainable and resilient. Urbanization & Economic Growth (E): This course looks at the structural transformation of societies as they urbanize both historically and around the world. It does not have all the answers but it attempts to identify insights and lessons that have been learned to help make urbanization work as part of a more coherent, sustainable growth strategy.
Social Justice
Climate & Society (L)*: Here, students will take aim at pressing climate issues and how they have an impact on our society from global and local levels. This course will focus on climate-society interactions and take five basic elements into play - ranging from climate science and knowledge to climate ethics and equity. Global Political Ecology (N): The focus of this course is to examine the relationship that has been established between the environment and politics with a specific spotlight being placed on the connection of biodiversity as an environmental policy issue. For example, student can expect to learn about the decline of biodiversity, the history of biodiversity science, conservation effort, what is causing a loss in biodiversity, and more.Indigeneous Politics and Environmental Justice (E): This interdisciplinary course critically examines the interplay among settler colonialism, indigenous resurgence, and the politics of climate justice. Students gain an understanding of how histories of invasion, conquest, and ongoing settler colonial dispossession factor into debates over extractive industries and further consider the dynamics and possibilities of indigenous resurgence and epistemology in response to corporate and governmental encroachment on, and pollution of, land, water, and air.Political Ecologies of Food, Farming & Capitalism (E): This course examines the intersections of states, humans and nature through the political ecologies of food and farming inside and outside of capitalism. Political Ecology is a field that draws on critical social theory, case study research and ecological science to examine the historical processes, both natural and social, through which relations between humans and environments are formed and sustained.Environmental Health in Latin America & the Caribbean (L)*: This seminar will focus on contemporary environmental health topics and issues in Latin America and the Caribbean. There will be an emphasis will be on people and their relationship with the environment. Students will understand how the region is adjusting to increased integration, globalization, and environmental change, including global warming. This course has no prerequisites.Ethical Fashion (P): This course will examine manufacturing from a social, political and economic point of view, enabling students to learn about the human rights and environmental violations as related to the apparel and textile industry.
Environment
Sound in Art & Environment (L): This course will dive into city-specific sound works and investigate the field of “acoustic ecology”, In addition, this will incorporate the role of an acoustic ecologist in city planning,, climate science, and environmental policy making. The course will explore working in an acoustic environment at any level. Genes, Environment, & Behavior (L): This course takes aim at looking at epigenetics and comparing our relationship to the environment with our genetic makeup. It will dive deeper into the understanding that human behavior and human impacts will have on our genetic makeup and social environment.Environmental Law & Science (E)*: This course reviews key provisions of environmental law and the scientific and social principles that underlie such laws. Students will examine the application of these disciplines to particular issues in environmental policy and sustainability management with the goal of familiarizing students with environmental law and science and to provide experience in applying these principles.Global Urban Environmental Policy (E)*: 40 trillion dollars will be invested, over the next two decades, in bridging the global deficit in environmental infrastructure—transport, energy, and water. This course examines old and new theories of environmental infrastructure policy and planning.Water Quality Lab (L): Through experiments and activities, this laboratory course explores the chemistry of water. Lab experiments will investigate techniques for measuring levels of contaminants in water to assess drinking water quality and the importance of experimental design and data quality in making decisions on water quality. Topics: Water & The Elements (P): Our exploration will begin with your lived experiences of water. We will also dive into the differing cultural experiences of water. We will explore current conflicts related to water and predictions about its future. Then we will develop ways to communicate what we have rescued from the sea of data on water. Principles of Environmental Science (E): This course will introduce students to the fundamental scientific, technical, and analytical issues relating to environmental studies, providing a strong foundation so they can be conversant in the multidisciplinary environment that is sustainability management.
Design
Production & Design 2 (C): This course serves to bridge together work that directors have done to begin to create the full vision for a production. Rising directors have the opportunity to find ways to incorporate the ideas and principles of sustainability into the course.Food, Research & Design (N): Through this seminar/workshop hybrid, student focus on food-related topics in order to develop a deeper knowledge of their particular interests in food issues. This will lead them to prepare final project or thesis using their knowledge to examine in a methodological and content manner.Zero Waste Garment (P): Students will build upon their current fashion designing skills, focusing on how to design and then produce a “zero-waste garment”. Through this process, the understanding of relationships between cloth, design, etc. becomes clearer with their tie to the end product and the impact that it will have.Environmental Design (P): This course addresses the principles, process and practice of environmental design, at the interior design scale. It looks at the links between environmental and formal design, and the effect of that developing connection on the future of design theory and practice. Infrastructure Finance & Design (E)*: Infrastructure is widely acknowledged to be critical for economic success, and infrastructure investments in telecommunications, transportation, water, and electricity generation are promoted as leading to economic growth, either at the local, national, or global levels.EcoFash: Sustainable Solutions (P): This course celebrates the fashion industry's eco-pioneers and introduces students to sustainable solutions. Students will learn how to determine their carbon footprint and devise a strategy to lower it. Integrative Seminar 2 (P): In Integrative Seminar 2, the skills acquired in Integrative Seminar 1 are expanded through the introduction of a wide variety of research methods–both digital and analog–and in projects that are shared with Integrative Studio 2. Integrative Studio 2 (P): n Integrative Studio 2, students fact-find individually and in groups to investigate and document a topic. Research often requires investigation through multiple means including fieldwork, experimentation, failure, and creative problem solving.Materials & Manufacturing Processes: Recitation (P): This course informs the core studio sequence by providing a foundation for understanding.This list is not exhaustive - for other relevant courses, check out the course catalog.