Climate & Environmental Leadership in Action (SNF Paideia Program)

Catalog description

This course aims to engage undergraduate students at Wharton with fundamental questions at the intersection of climate change, environmental management, ethics, and leadership. Important questions we will address include: (1) What can we learn about leadership from being in “the environment” or “the field” that we cannot as easily learn in other settings? (2) What does it mean to be a leader in the area of climate change and environmental management at a for-profit business firm? A non-profit organization? A social enterprise/benefit corporation? Within this overarching theme of environmental and climate leadership, the course examines a concrete set of timely topics through readings, discussions, guest speakers, and written assignments, including: environmental management and a circular economy; product stewardship; extended producer responsibility; environmental personhood; greenwashing; and the different types of firms and organizations in this space, including for-profit corporations, benefit corporations/social enterprises; and non-profits. The course includes five traditional 90-minute classroom sessions on these issues with assignments and readings run and graded by Professor Light. The culminating event of the course is a weeklong Leadership Ventures – an expedition that combines both "being in the environment" and visiting an organization that is engaged in climate and environmental leadership. The Venture will be a backcountry experience involving camping and some combination of hiking, cycling and paddling, along with discussions about the subject-matter of the course – climate, environmental personhood, circular economy, just transitions have all been past topics – and reflections about leadership and teamwork. The crowning academic experience on the Venture is when pairs of students lead their teammates in discussions in the woods on topics on which they…