Environmental Studies: The Sky Is Not Falling

Education or almost 30 ye a rs , detractors and defen ders of u n der-gradu a te programs in envi ron m ental scien ce and s tudies have deb a ted the ac ademic ri gor, c u rri c u l a r s tru ctu re , and lasting outcomes of these mu l ti d i s c i p l i n a ry, i n tegra tive edu c a ti onal initi a tive s. This som etimes heated convers a ti on has been en ri ch ed over time by assessments of programs in place (e., ex p l ora ti ons of the com petencies and incom petencies these va ri ed programs con fer upon their stu dents (e.g. , Lem ons 1991, G o u gh and Robo t tom 1993, Ma n i a tes 1993, O' Rei ly et al. 1 9 9 6) , and ch a ll en ges to prevailing approaches to te ach i n g and learning (e. Ma t ti n gly 1997, Reeh er and Ca m m a rano 1997). Con s en sus on both the state and be s t de s i gn of envi ron m ental studies and scien ce programs nev-ert h eless remains elu s ive , even as the nu m ber and size of these programs grow (see Figure 1) and the disciplinary d ivers i ty of the fac u l ty staffing them incre a s e s. This convers a ti on has become more hard-ed ged with the recent publ i c a ti on of Mi ch ael Soulé and Daniel Pre s s's a ppraisal (1998) of US under gradu a te envi ron m ental stu dies progra m s. For Soulé and Pre s s , the increasing discipli-n a ry divers i ty of envi ron m ental studies fac u l ty is erod i n g the curricular co h eren ce and ac ademic integri ty of envi ron-m ental studies progra m s. Th ey pre s c ri be strong med i c i n e to arrest this all eged decl i n e. For us—a mem ber of the fac-u l ty of a US under gradu a te envi ron m …