• Environmental-Studies-Hero-Green-Roofs-Orosco-Room-Male-Students-Presentation

    Environmental Studies

  • Take the Next Step

  • Related Links

  • Contact Us

    Office of Admission
    Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts
    79 Fifth Avenue, 5th floor 
    New York, NY 10003 
    Phone: 212.229.5150 or 
    800.292.3040
    Fax: 212.229.5355
    lang@newschool.edu

    Program Contacts
    Student Success Advisor for Global, Environmental, and Urban Studies
    Chris McElderry 
    64 West 11th Street, room 120 
    clmcelderry@newschool.edu 
    646.909.2260

    Chair and Departmental Faculty Advisor for Environmental Studies
    Joseph Heathcott
    joseph@newschool.edu

  • Virtual Tour

  • The New School's Environmental Studies program takes an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the defining ecological issues of our time and creating opportunities to tackle them in practical, direct ways. Our students are innovators and creative problem solvers who are passionate about facing the environmental challenges of this century, curious about the interaction between humans and their environments, and inspired to bring about social and ecological justice.

    • Study Options Major, Minor

    The Environmental Studies program is rooted in the understanding that complex environmental problems cannot be grasped through a single discipline. As a student in the program, you investigate the relationship between humans and their environment through social, ecological, and political dimensions. We emphasize three main areas:

    • A firm grounding in the natural sciences, particularly urban ecology and resilience
    • A sustained engagement with environmental policy and politics, particularly around aspects of inequality, race, and justice
    • Studio-based work on design and sustainability

    Environmental Studies students take classes at Lang, as well as at Parsons School of Design and the Schools of Public Engagement. In an interdisciplinary curriculum that blends liberal arts with science, policy, and design, you take seminar and studio-based courses and engage in fieldwork and internships to gain practical, hands-on experience that is grounded in a rigorous theoretical framework. This prepares you to identify the critical environmental issues that face contemporary cities - and to devise creative and scientifically sound responses that draw on multiple academic disciplines.

    Major requirements

    Minor requirements

    Connecting to New York City

    While it offers the atmosphere and intimacy of a small college, Eugene Lang College is part of The New School, a major progressive university in New York City. As an Environmental Studies student your learning laboratory is the city itself and its diverse, surprising forms of nature. By studying environmental justice issues in NYC, you explore sustainability and climate change as they relate to inequalities along axes of race, class, and community. Finally, senior capstone projects and optional internships with nearby businesses, government agencies, and community groups take you into the professional world of environmental policy, science, business, and design. 

    Career Paths

    The Environmental Studies program prepares you for careers in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors and for graduate study in a wide range of fields. Graduates are able to hold meaningful conversations with experts in related fields and even manage teams of experts in complex projects. Career options include sustainability consulting, public policy, working with corporations in environmental analysis, working with nonprofit environmental organizations, urban design, and urban planning.

    If you are planning to pursue graduate studies, consider applying to the Bachelor's-Master's program, which enables you to earn graduate credits that will apply to both your Lang degree and a master's degree at The New School.

    Learn more

    Note: This program is STEM-designated. After graduating, eligible F-1 students in this program can apply for an additional 24 months of Optional Practical Training at the end of their Post-Completion OPT.

  • Courses

    Explore a selection of courses available to you in this program.

    • UENV 2957

      Zero Food Waste

      Globally, around one-third of all food produced is lost or wasted along the food chain, while an estimated 740 million people around the world suffer from hunger and malnutrition. During the past decade, no culinary topic has energized more people around the world than has food waste. Corporate exec...

      Read more
    • UENV 3510

      Planning Sustainable Cities

      This reading intensive seminar introduces students to issues of urban sustainability across time, space, and scale. We examine efforts by planners, activists, policy makers, and citizens to improve the urban environment over time, as well as the role cities might play in the creation of a more sust...

      Read more

  • Environmental Studies include professors from Lang as well as the Schools of Public Engagement. Committed to developing innovative responses to environmental challenges and sustainability issues, they help prepare students for careers that make an impact on the world.

  • Take The Next Step

Submit your application

Undergraduates

To apply to any of our undergraduate programs (except the Bachelor's Program for Adults and Transfer Students and Parsons Associate of Applied Science programs) complete and submit the Common App online.

Undergraduate Adult Learners

To apply to any of our Bachelor's Program for Adults and Transfer Students and Parsons Associate of Applied Science programs, complete and submit the New School Online Application.

Graduates

To apply to any of our Master's, Doctoral, Professional Studies Diploma, and Graduate Certificate programs, complete and submit the New School Online Application.