Science & Our Place on the Planet I: Population, Health, and the Environment
CRN
Course Number
Credits
Course Description
Exploring Malthus’ premise through a lens two centuries later, students in this course will learn the primary factors influencing population growth: births, deaths, and migration, and apply this knowledge to understand global population dynamics. Topics will include the demographic transition, the youth demographic gift, population aging, rapid urbanization, and the effect of HIV/AIDS on population growth. Links between population, health, and the environment will be emphasized throughout the course, such as the effect of rapid population growth, especially urbanization, on environmental degradation, as well as the effects of environmental degradation on human survival.
Prerequisites
Fairhaven admissions.
Materials Fee
Required Texts
Laurie Mazur, A Pivotal Moment: Population, Justice and the Environmental Challenge (Washington DC: Island Press, 2010)
Credit/Evaluation
S/NX grading; narrative evaluation.
Students will be narratively evaluated on their faithful attendance, preparation for, via reading reflections, and participation in course discussions as well as one group research project, presentation, and paper (2,000 word minimum) on a group designed population, health, and/or environment research question of the group’s choice.
For the group research project your group will select a research question, collect data in regards to that question, analyze the data and write up the results. We will use Microsoft Excel to analyze the data.