Development of a New Undergraduate Course on Global Change

Efforts to develop an undergraduate climate change course at the University of Texas at San Antonio benefited from a five-day workshop organized by the American Meteorological Society (AMS) in Washington, DC. The workshop introduced the main topics that will constitute a basic course in climate science and global climate change. Several experts discussed the most plausible approaches of course development and implementation. The proposed course will be aligned with the AMS Climate Studies course. The proposed course will be offered to Engineering, Education, and Science students in the two institutions. Most of the material included in Climate Studies will be part of the course. The course will cover topics such as the Earth climate system, greenhouse gases, hydrological, ecological, economic, regional, and health impacts of global change, in addition to adaptation, mitigation, and policy issues. Resources from AMS, NASA, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Environmental Protection Agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, and several other organizations are heavily used in class instruction and student projects. The content of the proposed course will cover topics relevant to all sub-disciplines of Engineering, Environmental Science, Education, and other targeted sciences.