Program Goals

What are the goals of this minor?

Goal 1: Envision and create positive futures

  • 1A. Students will identify their role in the local and global community and reflect on their own values, perceptions, feelings, desires and actions as they relate to living sustainably
  • 1B. Students will critique their thinking and to compare their ways of knowing in an effort to learn and to flourish over time in a diverse, interconnected world
  • 1C. Students will imagine, create, and express their own positive visions for the future and for socio-environmental change (i.e. visions that promote improved quality of life and wellbeing for all; meeting the needs of present and future generations; justice and equity; and living within ecosystem limits)
  • 1D. Students will anticipate and construct plausible futures, and implement actions in the service of their individual and collective visions.

Goal 2: Cultivate a sustainability perspective

  • 2A. Students will develop a perspective that recognizes and integrates multiple dimensions of sustainability (e.g. social, economic, environmental, historical, cultural, aesthetic, etc.)
  • 2B. Students will identify the ethical implications of their actions and assess the potential of ethical systems to guide humans to live sustainably
  • 2C. Students will explain the value of multiple, diverse perspectives in creating shared visions and actions that contribute to a sustainable future locally and globally.
  • 2D. Students will question norms, practices and opinions and formulate a position in the sustainability discourse.

Goal 3: Understand and employ systems thinking to solve problems

  • 3A. Students will apply the tools and concepts of system dynamics and systems thinking to their present lives, and to choices that will affect our future.
  • 3B. Students will plan and organize efforts to advance sustainability in their local and global communities
  • 3C. Students will apply different problem-solving frameworks to complex sustainability problems and develop viable, inclusive and equitable solution options that promote sustainable development.
  • 3D. Students will explore the link between the health of the biosphere and the health of the “ethnosphere” and will assess what to preserve and what to change in order for future generations of cultures and communities to thrive over time.

Goal 4: Understand the dynamics and limits of natural and social systems

  • 4A. Students will explain the origins and meanings of sustainability and living sustainably
  • 4B. Students will explain characteristics of sustainable and unsustainable social, economic, and political systems
  • 4C. Students will describe the interrelationships among the social, economic, environmental, historical and other facets of our bioregion and contribute to its regeneration and health.
  • 4D. Students will identify the laws and principles that govern life on Earth, and will describe their interdependence with other humans and their dependence on natural systems
  • 4E. Students will develop projects that recognize and address these limits.

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