Educational Outreach
Program participants engage in educational efforts through many methods including the normal academic course development and classroom teaching, as well as public presentations, and interactions with the press and policymakers. Examples of these types of activities are made available on the Internet to help inform the broader community interested in climate issues.
MIT Open Course Ware
Global Climate Change: Economics, Science, and Policy is an interdisciplinary course taught at MIT by the Program co-directors. It is intended for graduate and advanced undergraduate students from a broad range of backgrounds and draws extensively on Joint Program research. Course materials are publicly available through MIT OpenCourseWare.
The subject introduces scientific, economic, and ecological issues underlying the threat of global climate change, and the institutions engaged in negotiating an international response. It develops an integrated approach to analysis of climate change processes, and assessment of proposed policy measures. Students use computer models and participate in group as well as independent projects. This course has been offered in Spring semester for more than a decade and is jointly listed in the Sloan School of Management, the Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, and the Engineering Systems Division (Technology and Policy Program). The class draws students from a number of MIT departments as well as from Harvard and Tufts Universities.
Video Presentations
Selected lectures by our faculty or invited speakers at special events are available.
Global and Regional Climate Change: Underlying Science and Emerging Riddles
May 2, 2008 - Veerabhadran Ramanathan
How Would Climate Change Influence Society in the 21st Century? (Panel discussion)
January 29, 2008 - Rajendra Pachauri, John Reilly, Howard Herzog and others
Symposium on Earth System Revolutions: Key Turning Points in the History of Our Planet
October 9, 2007 - Paul Falkowski, Dianne Newman, Daniel Pauly, Ronald Prinn, Daniel Nocera, Roger Angel, Margaret Leinen, Brad Allenby
Uncertainties in Climate Forecasts: Causes, Magnitudes and Policy Implications
April 25, 2007 - Stephen Schneider
Climate Change and The Challenge of Meeting Global Energy Demands Sustainability
Oct 18, 2006 - Kerry Emanuel, Ernest Moniz
Climate and Energy: Uncertainties in Forecasts and the Problems of Scale
June 15, 2006 - Ronald Prinn
Changes in the Land: Environmental Stresses and the Terrestrial Biosphere's Capacity to Store Carbon
May 18, 2006 - Jerry Melillo
Energy for a Rapidly Evolving World
May 3, 2006 - Henry Jacoby, Ronald Prinn, John Heywood, Karen Polenske and others
What Does Current Scientific Research Have to Say About the Present and Future Risks Associated with Hurricanes
Oct 31, 2005 - Kerry Emanuel
From Complex Science to Contentious Policy: Lessons from Global Warming
Jun 8, 2002 - Ronald Prinn
MIT Independent Activities Period
The Joint Program also promotes educational outreach among the MIT community by sponsoring climate change lectures and activities during MIT's Independent Activities Period (IAP) in January. These sessions are usually organized and presented by graduate students affiliated with the Joint Program.
Program-sponsored sessions during 2008 IAP included lectures on climate change science, a seminar on domestic climate policy, a mock climate policy negotiation, and a series of sessions in which participants designed and built an educational boardgame about climate change. In a prior year the students led an innovative walking tour of Boston that utilized landmarks as touch-stones to highlight potential risks of climate change. The "Climate Change: Boston Underwater" tour spanned issues from local to global: the "Tragedy of the Commons" was explained at a stop on Boston Common; the potential impact of climate change on the insurance industry was the theme in the Financial District; regional greenhouse gas regulation initiatives were reviewed on the steps of the State House on Beacon Hill; and ecosystems impacts and intergenerational issues were the focus of discussion in front of the Make Way For Ducklings statue.