Update: The educational goal of the climate commitment is to prepare all members of Duke University’s learning community with the competencies they need to engage thoughtfully in explorations about climate and sustainability.

Central to the mission of any university is the responsibility to educate and prepare its students for a meaningful and impactful life. The Duke Climate Commitment will educate the next generation of climate and sustainability leaders, instilling within them the knowledge, skills and abilities to become climate changemakers in their professional and personal lives. Our goal is to create an immersive environment that makes climate and sustainability learning an intrinsic part of the Duke experience. We will infuse climate and sustainability learning university-wide, activating every corner of campus life, in Durham, Beaufort and Kunshan. Duke students of all disciplines, majors and programs will recognize the connections of their careers to climate and sustainability and act as agents of change in their careers and in the world. Durable, just, sustainable climate solutions require input from practitioners across many different areas of expertise. Nurses, economists, lawyers, educators, policymakers, software developers, researchers, and doctors must be tapped for their unique perspectives and ideas. Pastors and pediatricians are just as critical to implementing just climate solutions as are policymakers, scientists and engineers. In the educational paradigm of the Duke Climate Commitment, all majors can connect to climate and sustainability; all careers can play a role in climate and sustainability solutions.

To define the framework for climate and sustainability fluency — knowledge, skills and abilities for all Duke students — a working group of faculty, staff and students from across the university convened in Fall 2022 and coalesced around (1) definitions for climate and sustainability and (2) a thematic outline of climate and sustainability knowledge that Duke students should have: science, society and solutions. The working group’s definitions of climate and sustainability and thematic outline are outlined below:

Climate is the average weather, including surface variables such as temperature, precipitation, and wind, in a location over time.i Climate on Earth varies over time and space.  

Sustainability is the balanced integration of systems (environmental, social, and economic) to meet the needs of the present for all living beings without compromising the needs of future generations of all living beings.ii,iii  

  1. SCIENCE: What physically governs climate and drives climate change? Earth’s climate system is governed by the balance between net incoming sunlight and outgoing terrestrial radiation. Outgoing terrestrial radiation is affected by the composition of our atmosphere. Increased levels of greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere cause an imbalance in the incoming and outgoing radiation, causing Earth’s surface temperature to rise and the climate to change. Life on Earth depends on, is shaped by, and affects climate. Observed changes in the climate system during the 20th and 21st centuries are overwhelmingly attributable to human activities. Among human activities, the largest driver of climate change is the emission of greenhouse gases — especially carbon dioxide — from burning fossil fuels, including coal, petroleum products, and natural gas. The rate of climate change is accelerating as the rate of fossil fuel consumption increases globally. 
  2. SCIENCE: What are the impacts of climate change? Climate change affects multiple aspects of the Earth and biological systems, including human lives. Effects on these systems are compounded by the systems’ interconnections and feedbacks on one another. The vast majority of impacts bring greater damages than benefits, and damages are becoming increasingly severe as warming continues. Physical and biological impacts include sea level rise, more extreme weather, and mass extinctions and dramatic declines in species diversity. Impacts on humans include migration, diseases, conflict, and food and water scarcity. Without intervention from current emissions trajectories, these impacts will become catastrophic. Additionally, abrupt, irreversible, large-scale events called climate system tipping point crossings are already occurring and will continue to occur without intervention. 
  3. SOCIETY: What are the socioeconomic drivers of climate change? Historical emissions have primarily been produced by wealthy, industrialized nations. Fossil fuel reliance in these countries has led to economic growth and increased quality of living (e.g., health outcomes, food security, mobility). As our technologies and knowledge of fossil fuels’ harms have advanced, industrialized countries have begun moving toward renewable energy (e.g., solar, wind, hydropower), but developing countries believe it is fair to rely on fossil fuels to increase their quality of living now.  
  4. SOCIETY: What is climate justice? Climate change disproportionately affects groups from (1) historically marginalized communities within most countries and (2) less developed countries around the world. Within nations, the marginalization of these groups is the result of historic, systemic dynamics of power and oppression. Across nations, those suffering the greatest harm from climate change are typically those least responsible for the emissions driving that change. Without intervention, these communities will continue to be those most impacted by climate change. 
  5. SOLUTIONS: What technological and physical strategies will combat climate change? Solutions for addressing climate change can broadly be categorized as strategies of adaptation and mitigation. Adaptation seeks to cope with the impacts of climate change and manage risks of climate change hazards. Mitigation seeks to reduce the impacts of climate change.iv To combat climate change, societies must dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reduce the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. This involves decarbonizing our energy usage, utilizing renewable energy sources, increasing energy efficiency, and capturing carbon through sequestration. 
  6. SOLUTIONS: What sociocultural and behavioral changes will combat climate change? Behavioral solutions to climate change focus on informing consumers about how their decisions affect emissions. Individual actions and decisions affect the environment and can influence and contribute to broader cultural shifts. By rethinking and reimagining the narratives of how we live our lives, relate to and steward the natural world, and utilize natural resources, our individual actions can contribute to collective, community-based action and solutions on climate change.

The fundamental skills and abilities that students should learn to address climate challenges will vary from discipline to discipline; therefore, each of Duke’s ten schools will identify and build students’ climate- and sustainability-related skills and abilities as appropriate to their specific areas of expertise.

To begin identifying existing Duke courses that include climate and sustainability content and learnings, educational staff under the direction of Climate Commitment leadership collated lists of sustainability-related courses, prior to and during course registration for the Spring 2023 and Fall 2023 semesters. These course lists have been linked from the Duke Climate Commitment’s website to provide students with a resource to help them identify climate and sustainability courses within their disciplines. Work is underway to create a more evergreen database of any courses within the Duke Course Catalog whose course description matches climate and sustainability topics, and updates about this database will be forthcoming when it is ready for student use.

iIPCC (2022). Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [H.O. Pörtner, D.C. Roberts, M. Tignor, E.S. Poloczanska, K. Minterbeck, A. Alegría, M. Craig, S. Langsdorf, S. Löschke, V. Möller, A. Okem, B. Rama (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, and New York, NY, USA, 3056 pp., doi:10.1017/9781009325844.

iiRupprecht, C.D.D., et al. (2020). Multispecies sustainability. Global Sustainability 3, e34, 1-12. https://doi.org/10.1017/sus.2020.28

iiiBrundtland, G.H. (1987). Our Common Future: Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development. Geneva, United Nations General Assembly document A/42/427.

ivLaukkonen, J., et al. (2009). Combining climate change adaptation and mitigation measures at the local level. Habitat International 33, 287-292.