Programs and Courses

Smerdon has served as co-director (with Ruth DeFries and previously with Kevin Griffin) of the Undergraduate Program in Sustainable Development since 2011.  The program comprises more than 150 majors and special concentrators through Columba College and the School of General Studies and celebrated its 10-yr anniversary during the 2017-18 academic year.  Please contact our program manager Cari Shimkus with general inquires about the program and follow our current activities at our website or on Twitter and Facebook.

Smerdon has taught the courses listed below through affiliations with the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, the Environmental Science and Policy program in SIPA, and the Undergraduate Program in Sustainable Development.

Introduction to Sustainable Development is a required course for all concentrators and majors in the Undergraduate Program in Sustainable Development.  Weekly discussions explore the breadth of subject matter and the multidisciplinary nature of sustainability scholarship.  A course blog is used to discuss reading and ideas in preparation of each class session.  I have taught this course in one or both semesters since the fall of 2011.

One of the three core courses in the undergraduate curriculum in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences is Earth’s Environmental Systems: Climate.  I have worked on this course in various capacities, including instructor (2010), lab developer and guest lecturer.

Since the summer of 2008, I have taught Climatology to students in the Environmental Science and Policy Masters Program in the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University.  The course seeks to explain the complexities of the climate system and contemporary climate change to many future policy makers in the United States and abroad.

Columbia Affiliations
Columbia Climate School
Lamont-Doherty Earth Obervatory
Ocean and Climate Physics
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences