Minor in Climate Change
The mission of the Climate Change: Science and Practice minor program is to prepare students with the subject matter literacy and analytical competencies necessary to support professional practices that advance climate change mitigation and adaptation in the interest of people, places, and the planet.
The Climate Change: Science and Practice minor offers students the opportunity to study climate change through a multidisciplinary foundation of applied, health, natural, and urban science. Jointly offered by the School of Architecture and Built Environment, Celia Scott Weatherhead School of Public Health & Tropical Medicine, and the School of Science & Engineering, the minor offers students the opportunity to understand how professional practices from public health to engineering and from sustainable design to environmental management converge to support climate action that reduces greenhouse gases and climate-related natural hazards risk, preserves biodiversity, advances public health, and supports adaptations to climate impacts. This minor is designed to be complementary to students’ existing majors insofar as nearly all future professional practices—regardless of vocation—will be shaped by the challenges and opportunities of climate change.
Open to any Tulane University undergraduate, this fifteen (15) credit hour minor is structured in three parts: Foundations, Explorations, and Practices. The Foundations curricular section of the minor requires that students take core courses in at least two of the three home schools that administer this minor in order to ensure the attainment of a qualifiable literacy in the science of climate change. Here, climate literacy is defined by a basic understanding of the causes, impacts, and solutions that shape our common understanding of the manifestations of anthropogenic climate change. By taking courses across schools, students gain a diverse perspective on the convergence of science and practice.
The Explorations curricular section of the minor reinforces this perspective by allowing students to select from a wide range of courses with varying specializations that open the door to a new range of the methodologies and forms of analysis that are unique to the problem-solution nexus in climate change. The goal is to allow students to explore the convergence of common issues that often defy the knowledge and capabilities of a singular academic discipline or professional practice. For instance, the growing exposure of society to flooding requires river science and engineering to support engineering resilience design, urban planners to support the public financing of infrastructure, and public health professionals to manage a population’s health risks from the diffusion of toxic contamination and vector-borne diseases.
The Practices curricular section of the minor offers students the opportunity to synthetically apply their knowledge in dialogue with students and faculty from across the respective schools in order to simulate the complexities of engaging a variety of stakeholders and conditions in advancing climate action. Students may attain credit in this section by successfully pursuing an approved independent study, undergraduate thesis, senior seminar or capstone course, climate change themed architecture or landscape architecture studio, field course, or other such courses approved by the program.
Minor Information
Suggested Plan of Study and Program Regulations (PDF, text)
Minor Declaration Form (PDF)
Newcomb-Tulane College Climate Minor Homepage (Web)
Minor Program Contact*
Climate Change: Science and Practice Program
Center on Climate Change and Urbanism
School of Architecture and the Built Environment
Tulane University
Richardson Memorial Hall
6823 St. Charles Avenue
New Orleans, LA. 70118
Office: 504-314-2399
climateminor@tulane.edu
Minor Program Director & Steering Committee**
Jesse M. Keenan, M.Sc., Ph.D., J.D., LL.M., AICP, Director, Favrot II Associate Professor of Sustainable Real Estate and Urban Planning & Director, Center on Climate Change and Urbanism
Melissa Gonzales, Ph.D., M.S., Professor and Department Chair of Environmental Health Sciences, Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine
Daniel Friess, Ph.D., Cochran Family Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Tulane School of Science and Engineering
Torbjörn E. Törnqvist, Ph.D., Vokes Professor of Geology, Tulane School of Science and Engineering
*For additional inquiries related to student advising, please contact your university academic advisor.
**For inquiries related to this minor, please email climateminor@tulane.edu.