AN INTERDISCIPLINARY SPECIALIZATION FOR GRADUATE STUDENTS WHO WANT TO PUT SCIENCE INTO ACTION: CLIMATE ADAPTATION SCIENCE (CAS)

Climate change poses many challenges for earth and environmental sciences and for society. Meeting these challenges requires transformative partnerships among diverse scientists and with decision-makers, agencies, non-profit and for-profit private businesses, and citizens. To accomplish this, we must also evolve education to better empower students for diverse careers at the interfaces of science and society. Utah State University’s Climate Adaptation Science (CAS) program, created with funding from the National Science Foundation’s Research Traineeship (NRT) program, is one model of innovative holistic graduate education to prepare students to work effectively at the science-society interface in a challenging and uncertain future. The CAS program is a 2-year interdisciplinary graduate specialization that engages diverse cohorts of students, from 10 departments and 5 colleges, in collaborative interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research that aims to inform adaptive actions in the face of climate change. The program centers around a student-originated team science project and also includes a mentored internship outside of academia and regular meetings with people who work at the intersections of science, policy, and management. The program integrates training and experience in communication (using a variety of formats, media, and venues and with a variety of scientist and non-scientist audiences), in data management and reproducible science, in risk assessment and decision-making, and in leadership, followership, and teamwork. We highlight case studies of students’ experiences and accomplishments in the CAS program and their career paths after the program.