Environmental Science

 
 


DESCRIPTION

This course is a higher-level science course. Environmental Science will challenge students to think about their beliefs, their attitudes, and their behaviors, and how these affect our individual responsibility for the environment. Students should have successfully completed Biology before taking this course.

OBJECTIVES

After completing the course, students will be able to:

  • Understand the role of humans in decreasing the diversity of plants and animals in a region.
  • Identify the global impacts of human changes in the physical environment.
  • Explain how people’s changing attitudes toward the environment have led to changes in the physical landscape.
  • Describe how changes in the physical environment have reduced the capacity for supporting human activity.
  • Understand and give examples of how global development and environmental issues are connected.
  • Describe the concept of sustainable development and predict its effects in a variety of situations.
  • Explain why policies should be designed to guide the use and management of Earth’s resources and to reflect multiple points of view.
  • Understand contemporary issues in terms of Earth’s physical and human systems.
  • Recognize the relationships between resources and the exploration and exploitation of different regions of the world.
  • Describe programs and legislation related to the use of resources on a local to global scale.
  • Analyze the impact of policy decisions regarding the use of resources in different regions of the world.
  • Identify issues related to the reuse and recycling of resources, and show how these issues apply to your local area.
 
 

Course Outline, First Semester

  1. ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE AND ECOLOGIST PRINCIPLES

    1. Understanding our environment
    2. Environmental ethics and philosophy
    3. Matter, energy, and life
    4. Biological communities and species interaction
    5. Biomes, landscapes, restoration, and management

  2. POPULATION, ECONOMICS, POLICY, AND HEALTH

    1. Population dynamics
    2. Human populations
    3. Ecological economics
    4. Environmental health and toxicology

  3. FOOD, LAND, AND BIOLOGICAL RESOURCES

    1. Environmental policy, law, and planning
    2. Food and agriculture
    3. Pest control
    4. Biodiversity

Course Outline Second Semester

  1. Land use: forests and rangelands
  2. Preserving nature

  1. PHYSICAL RESOURCES

    1. Environmental geology
    2. Air, climate, and weather
    3. Air pollution
    4. Water use and management
    5. Water pollution
    6. Conventional energy
    7. Sustainable energy

  2. SOCIETY AND THE ENVIRONMENT

    1. Solid, toxic, and hazardous waste
    2. Urbanization and sustainable cities
    3. What then shall we do?
 
 

TEXTBOOK:Environmental Science, A Global Concern, Cunningham, Cunningham, Saigo