Students Committed to the Environment Spur CEM Program

George Buckley, Coordinator Certificate in Environmental Management

What started as a single course, Managing Environmental Quality, at the Harvard Extension School more than two decades ago has now grown to include an assemblage of related courses and the recently developed Certificate in Environmental Management (CEM). The certificate was created for students like Carl Howard who sought formal recognition of their extensive course of study in environmental topics. Howard had completed all of the environmental courses but kept returning to assist on field expeditions to the coastal areas of Cape Cod and to gently prod instructors to provide "something beyond a collection of environmental courses."

In fact the entire expanded suite of environment courses grew from similar student interest. To the first course that became Environmental Management I, Environmental Management II was added to expand upon topics covered in the initial course. As students clamored for more about the oceans, Ocean Environments was added, followed by Strategies for Environmental Management, Sustainable Development, and Environmental Ethics and Land Management.

The Certificate in Environmental Management is designed for individuals and professionals in industry, government, consulting, and environmental organizations who are interested in better understanding environmental problems and their solutions. The courses associated with the CEM give students an exposure to many of the environmental problems at the local, national, and global levels, while providing them with an extensive repertoire of management protocols. The CEM is also coordinated with Timothy Weiskel's programs at the Harvard University Center for the Environment and the Harvard Green Campus Initiative.

Drawing on the historic environmental work of people such as Rachel Carson, Aldo Leopold, and Frederick Law Olmsted, courses include work done by Extension School instructors, guest lecturers, and others who bring the latest in fieldwork and management techniques to students. This has included the pioneering three-dimensional underwater imaging work of Edward Jamison, the island management work of Jack Chalk on Bonaire in the Netherlands Antilles, the global warming and climate change work of Michael McElroy, and the new efforts of the Philippe Cousteau Foundation and its "Sustainable Seas" campaign.

Professor John Spengler, CEM co-founder, has noted that "the environmental challenges of our times are daunting as humankind has now influenced the biogeochemical cycles fundamental to the health of ecosystems and the atmosphere. Our courses are about information that will change attitudes and motivate students to action. It is personally rewarding to see the environmental commitments our students are making in their professions and their lives."

A student in Ocean Environments

To understand what makes environmentalists seek a deeper understanding and protection of nature one need only look to Henry Beston's Outermost House. Some 75 years ago, Beston spent a year observing nature on Cape Cod's "Great Beach," Nauset. After four seasons he wrote of the animals that he had studied: "We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err and err greatly. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we will never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings, they are other nations caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the Earth." His words have even more meaning today as natural environments and the organisms that live there are gravely threatened.

Instructors in the environmental studies courses are active field researchers and consultants. They teach in the Extension School to "spread the word" about environmental concerns and topics. The CEM Program is a natural extension of the efforts of the past years and the positive responses of students and their many individual success stories: Rachel Piscatore and Tracy Schaal work at the Harvard School of Public Health, Bob Burns is the environmental compliance officer for his company, Max Chang is with an environmental consulting company, Chris DiPerna is at the Mass Water Resources Authority, and Zachary Zevitas runs ScienceNetwork.com. While many students have gone into the environmental field, these students are unique because they also have been teaching assistants in Extension School environmental studies courses.

Environmental courses have also proved popular with high school students and teachers participating in the Lowell Scholarship Program. Some past high school participants include Mike Zappala who is an environmental consultant and Sandra Volz who is studying marine biology at Northeastern University. Teachers such as David Gorman, Margaret Murphy, and Melissa Rosenwald have created unique environmental education modules for their classrooms as part of their coursework.

With the able assistance of Zachary and Peter Zevitas of ScienceNetwork and Leonard Evenchik's distance education group, several environmental studies courses are now offered both on campus and online.