Meteorology and Atmospheric Science

Catalog description

From hurricanes and heat waves to climate change and urban heat islands, atmospheric science sits at the center of some of today's most urgent environmental challenges. This course provides the foundation for understanding these phenomena and prepares students for careers across fields including meteorology, climate science, environmental policy, urban planning, and Earth system research. Students explore the structure and composition of the atmosphere and the physical processes that shape weather and climate, investigating how solar energy drives atmospheric motion and how interactions among air, land, and water produce patterns from local storms to global circulation. We examine why some regions are arid while others receive abundant rainfall, how winds form and evolve, and why hazardous events such as hurricanes and tornadoes occur more frequently in certain parts of the world. Throughout the semester, we connect theory to real-world events by examining historic and current weather events. By the end of the semester, students will have developed strong physical intuition for how atmospheric processes operate across scales, from neighborhood urban microclimates to the entire planet, and how interactions between the atmosphere and Earth's surface drive weather, climate variability, and extreme events.