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Community-engaged learning course that exposes students to sustainability concepts and urban planning as a tool for determining sustainable outcomes in the Bay Area. The focus will be on land use and transportation planning to housing and employment patterns, mobility, public health, and social equity. Topics will include government initiatives to counteract urban sprawl and promote smart growth and livability, political realities of organizing and building coalitions around sustainability goals, and increasing opportunities for low-income and communities of color to achieve sustainability outcomes. Students will participate in remote team-based projects in collaboration with Bay Area community partners. Prerequisites: Consent of the instructor. (Cardinal Course certified by the Haas Center.) Apply here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfhY1w5A_PCjmKdMcGNaZ6Hic24T2zvgF7CfcGrL2tWCWnQGg/viewform

The sustainable development goals (SDGs) encompass many important aspects of human and ecosystem well-being that are traditionally difficult to measure. This project-based course will focus on ways to use inexpensive, unconventional data streams to measure outcomes relevant to SDGs, including poverty, hunger, health, governance, and economic activity. Students will apply machine learning techniques to various projects outlined at the beginning of the quarter. The main learning goals are to gain experience conducting and communicating original research. Prior knowledge of machine learning techniques, such as from CS 221, CS 229, CS 231N, STATS 202, or STATS 216 is required. Open to both undergraduate and graduate students. Enrollment limited to 24. Students must apply for the class by filling out the form at https://goo.gl/forms/9LSZF7lPkHadix5D3. A permission code will be given to admitted students to register for the class.

An introduction to what causes the motions in the oceans. Topics include: the physical environment of the ocean; properties of sea water; atmosphere-ocean interactions; conservation of heat, salt, mass, and momentum, geostrophic flows, wind-driven circulation patterns; the Gulf Stream; equatorial dynamics and El Nino; and tides. By the end of the course, students will have physical intuition for why ocean currents look the way they do and a basic mathematical framework for quantifying the motions. Prerequisite: PHYSICS 41

The transportation network is an essential, if often invisible, part of communities. Only when traffic piles up, the subway shuts down, or the sidewalk is closed do we notice the services and infrastructure that are critical to everyday movement. Beyond the everyday effects, transportation planning decisions also have long term consequences for the environment (transportation is the leading source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States); the economy (transportation is the fourth largest household expenditure after healthcare, housing, and food); and community wellbeing (traffic collisions are the leading cause of death for young people in the United States). This course will interrogate the role of transportation in fostering sustainable communities paying particular attention to how policy and planning decisions contribute to or hinder equitable access, economic vibrancy, environmental protection. Through a combination of lectures, field work, guest speakers, and real-world client projects, this course will provide an introduction to the field of transportation policy and planning. Student will learn about and get hands-on practice with topics such as bicycle and pedestrian design, safety analysis, traffic operations and modeling software, transit planning, and emerging trends such as autonomous vehicles, micromobility, and congestion pricing. (Cardinal Course certified by the Haas Center).

What is water (in)justice? How have frontline communities come together to reveal inequities in water access and flows, advance meaningful reform, and build and sustain alliances? How do we center equity and repair in the face of drought and climate change? How do we learn to be good allies for water equity? This class will provide a nuanced examination of water injustice and justice by examining historical foundations, inequities in governance and distribution, and pathways toward restoration, repair, and water rights reform for justice. We will anchor our learning in three California-based modules where Indigenous and frontline communities have built powerful alliances for water equity and reform: 1) access to safe drinking water as a human right, 2) protecting in-stream flows and tribal beneficial uses of water in the face of large-scale water exports and diversions, and 3) dam removal for ecological and cultural restoration. Each module will include issue framing and readings from a multidisciplinary instructor team working from an allied perspective, a panel conversation with frontline community leaders for Indigenous rights and environmental justice, and student-led readings and discussions. By grounding our learning in dialogue with frontline community leaders who are reshaping the legal, political, and eco-cultural landscapes for water justice in California, we seek to question dominant frameworks of "community vulnerability," learn from the lived experience of individuals and organizations building meaningful alliances for justice, and begin to anticipate a wide array of legal, policy, organizing, and institution building strategies for reform.

Through case studies with a focus on the San Francisco Bay Area, guest speakers, selective readings and interactive assignments, this survey course seeks to demystify the concept of land use for the non-city planner. This introductory course will review the history and trends of land use policies, as well as address a number of current themes to demonstrate the power and importance of land use. Students will explore how urban areas function, how stakeholders influence land use choices, and how land use decisions contribute to positive and negative outcomes. By exploring the contemporary history of land use in the United States, students will learn how land use has been used as a tool for discriminatory practices and NIMBYism. Students will also learn about current land use planning efforts that seek to make cities more sustainable, resilient and equitable to address issues like gentrification, affordable housing, and sea level rise.

Under conditions of global environmental change and mass extinction, how will humanity share the planet with wildlife? This course invites undergraduate students to consider this question under the guidance of two biologists and a literary scholar. We will engage with a range of interdisciplinary scholarship on how humans seek to study, understand, exploit, protect, and empathize with charismatic megafauna. We ask how regional differences in culture, political economy, and ecology shape conservation efforts.

Practical, collaborative, hands-on exploration of environmental journalism as an agent of change. Students learn how to identify and execute engaging and impactful stories about environmental science, policy, and justice through critique of environmental journalism pieces and extensive workshopping of each other's work. Emphasis on a just transition to climate adaptation and mitigation through elevating marginalized voices by using the tools and practices of journalism to spur positive change. Limited class size, preference to Environmental Communication and Journalism MA students. Prerequisite: EARTHSYS 191/291, COMM 104W, or consent of instructor. Admission by application only ( https://forms.gle/C84WQRqbTFtuEfM49). Email instructor Chloe Peterson-Nafziger with any questions; chloepn.biosphere@gmail.com. Meets Earth Systems WIM requirement. (Graduate students enroll in EARTHSYS 277C/ COMM 277C for 4 units; Undergraduates enroll in 177C for 5 units.)

How should human beings interact with the natural world? Do we have moral obligations toward non-human animals and other parts of nature? And what do we owe to other human beings, including future generations, with respect to the environment? In this course, we will tackle ethical questions that confront us in our dealings with the natural world, looking at subjects such as: animal rights; conservation; economic approaches to the environment; access to and control over natural resources; environmental justice and pollution; climate change; technology and the environment; and environmental activism. We will frame our inquiry with leading ethical theories and divide our approach to these topics by ecosystem, dedicating time to each unique environment and its specific nuances: aquatic, desert/tundra, forest/grassland, and the increasingly recognized environment of Space.