Unit 5: Hazardous Waste and Love Canal
Jill Schneiderman, Vassar College; Meg Stewart, American Geophysical Union
Students explore the classic case of Love Canal, New York, in which Lois Gibbs—originally described as a "hysterical housewife"—mobilized her community and called attention to the contamination of ...

Unit 4: Women and Water
Jill Schneiderman, Vassar College; Meg Stewart, American Geophysical Union
Students explore water quality and freshwater access issues around the globe. The activities require students to investigate region-specific water problems in different parts of the world and analyze how those ...

Unit 1: Introduction to Environmental Justice
Jill Schneiderman, Vassar College; Meg Stewart, American Geophysical Union
Students will investigate the history of the environmental justice movement in the United States by situating it within the context of the US civil rights and environmental movements. The unit also makes ...

Unit 3: Streams and Water Diversion
Jill Schneiderman, Vassar College; Meg Stewart, American Geophysical Union; Joshua Villalobos, El Paso Community College
Unit 3 communicates the critical need for management of fresh water and ways in which citizens may take part in its conservation and restoration. Students explore the relationships between watersheds, drainage ...

Environmental Justice and Freshwater Resources
Adriana Perez, El Paso Community College; Jill Schneiderman, Vassar College; Meg Stewart, American Geophysical Union; Joshua Villalobos, El Paso Community College; David McConnell, North Carolina State University
This module enables students to identify the freshwater components of the hydrologic cycle and connect them to the basic need of all human beings for equal access to clean freshwater. This is accomplished by ...

Unit 3: Managing the Risks of Lead Exposure
Katrina Korfmacher (University of Rochester), Richard Gragg (Florida A&M), Martha Richmond (Suffolk University), and Caryl Waggett (Allegheny College)
In the past two units, students considered the strengths and limitations of scientific tools to identify exposure pathways and demographic patterns of lead poisoning. In Unit 3, students evaluate domestic ...

Blogging about Nature and Politics: A Weekly Journal Activity for Building Resilient and Active Students
David Spataro, Bellevue Community College

Afghan Poppies, Climate Change and War: Thinking Systemically About Us and Them
Karen Litfin, University of Washington-Seattle Campus
This contemplative practice inquires into the complex web of interdependencies linking global climate change, the War on Terror, Afghan poppy production, opiate addiction, and food security through the lens of systems theory. The exercise challenges students to consider these linkages not only conceptually but also somatically and emotionally.

A Game-Based Social Resilience Workshop: Thinking about Communal Response to Change
Joli Sandoz, The Evergreen State College
Social resilience is the capacity of a social entity to learn and adapt to sudden or gradual change, while continuing to fulfill the entity's purpose or function. This integrative and experiential workshop prompts students to apply previous learning about social resilience, social equity, social dilemma, and governance by experiencing several ways to approach a collective action problem in equitable resource distribution and management. The collective problem is modeled in the form of a card game that requires players to manage 12 plots of commonly-held crop and forest land under various conditions.

Contemplative Inquiry on Climate Change: Playing with Perspectives
Abigail Lynam, Fielding Graduate University
Hour long contemplative exercise to explore the psychological, emotional and spiritual dimensions of learning about climate change. Guided perspective-taking exercise in small groups of 3-4 students, with discussion and reflective writing.