Warren Wilson adds new climate studies program, reworks others after cutting 5 majors
Just months after announcing it was discontinuing majors in five fields of study, Warren Wilson College announced it will be introducing a new academic program while reconfiguring others.
The new program, announced in a Feb. 13 news release, is a Master of Science in applied climate studies. This comes after the college discontinued five majors in October 2023. While current Warren Wilson students are able to major in the affected fields of study — chemistry, global studies, history and political science, math and philosophy — no new incoming students will be admitted to the programs.
In November, Provost Jay Roberts told Black Mountain News the decision to discontinue these majors was part of a “strategic planning process” put forth by Warren Wilson President Damián Fernández.
Roberts told Black Mountain News on Feb. 20 that adding this new Master of Science in applied climate studies program is “part of that overall strategic action framework.”
“This isn’t just about cutting,” Roberts said. “It’s about strengthening and reinvesting. We know that our environmental curriculum areas are areas of strength for us, and so this is just an example of where we are choosing to invest and put additional resources that we think are going to lead to really great outcomes for both our students and the region as a whole.”
According to Warren Wilson spokesperson Mary Bates, some of the academic programs the school previously said it was discontinuing are being transformed and absorbed by other disciplines:
The history/political science and philosophy majors are being discontinued, but "faculty are working to create a new combined interdisciplinary major" in history and philosophy.
In place of the discontinued global studies major, faculty in sociology-anthropology "and several other departments are working to create" a new major in international relations.
In place of the discontinued math major, the school has added a new major in data science.
While there will no longer be a chemistry major, the school offers a biochemistry major.
Bates said Warren Wilson also introduced new majors in outdoor business and communications
The new master's program in climate studies will operate on a low-residency model and will be similar to Warren Wilson’s current Master of Fine Arts in creative writing program, according to Roberts. He said there will be two cohorts of 20 students each at any given time in the two-year program.
Students will take coursework online during the fall and spring semesters and will be in residency at Warren Wilson during the summer for “more intensive kinds of work.”
Roberts said this new program will be focused in science areas, specifically focused on climate studies, climate adaptation and data science. He said the curriculum will also include a “liberal arts approach” that involves courses on climate justice.
“They will be looking at a range of climate issues from an interdisciplinary point of view,” Roberts said. “The curriculum is purposefully designed to have a strong focus in traditional STEM areas — science, technology, engineering, math — but with an interdisciplinary approach that extends into the social science and even the humanities.”
Roberts said the goal for students in this program is to graduate into a climate-related career.
He said Warren Wilson has been working about a year on establishing this program. A group of faculty members put the program together, and it was submitted to the school’s regional accreditor in the fall of 2023. The program was accepted and Roberts said the college is beginning to “develop, advertise and recruit” for the new program. He said the first cohort of students are expected to start in the summer of 2025.
Until then, Roberts said Warren Wilson will spend the next six to 12 months searching for a director for the program and working on admission, marketing and recruitment materials for the program.
In addition to a director, an assistant director will also be hired. A position in the admissions office will also be added.
The program will be taught by faculty that Warren Wilson already has relationships with, according to Roberts. Similar to the current creative writing master's program, faculty will be both regional and national. These faculty members will be teaching part-time in additional to existing Warren Wilson faculty in environmental studies and environmental science programs teaching part-time in the program as well.
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Roberts said initial funding for the program comes from the President’s Innovation Fund, set up by Fernández “to initiate some of these new strategies for the college.” Roberts said the college anticipates additional resources will need to be brought in “very quickly” to support the program long-term.
Roberts said this program “is about as centrally and missionally aligned as it can possible be” with the mission of Warren Wilson.
“This program really fits well in building off our undergraduate academic areas of strength and being able to utilize both our campus resources in terms of the Center for Working Lands and our local and regional connections to a range of environmental organizations and environmental networks to what we hope is going to be a driving resource and partnership for this entire region as Asheville, Western North Carolina, indeed the entire South wrestles with both the problems and possibilities of climate change,” Roberts said.
Karrigan Monk is the Swannanoa Valley communities reporter for Black Mountain News, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach her at kmonk@blackmountainnews.com.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Warren Wilson adds new program, reworks others after cutting 5 majors
