Proposal for a Thematic Campus Center: Environmental and Sustainable Systems

Environmental Systems Graduate Group: Strategic Focus and the 2020 Project

Spokesperson: Peggy O'Day, ES Graduate Group Chair

Human activities drive far-reaching changes in Earth systems of climate, biosphere, hydrosphere, and cryosphere, while depleting natural resources and creating social, economic and political problems that demand long-term, multi-faceted solutions.  In UC Merced’s 2009 Strategic Academic Vision, the faculty identified Environmental Sustainability as a key interdisciplinary theme for organizing research initiatives and academic programs.  We set a goal to build an integrated research and educational program on ecological systems, energy, water and other natural resources, climate change and security threats associated with global change that will help build a sustainable environment.  Research on environmental systems is critical to understanding how they function, how human actions are changing them, and how societies can sustainably interact with them.  The field of sustainability examines both fundamental interactions between nature and society, and society’s capacity to create and follow sustainable trajectories.  Thus, our focus on environmental and sustainable systems provides a context and focus for multiple groups and research areas across campus in natural sciences, engineering, management, social sciences, humanities and arts.

The Environmental Systems Graduate Group is the intellectual center on our campus for research and graduate education associated with the themes of environmental and sustainable systems.  Environmental Systems was the first UC Merced graduate program to obtain system-wide approval, and the span of faculty research encompasses the transdisciplinary nature of environmental and sustainability research in this millennium.  The Environmental Systems faculty belong to all three Schools, with representation primarily from the faculty in Natural Sciences (Life and Environmental Science (LES)) and Engineering (Environmental Engineering (ENVE), Mechanical Engineering (ME), Material Science and Engineering (MSE)).  Faculty teach in a range of undergraduate programs, primarily Environmental Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Earth Systems Science, Biological Sciences, Environmental Science and Sustainability (minor).  Faculty and students participating in the Environmental Systems Graduate Group are strongly supported by related institutes and centers, primarily the Sierra Nevada Research Institute, UC Solar, the Center for Climate Communication, Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society, the Spatial Analysis and Research Center, and the National Parks Institute.  Our faculty also contribute to strategic planning and synergistic growth for related programs in Management and Cognitive and Information Sciences.

Our campus was founded on the ideal that interdisciplinary programs would flourish in the absence of traditional department silos.  Our group embraces that philosophy, but as a result, has suffered from a lack of physical space, efficient resource distribution, and academic support to sustain cross-school programs and cross-disciplinary interactions.  Although the themes of environmental and sustainability research connect elements within our program, we are far from realizing the full potential of research scope, program innovation, and educational excellence that could be developed campus-wide from our current strong base.  In order to bring together and build on current foundations, and to nucleate and launch new programs, we propose a thematic campus center highlighting research, education, and non-academic partnerships around environmental and sustainable systems.

Proposal for a Building Cluster

We envision a physical space consisting of a cluster of buildings and related field research facilities that would bring together multiple elements around the theme of environmental and sustainable systems for both on-campus and off-campus communities.  The cluster would create a focal point on campus where academic research and non-academic partners are co-located, graduate and undergraduate students have access to faculty and facilities, physical buildings and outdoor research areas are integrated, and where students could live and work in a transdisciplinary setting.  A building cluster might include:

1. Academic Research Building: A multi-use research building that includes: high performance laboratories, both faculty labs and shared instrumental facilities (e.g., stable isotope facility, ancient DNA, environmental genomics, environmental analysis); computational and spatial data visualization and analysis labs; non-specialty labs and collaborative spaces; faculty, student, and research staff office space.

2. Mixed Academic-Partners Office and Classroom Building:  Office, conference/classroom, and mixed-use collaborative spaces for on-campus institutes and centers (e.g., SNRI, UC Solar, SpARC, Vernal Pools Reserve) and affiliated non-academic partners (e.g., US Park Service, US Forest Service, State agencies, University extension, start-up partners); educational/outreach activities and partnerships and special courses (e.g. Parks Institute course, UC extension courses).

3. Housing, Dining, and Conference Facilities:  Housing designed specifically for graduate students would fill a gap in our on-campus housing options and create a sense of community for graduate students.  Undergraduate housing with an environmental and sustainable systems theme would unite students from different majors in a thematic college and help strengthen multiple undergraduate programs.  During summer, undergraduate housing could be used for student summer programs, conferences, visitors, etc.

4. Research Facilities:  New field and experimental research facilities could be integrated thematically with a new building cluster to highlight integrated research.  A current critical need is for a plant and environmental research facility consisting of a greenhouse, growth chambers, and related indoor and outdoor experimental areas.  The existing solar energy facility and UC Vernal Pools Reserve could be included in the design for integrated outdoor and indoor laboratories that highlight interdisciplinary research and education.

A campus center where faculty, students, and research professionals are brought together serves to strengthen and expand core research in the Environmental Systems graduate program and its affiliated research centers.  Our existing research institutes, in particular SNRI and UC Solar, would be co-located and able to support faculty in ongoing research as well as catalyze new initiatives.  Equally important, a campus center would spawn and support new interdisciplinary programs and foci among scientists, engineers, social scientists, and cognitive scientists that may ultimately develop into new independent programs.  Non-academic partners on campus could easily offer internships and research experiences to students, and buildings could house outreach and community liaison activities (e.g., Center for Climate Communication; soil and water sustainability with UC Extension partners).  A physical center would create a campus synergy around a central theme that, while important on our campus, is currently diffused among many physical locations and different programmatic efforts. 

Research Strengths and Future Growth

Faculty in the Environmental Systems group share a common interest in the study of natural and human-impacted environmental systems and the services they provide – their functioning, health, and sustainability on a planet experiencing rapid climate and ecosystem change.  The scope of research within the group falls within the thematic areas of:

• Water, soil, air and climate science and engineering
• Ecology, ecosystems and biodiversity
• Sustainable energy systems
• Natural resource science, economics, policy and management

These themes are central to the mission of the campus and address broader societal needs.  Research of existing faculty is mostly within the first three themes; the last area is currently being developed jointly with management faculty in the SOE as part of the MIST proposal.  Faculty within the ES group have a strong track record of successful extramural funding in both collaborative projects and as individual investigators.  Each of the themes above has significant potential for growth of high-impact research that integrates science, engineering, and social sciences.  The ES graduate group, together with affiliated research institutes and centers, can serve as both a catalyst for research through growth in core areas, and as an incubator for initiating new, related graduate programs.  For example, an M.S. degree program in natural resources management could be initiated within the existing ES program, the emerging MIST program, or jointly between the two, eventually moving to a future School of Management if appropriate.  Likewise in the area of sustainable energy systems, faculty and graduate student growth and new research initiatives may lead to independent graduate or undergraduate degree programs.  The ES graduate program could potentially serve as the nucleus for a new school or graduate school to academically join faculty now appointed in different schools and academic units, improve the delivery of resources, and better coordinate program growth.  At this stage, physical separation and lack of sufficient, appropriate space are the most critical factors impairing faculty and student success and future growth.

Current Barriers

Through discussions and surveys, the ES faculty have identified the following barriers and challenges to faculty and student research and academic success:

• Physical separation of faculty and students (SE1, Castle, SS&M, future SE2) impairs the ability of the ES group to act as a cohesive unit and realize its interdisciplinary strengths
• Faculty academic fragmentation and poorly defined resource streams (three schools, multiple academic units) create barriers for leveraging resources such as graduate student funding, staff support, appropriate research and office space, and faculty efforts in teaching, graduate student mentoring, and program administration
• Integrated, common facilities are needed to fully support current faculty and student research (e.g., greenhouse, genomic, microscopy, computing, analytical)
• The ES graduate program has difficulty attracting top students because of its broad nature and diffuse identity between schools, and has been unable in some cases to make competitive, timely financial aid offers to students

Programmatic Growth within the Environmental Systems Graduate Program

A central aim of our graduate program is to train students to view the environment as an integrated system of atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere and biosphere that intersects human society.  Graduates of our program are prepared for careers in academia, research, government, and industry that integrate expertise from across engineering, natural sciences, and social sciences.  The ES graduate group currently has 25 faculty members (18 FTE given membership in multiple graduate groups); two new faculty have been hired in SNS that will join next year.  There are four searches this academic year (2 in SNS, 1 in SOE, 1 cross-unit) affiliated with the ES graduate program.  Our long-range enrollment plan calls for growth to ~50 faculty by 2020.  Ideally, we would like a ratio of ~3 graduate students per faculty (~150 graduate students, Ph.D. and M.S., including targeted/Professional M.S.), although this amount of growth in student population will be challenging by 2020 (see spreadsheet).  Growth in the number of post-doctoral scholars and professional research staff will track faculty and student growth, and additional academic staff will be needed.  In order to house new and existing faculty, students, staff and facilities in one location, space for ~250-300 people is needed (Academic Research Building).  Bringing non-academic partners to campus and expanding outreach and extension activities would require additional space (Mixed Office-Classroom Building), with the size determined by the number of potential partners.

To achieve graduate student enrollment and graduation targets, we have identified the following needs:

• Increase the size and quality of the applicant pool; aggressively recruit qualified applicants
• Develop relationships with good undergraduate "feeder" schools with interdisciplinary undergraduate environmental programs (e.g., Cal States, Claremont Colleges)
• Improve program visibility and identity with new web page and marketing efforts
• Stabilize student funding with 4-year and 2-year guarantees for top students
• Streamline TA appointments and identify courses in SOE and SNS that rely on ES TA's
• Expand the number of graduate courses that are not co-convened with undergraduate courses
• Improve time to degree, particularly for M.S. students
• Assess and adjust graduate degree program requirements to ensure coursework requirements and qualifying exams provide sufficient student preparation and depth of knowledge while creating a common focus and identity for Environmental Systems graduate programs

The ES graduate group faculty has discussed developing targeted M.S. programs in specialized areas.  Some may develop as Professional/certified degree programs that are self-supporting.  The exact nature of the Professional M.S. programs will depend on results of market research to determine student demand and program economics.  Some elements of these programs may be amenable to on-line course offerings.  Possible professional/targeted M.S. programs under discussion are:

• Water resources management; public lands management; conservation science and management; applied computing for the environment; environmental systems development engineering

Success Metrics and Program Differentiation

The ES graduate program occupies a unique position bridging science and engineering, and incorporating relevant elements of social and cognitive science.  At established universities, inter- or multi-disciplinary programs in environmental research are often amalgams of traditional disciplinary departments.  For example, the Environmental Science, Policy, and Management Department at UC Berkeley, which covers a wide range of environmental research, was created by combining several traditional departments.  Some of the more prominent U.S. programs in environment and sustainability have gathered programs and departments under institutes or schools (e.g., Columbia University's Earth Institute, Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University, University of Washington College of the Environment), but many of their Ph.D. degrees are awarded in more narrowly focused areas.  Few Ph.D. programs were created de novo as interdisciplinary degrees (the Earth System Science program at UC Irvine is one example).  The uniqueness of the ES program gives us an immediate advantage, but also makes comparison with other programs difficult.  In order to track our success, we will use standard metrics employed for rankings of research doctorate programs[1]:

• Impact and number of faculty and student peer-reviewed publications
• Ph.D. graduation rates and post-graduation placement (e.g., number of graduates in faculty, post-doctoral, or industry positions)
• M.S. graduation rates and post-graduation placement (e.g., number of graduates in jobs within their field and salary information, or in Ph.D. or other post-graduate programs)
• Number and impact of student and faculty awards and honors
• Amount and source of extramural faculty and student funding
• Number and type of public and professional presentations
• Number and type of general media coverage of student and faculty research
• Diversity of students and faculty in the program

Next Steps

Several other initiatives are being proposed that fall within, or are synergistic to, the proposal here for a complex of buildings to strengthen and accelerate environmental and sustainability research.  We recognize the need to address academic organization (schools and academic units), faculty hiring, and relationships with institutes and centers, in addition to physical facilities.  We look forward to discussion among different groups of how best to coordinate and integrate campus research and educational efforts under the theme of environmental and sustainable systems to attain programmatic and physical cohesion.