Overview
Students of GLST 343: Global Environmental Change gain foundational knowledge about contemporary global environmental issues, such as climate change, diminishing biodiversity, and plastics pollution. Students also acquire an analytical tool kit to examine the integrated complexity of global environmental issues and the relationships between the local, regional, and global dimensions of environmental change, how human societies make environments, and how environments influence humanity over time. Additionally, students critically reflect on how relations of power, production, and reproduction over various scales work in association with the web of life. While doing this, students also have opportunities to learn how they learn, and in so doing, tailor this course to fit their interests and passions.
Students of GLST 343 are expected to share at least some of their coursework with others and, optionally, to comment or provide constructive advice on the work of others. The work is problem-based and personalized so, for the most part, no two pieces of student work will ever provide the same answers.
Learning outcomes
On completion of ENVS 343, successful students will have the capacity to:
- Explain major biogeochemical cycles and identify some of the key ways they are impacted by specific global environmental change processes.
- Discuss the key components of complex systems theory and apply a systems lens to global environmental change issues to describe their integrated complexity.
- Identify the key relationships between the local, regional, and global dimensions of environmental change issues.
- Apply a political ecology analysis to global environmental change issues to explain how the structural dynamics within socioecological systems create effects that are unequal, not only in generating wealth and health disparities but also in exacting environmental and social burdens.
- Apply an integrated global studies, systems, and political ecology analytical frame to undertake a case study of a specific socioecological problem.
- Communicate effectively, and document and reflect on the processes used to plan, monitor, and assess their understanding and performance in the course.
Outline
ENVS 343 is divided into 10 units:
- Unit 1: The Learning Context
- Unit 2: Studying Global Socioecological Systems
- Unit 3: Atmospheric Science and Climate Change
- Unit 4: Water
- Unit 5: Biodiversity
- Unit 6: Soils, Agriculture, and Food
- Unit 7: Waste and Pollution
- Unit 8: Energy
- Unit 9: Mobility
- Unit 10: Pathways to Transition
Evaluation
This course has a flexible, student-centered assessment structure. Students are given a smorgasbord of learning activities to choose from, and formative ungraded feedback is given along the way. Students are empowered to play a role in determining the kind of assessment they receive and their final course grade. At the end of the course, students present a portfolio of work and explain how they've met the course objectives.
To receive credit for ENVS 343, students must complete a course overview quiz, three learning process journal entries and corresponding meetings with the tutor, a final project and a few other self-selected learning activities—all of which will enable students to achieve a majority of the course learning outcomes. Students must also achieve a course composite grade of at least D (50 percent).
To learn more about assignments and examinations, please refer to Athabasca University’s online Calendar.
Materials
This course either does not have a course package or the textbooks are open-source material and available to students at no cost. This course has a Course Administration and Technology Fee, but students are not charged the Course Materials Fee.
Digital course materials
Links to the following course materials will be made available in the course:
Katz-Rosene, R. & Paterson, M. (2018). Thinking Ecologically About the Global Political Economy. New York: Routledge.
Other Materials
All other materials are available online.
Special Instructional Features
This course includes a guided and somewhat scaffolded process, but students are not told precisely what, how, or when to do it, as might be the case in a typical course. The onus is on the student to seek out information and undertake learning activities that allow them to achieve the course learning outcomes. This is, however, a supported process: Advice is given regarding the overall structure of development and the process of learning; recommendations are given about appropriate resources; a rich social space is provided in which to discuss issues, ask questions, and receive answers; and feedback is provided along the way on work that is done. Where possible, students are encouraged to help and support one another. Such support can be rewarding not just as a learning activity in itself, but also as a means of showing that the course learning outcomes have been achieved.
Challenge for credit
Overview
The challenge for credit process allows you to demonstrate that you have acquired a command of the general subject matter, knowledge, intellectual and/or other skills that would normally be found in a university-level course.
Full information about challenge for credit can be found in the Undergraduate Calendar.
Evaluation
The challenge assessment for ENVS 343 involves the production of a portfolio of evidence/documentation and reflective commentary, mapped to the course learning outcomes, demonstrating competence, as well as an online oral examination based on the work submitted.
The evaluation will be based entirely on evidence presented in the portfolio and oral examination, mapped to the intended learning outcomes of the course. There is no explicit weighting given to any particular component: Grades are given based on evidence of achievement of learning outcomes.
To receive credit for the ENVS 343 challenge registration, students must achieve a grade of at least D (50 percent)on the portfolio and oral examination.
Challenge for credit course registration form