Sustainability, Society, and Well-being

Catalog description

We live in a world increasingly connected via global trade, political alliances and frameworks, transportation, vast and rapid digital, telecommunication, and traditional social and communication networks. Human health and well-being and ecological integrity face the challenging demands of exponential human growth that tax our our planet's finite environmental resources. These challenges, framed as "the great acceleration of the Anthropocene" that pushes on planetary boundaries, demands sustainability become more of an imperative each day. But what exactly is sustainability? How does it relate to a career in Recreation, Park and Tourism Management (RPTM) or to your studies in other departments at Penn State? How does sustainability play into this career in the United States, on different continents and in different cultures? This course is designed to provide students with strong foundational knowledge about sustainability and how it relates to their career in RPTM. To develop students' understanding of the concept of sustainability, the course explores how interconnected social, economic, and environmental systems have resulted in the contemporary sustainability challenges we face at multiple scales and in multiple contexts, from the local to the national to the global. Each week students are presented with the large-scale, global status of a particular issue related to sustainability before then exploring these challenges in increasingly local contexts, including African and Asian nation, the U.S. and Pennsylvania, and a career path in RPTM. In contemplating the broad scope of sustainability, students will become better informed about the many ways that their career in RPTM is influenced by this multiscalar context of challenges to social, environmental, and economic sustainability and partnerships among organizations that face sustainability challenges. In exploring how RPTM activities exert an influence on sustainability goals articulated through the targets and indicators of the United Nations Agenda 2030: The Sustainable Development Goals and other frameworks, students will be better equipped to address sustainability challenges within the organizations in which they work and the communities where they work, live, and play.