The Environmental Justice Graduate Certificate program will equip students with the tools to recognize and address environmental injustices by focusing on real-world practices and solutions. The certificate program offers a holistic and critical examination of environmental justice, employing multiple frameworks from social sciences, humanities, ecological sciences, natural resources, public health, engineering and more. Students will study the distribution of environmental benefits and harms, the epidemiological consequences of pollution, the impacts on cultures and voices, the role of inclusive and democratic participation, and the restoration of social and ecological damages. The courses included in the certificate program engage with a broad range of theoretical perspectives and offer practical examples of real-world environmental injustices.
Students interested in graduate work should refer to the Graduate and Professional Bulletin.
Learning Objectives
Upon successful completion of the certificate, students will be able to:
- Identify and recognize environmental justice and injustice.
- Employ a wide range of methods to study and address environmental injustice.
- Advance real-world solutions to environmental injustice.
- Communicate a holistic understanding of environmental justice that cuts across disciplines, epistemologies, and trainings.
Effective Spring 2025
Additional coursework may be required due to prerequisites. Students must earn a cumulative GPA of 3.000 or better, and a minimum grade of “C” in all courses.
| Code | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| Required Core Course: | ||
| GES 535/LB 535 | Foundations of Environmental Justice | 3 |
| Group A: Select 3 credits from the following: | 3 | |
| Indigenous Law, Policy, and Peoples | ||
| Decolonial Feminist Political Ecology | ||
| Sociology of Food Systems and Agriculture | ||
| Environmental Justice | ||
| Group B: Select a minimum of 5 credits from the following list. One course must be taken outside the student’s home College/Special Academic Unit; the other course(s) may be taken within the student’s home College/Special Academic Unit and Department. 2 | 5 | |
| College of Agricultural Sciences: | ||
| Sustainable Agriculture | ||
| Applied Welfare and Policy Analysis | ||
| Environmental and Natural Resource Economics | ||
| Advanced Natural Resource Economics | ||
| Advanced Environmental Economics | ||
| College of Business: | ||
| Sustainable Venturing and New Energy Economy 1 | ||
| Sustainability Ethics and Business Practice 1 | ||
| College of Health and Human Sciences: | ||
| Sustainable Building & Infrastructure Systems | ||
| College of Liberal Arts: | ||
| Human-Environment Interactions | ||
| Place, Space and Adaptation | ||
| Environmental Literature and Criticism | ||
| Environmental and Natural Resource Economics | ||
| Advanced Natural Resource Economics | ||
| Advanced Environmental Economics | ||
| Seminar: Development 1 | ||
| Critical Disability Studies | ||
| Reading Seminar--World Environmental History | ||
| Seminar in Environmental Philosophy | ||
| Politics of Environment and Sustainability | ||
| Power, Justice, and Democracy | ||
| Seminar in Environmental Policy | ||
| Environmental Politics in the U.S. | ||
| Political Theory and the Environment | ||
| International Environmental Politics | ||
| Comparative Environmental Politics | ||
| Environmental Policy and Administration | ||
| Environmental Sociology | ||
| College of Natural Sciences: | ||
| Chemistry of Sustainability | ||
| College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences: | ||
| Environmental and Occupational Health Issues | ||
| Health Impact Assessment | ||
| Public Health: | ||
| Environmental Public Health and Policy | ||
| Seminar: Animals, People, and the Environment 1 | ||
| School of Global Environmental Sustainability: | ||
| Issues in Global Environmental Sustainability | ||
| Assessing the Food, Energy, Water Nexus | ||
| Walter Scott, Jr. College of Engineering: | ||
| Climate Intervention to Cool a Warming Planet 1 | ||
| Assessing the Food, Energy, Water Nexus | ||
| Life Cycle and Techno-Economic Assessment | ||
| Warner College of Natural Resources: | ||
| Principles of Ecosystem Sustainability | ||
| International Climate Negotiations 1 | ||
| Virtual International Climate Negotiations 1 | ||
| Climate Justice and Policy | ||
| Study Abroad--Europe and British Isles: UN Climate Change Conference (COP) 1 | ||
| Study Abroad--Americas: UN Climate Change Conference (COP) 1 | ||
| Study Abroad--Asia/Oceania: UN Climate Change Conference (COP) 1 | ||
| Study Abroad--Africa: UN Climate Change Conference (COP) 1 | ||
| Community-Based Natural Resource Management | ||
| Program Total Credits: | 11 | |
- 1
2-credit courses, 1-credit courses, and variable-credit courses must be combined with other courses in such a way that the courses taken in Group B reaches a total of at least 5 credits.
- 2
If a course is cross-listed with a course in one's home college/special academic unit, that course cannot be counted as an outside course.
*This certificate may have courses in common with other graduate certificates. A student may earn more than one certificate, but a given course may be counted only in one certificate.