Proposed Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study in Environment and Sustainability

Summary

The FENS is proposing that the MIT faculty approve a new Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study in Environment and Sustainability. This would be open to any and all graduate students, regardless of the department or degree program in which they are registered. Certificate requirements would include (1) a two-semester transdisciplinary graduate core seminar (24 units), (2) at least three graduate subjects in one of seven or eight approved sub-specializations (at least 27 units), and (3) an environmentally- or sustainability-oriented thesis or dissertation approved both by the student's home department and a new interdepartmental faculty committee (described below).

What is a Graduate Certificate?

A graduate certificate is not a master's degree. It is a means of acknowledging that a graduate student has completed a modest additional course of study outside his or her area of specialization without adding to the time it takes to complete their graduate degree requirements. For students in a degree program (like a masters or doctoral degree program in City Planning, for example), completing a certificate that acknowledges the coursework they have completed in the environment and sustainability field would increase their appeal to potential employers. A certificate would acknowledge both the breadth of their studies at MIT and that fact that they have had at least an introduction to the emerging field of sustainability science.

A student could not come to MIT just to earn a Certificate of Advanced Study in Environment and Sustainability. The certificate could only be earned in conjunction with a masters or doctoral degree for which a student has been admitted to the Institute. (Thus, it could not require more than two or three additional subjects beyond those that can count toward a masters or a doctoral degree in an MIT department.) The Sloan School of Management recently added a certificate as part of its Sustainability Initiative. The School of Architecture and Planning offers a Certificate in Environmental Policy and Planning for students enrolled in the Master of City Planning or the Doctoral Program in Urban Studies and Planning. These programs attest to growing student interest in an acknowledgment of the skills they have learned beyond what is required as part of their degrees. Since the goal of a certificate is to broaden a student's graduate education, it would probably make sense to offer a single campus-wide Certificate of Graduate Study in Environment and Sustainability that makes it easy for any graduate student in any part of the Institute to study outside his or her home department in conjunction with students from all five schools and WHOI. The certificate program we are proposing would guarantee that pre-organized sequence of subjects are offered regularly and that students are able to find faculty advisors outside their degree program should they seek such assistance.

Year-Long Core Seminar

We propose that a new year-long transdisciplinary seminar be designed (and taught by several faculty members) that all students in the Certificate program will be required to complete. The fall semester of the seminar would deal with "sustainable systems" and focus on the dynamics of and interactions among ecological, engineering, organizational and sociological systems. The spring seminar would examine the ways in which such systems can and should be guided to ensure more sustainable outcomes and examine the ethical, political, economic and psychological issues raised by such intervention, whether by government, corporations, or non-governmental actors. There are no existing multidisciplinary subjects that could be readily redesigned to cover these materials. Thus, it will take several faculty members working together, or, possibly, the hiring of a new faculty member to ensure that this year-long core seminar is available.

Fall: Graduate Seminar I: Sustainable Systems (NEW)

The fall seminar would deal with "sustainable systems" and focus on ecological, engineering and sociological systems.

Spring: Graduate Seminar II: Guiding Sustainable Development (NEW)

The spring seminar would examine the ways in which socio-ecological systems can and should be guided toward more sustainable outcomes and the ethical, organizational, political, and psychological factors required to do this.

Enrollment Projections

Based on a survey recently completed by graduate students in Sustainability@MIT, we would expect about 20 graduate students to enroll in the new Certificate program within the first year. We would expect to achieve a steady state of approximately 60 (i.e., 20 students in each of three cohorts remaining with the program for an average of three years).



Crushed Cans

An Approved Thesis or Dissertation (With an Interdepartmental Faculty Committee)

Any student applying for the Graduate Certificate will be enrolled in an existing graduate degree program at MIT. Almost all students in such programs are required to complete a thesis or a dissertation. To be eligible for the Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study, all graduate students will be required to submit a departmentally-approved thesis or dissertation proposal to the Environment and Sustainability Council. The Council will establish explicit criteria for deciding whether proposed theses or dissertations are adequately related to one of the approved sub-specialties to merit approval. If a student requests assistance identifying a faculty member from outside their home department to join their thesis or dissertation committee (to ensure adequate interdisciplinary advice and assistance), the Council will endeavor to find an appropriate faculty member willing to play this role.

A New Institute-Wide Environment and Sustainability Council

The proposed Institute-wide Council would be responsible for academic oversight and administrative coordination in relation to the proposed Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study. It would have the following structure:

Each of the five Deans and the Dean of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute will appoint a senior and a junior faculty member from their School to serve on the Council for renewable terms of three years. These twelve faculty members will elect a chair (one of the senior faculty members) for three years and an assistant chair (one of the junior faculty members) for three years. Whatever financial resources are administered by the Council will be administered by the "home" department of the chair of the Council. The Council will (1) take responsibility for monitoring the content and teaching of the year-long core seminar; (2) manage funds to cover teaching assistants assigned to help present the core subjects; (3) oversee the annual listing of sub-specialties and the subjects covered in each sub-specialty (and review and approve student petitions to create individualized sub-specialties); (4) review thesis and dissertation proposals, at the request of the student and the chair of the student's thesis or dissertation committee, and identify, if requested, faculty members willing to serve as additional interdisciplinary advisors (either as official committee members or as unofficial advisors); (5) advocate for the addition of new graduate subjects, new sub-specialties and the hiring of additional faculty with background and interest in environment and sustainability; (6) support and provide funding for graduate student activities organized by Sustainability@MIT and other student organizations; (7) host a campus-wide lecture series each semester to draw student attention to the Environment and Sustainability Minor; and (8) maintain a web listing of all FENS faculty, classes and campus activities.

Advising for students in the Certificate Program would be provided by each student's program advisor in their home department and by the FENS faculty. All the relevant departments are represented in the roster of FENS members (see here).

We realize that inter-School academic oversight and administrative coordination of interdisciplinary graduate certificate programs is still in an experimental stage at MIT. Locating the Certificate Program within a single academic department or even a single School would directly contradict the inclusive multidisciplinary nature of the learning experience they were trying to create.

The campus-wide faculty that has come together to create the Faculty Environmental Network for Sustainability, with support from the Provost, ought to take primary responsibility for on-going administration of the new Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study. Thus, we have proposed a leadership structure that provides for oversight by the Deans of all the schools while involving the relevant teaching faculty in a substantial way. If this needs to be done as an experiment (say, for five years), that might be a way for the Institute to learn more about the best ways of managing campus-wide interdisciplinary programs.



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Graduate Sub-Specializations

We hope to gain approval for between 8 and 10 sub-specialties hosted by various departments or schools (or clusters of departments). Host departments would be responsible for ensuring that at least three subjects in each sub-specialty are offered each year. These lists include only graduate subjects that are currently offered at MIT.

  • Design and Management of Sustainable Systems
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete at least three of the following: 15.389 (Global Entrepreneurship Lab: Emerging Markets), 15.915 (Lab for Sustainable Business), and 15.871/872 (Introduction to Systems Dynamics).
  • Environmental Science and Engineering Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete three of the following: 1.61 (Transport Processes in the Environment), 1.72 (Groundwater Hydrology), 1.725J (Chemicals in the Environment: Fate and Transport), 1.76 (Aquatic Chemistry), 1.77 (Water Quality Control), 1.831 (Environmental Organic Chemistry), 1.89 (Environmental Microbiology).
  • Water Policy and Landscape Design
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete three of the following: 11.314J (Water, Landscape and Urban Design); 11.308J (Urban Design and Nature); 11.334J/1.426J (Advanced Seminar in Landscape and Urbanism); 11.479J/1.85J (Water and Sanitation in Developing Countries); and 4.624J (Water Reading Group).
  • Environment, History, and Culture
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete at least three of the following: 4.663 (History of Urban Form), STS.320 Environmental Conflict and Social Change), 21H.968 (Nature, Environment, and Empire), STS.462 (Social and Political Implications of Technology), 11.308J Advanced Seminar: Urban Nature and City Design).
  • Transportation and the Environment
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete at least three of the following: 1.252J (Urban Transportation Planning); 1.253J (Transportation and Environmental Limits); 16.71 (The Airline Industry), 16.72 (Air Traffic Control), and 16.886 Air Transportation System Architecting).
  • Urban Sustainability
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete three of the following: 11.366J (Planning, Participation, and Consensus Building in Sustainable Development), 11.368 (Environmental Justice), 11.369J (Energy Policy for a Sustainable Future), 11.477 (Infrastructure in Crisis: Energy and Security Challenges), 11.533 (Ecological Planning with GIS).
  • Marine Environments
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete three of the following: 1.76 (Aquatic Chemistry), 7.47 (Biological Oceanography), 7.430 (Topics in Quantitative Marine Science) 1.83 (Environmental Organic Chemistry), 12.752 (Seminar in Oceanography), 12.747 (Modeling, Data Analysis, and Numerical Techniques for Geochemistry).
  • Law, Economics, and Political Process
    Students in the Certificate Program would be required to complete three of the following: 1.811/ESD.133J/11.630J (Environmental Law, Policy, and Economics: Pollution Prevention and Control), 1.812J/ESD.134J/11.631J (Regulation of Chemicals, Radiation, and Biotechnology), 1.813J/ESD.137J/15.657J (Sustainability, Trade, and Environment) 14.420 (Environmental Policy and Economics), 14.475 (Environmental Economics and Government Responses to Market Failure), 17.182/ESD.103J (Sustainability: Political Economy, Science, and Policy), 17.310J/STS.482J (Science, Technology, and Public Policy).

A list of all these subjects can be downloaded in PDF form here.