As an international direct student at USC, you’ll receive:

• Exclusive and rigorous academic coursework
• Priority access to in-demand courses that fit your interests
• Guidance from academic advisors and mentors
• Career development and networking opportunities
• Intensive classes with domestic students

Understanding and caring for our planet requires an appreciation of the sweeping arc from the solid earth, to freshwater and marine systems, to the relationship of humans to those environments. Our mission at the School of the Earth, Ocean and Environment is to achieve an understanding of Earth’s diverse environments and human relationships through research, and to convey that understanding through education, and outreach to the broader community.

The BA in Environmental Studies degree incorporates critical social, economic, policy, communications, and/or humanities components that are not within the BS degree. The curriculum prepares students to address complex environmental problems requiring knowledge and understanding from multiple social and science disciplines that are framed in an environmental context. Students learn to make sound analyses and judgments about interdisciplinary environmental challenges, and to seek and develop sustainable solutions that productively integrate social and economic needs with scientific and technical understanding.

Environmental Studies majors may combine coursework in Sustainability, Anthropology, Political Science, Geography, History, Economics, Business, Media Arts, and Journalism to create an individually-tailored curriculum relative to their career goals.

Impending environmental challenges include climate change, increasing drought and other extreme weather events and their impacts on infrastructure and food, energy and water supply, loss of biodiversity, increases in infectious disease, and invasive species. Environmental scientists may find themselves conducting field research to quantify such issues, while Environmental Studies majors may use their skills to incorporate that data into policy, advocacy, and sustainable business practices.