Preregistration Available for EVST Spring Courses: Sign up Now!

December 5, 2018

For the first time, the Environmental Studies major is offering preregistration for four EVST courses this spring.  Preregistration gives EVST majors favorable consideration for enrollment in limited enrollment courses and allows instructors to anticipate and manage the demand for course enrollment.  Other departments and programs use preregistration and we are rolling it out now on a trial basis and hope to expand its use in the future.

  • EVST 251 Pests, Parasites, and Pathogens: Meets M 3:30-5:20 PM Instructor: Comita/Muehleisen. Offered for the first time, this course is about the hidden but immensely important role that small, opportunistic organisms play in the ecosystems all around us. While pests, parasites, and pathogens receive plenty of rightful attention regarding their direct impact on human health, the course offers an ecological perspective on the myriad underappreciated ways they influence both natural and managed ecosystems, are affected themselves by our impacts on the environment, and thus affect our lives. A sample of questions the course will explore include: Can pathogens explain why tropical forests are so diverse? How is a loss in biodiversity related to an uptick in Lyme disease? How will a changing climate affect disease transmission in wildlife and livestock? How do invasive insect herbivores impact carbon emissions from forests in the US? Preregister here.
  • EVST 290 Geographic Information Systems: Meets T 9:25-11:15 AM Instructor: C. Tomlin. A practical introduction to the nature and use of geographic information systems (GIS) in environmental science and management. Techniques for the acquisition, creation, storage, management, visualization, animation, transformation, analysis, and synthesis of cartographic data in digital form will be applied. Preregister here.
  • EVST 351 The Anthropocene: Meets: Th 9:25-11:15 AM Instructor: H. Weiss. Examines the detailed record of societal transformations of the earth from early agriculture through the Industrial Age, including the global interrelations of agriculture, deforestation, and carbon dioxide and methane production.  Explores the “Early Anthropogenic” hypothesis and its models for east Asia, west Asia, and Europe, as well as the global effects of subsequent land-use intensification and industrialization that mark the Anthropocene. Preregister here.
  • EVST 473 Abrupt Climate Change and Societal Collapse: Meets: Th 4:00-5:50 PM Instructor: H. Weiss. Explores the coincidence of societal collapses throughout history with decadal and century-scale abrupt climate change events and the challenges to anthropological and historical paradigms of cultural adaptation and resilience. Examines archaeological and historical records and high-resolution sets of paleoclimate proxies. Preregister here.

Preregistration closes on December 14th. Students will be notified if they are admitted to the class the first week in January. If you choose not to take the class, please let the instructor know.