Bachelor of Science in Environment and Sustainability

The BS in Environment & Sustainability, jointly offered by the College of Arts & Sciences and the Earth Commons Institute, equips students for a lifetime of environmental changemaking through hands-on learning, interdisciplinary perspectives, immersive experiences, personal development, and a diverse and hopeful community invested in wider transformation.

With their first two years spent on the Hilltop and latter two at the Capitol Campus, students pursuing the BS in Environment & Sustainability (BS-ES) will have unparalleled access to the many layers of Washington, DC, where local and global environmental change is made.

Students who intend to enroll in this degree are advised to complete their University and College Core requirements in their first two years. First-year students should begin the foundational coursework in the Fall.

BS-ES Major Requirements

The BS-ES degree features a series of required foundational courses that introduce students to a range of environment and sustainability issues and the analytical frameworks and methodological tools used to design and evaluate strategies to tackle these challenges. BS-ES majors are required to complete 27 credits on the Hilltop campus in their first two years, including:

  • 8 credits in Environmental and Sustainability Science (with labs)
  • 4 credits in Interruptions and Integrations
  • 3 credits in Environmental Ethics
  • 3 credits in Environmental Justice
  • 3 credits in Theories of Change
  • 3 credits in Experiential Rotations
  • 3 credits in Integration: Formation

In the third and fourth years of the BS-ES degree (which will take place at the Capitol Campus), students will develop a custom pathway to organize their upper-division coursework. Students will take a skills and/or methods course to provide them with exposure to different methodological approaches in the environment and sustainability fields. They will also take a course in professional development, which will include an internship (internal or external to Georgetown) and a corresponding seminar, plus participate in a peer leadership course. Students then complete six credits of coursework toward a Capstone project, over the fall and spring semesters of their fourth year in the program, which culminates in a symposium at the end of senior year. These upper-level courses for BS-ES majors total 28 credits (inclusive of electives and the QRDL core requirement), as follows: 

  • 3 credits in Peer Leadership
  • 4 credits in Professional Development
  • 3 credits in Quantitative Reasoning
  • 3 credits in Environmental Skills/Methods
  • 6 credits in Capstone courses
  • 9 credits of Custom Pathway and/or elective courses
  • Optional (but strongly recommended) Environmental Immersion experience

Writing in the Program

Students in this degree program will engage with a wide range of writing opportunities throughout the curriculum, from reflections and reports to advocacy and analysis artifacts. The foundational courses in science, ethics/justice, and the humanities all have significant writing components, and many of the elective courses are likewise centered on writing in a variety of formats particular to their foci and methodologies. Further, students seeking the BS-ES degree will complete a substantial capstone project in the senior year that encapsulates their learning with a premium on writing skills.

Minor in Environment & Sustainability

In addition to the BS degree, we also offer a minor that is available to students across the University. The minor in Environment & Sustainability is an 18-credit suite of courses, with 13 credits comprising the core and the balance as electives, with a range of options for fulfillment:

  • ERTH 1050/1051 Environmental & Sustainability Science I w/ Lab (4 credits)
  • Either ERTH 1060/1061 Environmental & Sustainability Science II w/ Lab (4 credits) or another approved ERTH science course (3 credits)
  • ERTH 2240 Environmental Justice (3 credits)
  • 2 credits in Interruptions and Integrations (ERTH 1008, 1009, 1018, 1019)
  • Approved Environment & Sustainability electives, to reach total of 18 credits in the minor (students who take ERTH 1060/1061 will require 5 credits; those who take an alternative science elective will require 6 credits)

More Information

For more information about the undergraduate degree, please visit the BS in Environment & Sustainability (BS-ES) website.