Environmental and Sustainable Development Workshops and Studios
Students examine data, investigate existing programs and develop workable solutions that can then be put to use by clients. They learn to think creatively, interact with the world around them and turn theoretical concepts into practical solutions.
SIPA MPA Workshop
A critical part of the MPA experience is an integrative capstone experience. This hands-on course draws on every part of the MPA curriculum, and assures that students are ready for the career path they've chosen. In the MPA Workshop, a small group of students and a faculty advisor serve as management consultants to a real-world government or non-profit client. After analyzing relevant issues, students make policy recommendations and identify avenues for further research for clients.
SIPA's MPA in Environmental Science and Policy Workshop in Applied Earth Systems Management
The Workshop in Applied Earth Systems Management and Workshop in Applied Earth Systems Policy Analysis teach students to solve environmental policy problems. Students enroll in the workshop while completing the program's Core Curriculum, and they are expected to integrate and apply the knowledge they have acquired of natural science, social science, policy studies, and management to policy problem-solving. In the summer and fall semester workshops, students explore a piece of proposed, but not yet enacted, state, federal, or local environmental law (or a treaty or U.N. resolution), and develop a plan to implement and manage the new program.
In the summer, the workshop focuses on the science aspects of the management problem, while in the fall students work to complete the operational plan for implementing the program. In the spring semester, new groups are formed and students work on projects for real world governmental or nonprofit clients. The students complete the workshop with a report analyzing an actual environmental policy or managerial problem faced by their client.
Read more about Spring 2009 workshop projects
View past and current workshop video presentations and reports
SIPA Economic and Political Development Concentration Workshop in Development Practice
In the Workshop in Development Practice, students participate in ongoing cutting-edge development efforts. Working in teams with a faculty advisor, students assist a variety of clients on a wide array of assignments that explore the intersection of development concerns with sustainability, public health, human rights, corporate social responsibility, humanitarian affairs, media and new technology. For example, recent workshop projects with a sustainability focus include an evaluation of a community-based disaster risk reduction project in Indonesia; a feasibility study for a sustainable tourism project in the Western Balkans; development of a business plan for a bamboo bike venture in Kenya; and a study of the social and environmental impacts of mining operations in Brazil. Workshop clients have included UNDP, UNFPA, UNICEF and the World Bank; national and local governments; NGOs such as Catholic Relief Services, International Rescue Committee, Oxfam, WaterAid and Women’s Refugee Commission; research institutes; and development advisors such as DAI and Technoserve.
Click here for more information on the Economic and Political Development Concentration Workshop in Development Practice
SIPA Environmental Policy Concentration (EPS)
The SIPA Environmental Policy Workshop consists of a group of eight to ten graduate students under faculty direction who work closely with a client (e.g., governmental agency, public interest group, international organization, corporation, or research institution) on a significant issue in environmental policy. The workshop enables students to gain valuable experience by applying theories and skills acquired in the classroom to an existing problem while at the same time providing policymakers assistance in exploring fully a complex issue.
This year’s workshop course, Post-Crisis Environmental Analysis, was taught by Professor Marc Levy and assisted by CIESIN program coordinator Alex Fischer.
The main objective of the project is to develop a framework for prioritization, costing, and sequencing environmental needs in a post-crisis setting. The group was asked to conduct a review of analytical tool kits recently developed by the United Nation Environment Programme’s Post-Conflict and Disaster Management Branch. These tools are designed to identify how natural resources, land, infrastructure, and environmental services are critical variables in the main recovery phases: the initial response, transitioning out of crisis, and long-term development and sustainability. The primary case study will focus on Haiti with field visits to a small area in the south coast.
SIPA International Energy Management and Policy Concentration
In the capstone experience of this SIPA concentration, students apply the thorough understanding of energy industry fundamentals that they have gained. The Workshop in International Energy Management and Policy provides second-year IEMP students with the opportunity to apply what they have learned from their coursework, internships and prior work experience to real-world consulting engagements. Students work in teams with a faculty supervisor to assist clients on energy-focused assignments.
Click here for a current list of the IEMP workshop clients.
Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP) and the Fu Foundation School of Engineering
The Urban Ecology Studio is a research and training venture on the design of sustainable cities. It was initiated in 2004 under the auspices of
Undergraduate Sustainable Development Workshop for the Special Concentration in Sustainable Development
The Sustainable Development Workshop is the first to be offered for undergraduate students who have declared the Special Concentration in Sustainable Development. This capstone science and policy research workshop requires students to undertake an analytic project for the real-world client, The Nature Conservancy on Long Island (TNC). The Columbia Center for Climate Systems Research has been working with the Conservancy on developing a decision-support tool to help local land use and natural resource managers integrate sea level rise and coastal hazard projections into their planning and protection activities. The project is known as the Coastal Resilience project.
The students enrolled in the workshop will engage in helping advance this project in a number of ways. The students are evaluating the current status and trends of marshes by using the Conservancy’s recent IR aerial imagery of marshes along the south shore. The Conservancy will use these findings to show which resources are at risk and the threat posed by sea level rise. With TNC as their client, students will assist in the development of a spatial database and interactive map server that provides decision support for jointly meeting biodiversity and coastal hazard mitigation objectives; a case study of these management tools. Students will gain experience in generating predications of sea-level rise and hazards, developing visualization tools for decision makers, promoting incentives for landowners to pursue conservation options that accommodate sea-level rise. They will also need to address sea-level rise and storm hazards in land-use planning, learn how to limit post-disaster reconstruction in vulnerable areas, and prioritize key areas for conservation.
The goal of the Urban Design Lab (UDL) is to advance sustainable development in New York and other cities by proposing and implementing multidisciplinary, design-based solutions to urban problems.
The UDL brings together academics and professionals from disciplines involved in shaping and supporting the built environment – urban planning and design, architecture, landscape architecture, historic preservation, engineering, and real estate – with those from other fields such as public health, environmental science, climatology, ecology, education, business, economics, social science, humanities, and law. It bridges academic and practical approaches and functions as a catalyst for action, assembling different stakeholders to work together to design and implement practical strategies.
With expert practitioners and access to cutting-edge academic research in each of these sectors, the UDL is uniquely positioned to provide solutions targeting New York communities’ most vexing development challenges and to preserve the city’s status as a global economic leader. The UDL’s model is applied to cities around the world that are faced with similar development pressures.
Environmental Law Clinic
The Environmental Law Clinic involves students with local, regional, and national environmental and community organizations. Students work with clients on issues including clean water, wetlands preservation, endangered species, environmental justice, "smart growth," and clean air. This clinic builds on students' litigation skills such as drafting pleadings, arguing motions, and negotiating settlements, and exposes them to mechanisms such as citizen suits, that are prevalent in both civil rights and environmental cases. Emphasizing client interaction, the clinic teaches students to counsel community groups to grapple with and settle their cases in ways that best achieve their goals. The clinic also addresses the interplay of economic development and environmental protection and the impact of contamination and regulation on communities of color and other economically disadvantaged groups.
Click here for more information on the Environmental Law Clinic
Darby Jack, an Earth Institute Fellow shares his experience.