More colleges adding “green” studies

An increasing number of colleges are adding new majors and minors in green studies and the schools are having no problem filling the classes. USA Today reports that colleges across the country created more than 100 major, minors and certificates this year in programs dealing with energy and sustainability. In 2005, there were only three.
Paul Rowland, executive director of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, told the newspaper that two factors are responsible for the increase: students want the courses and employers want trained students.

Arizona State University’s Global Institute of Sustainability started an undergraduate program 1½ years ago and now has 600 students who have declared sustainability as their major.

Illinois State University in Normal, Ill., has 65 majors in renewable energy. The program was started in 2008 with a $1 million grant from the Department of Energy. Richard Boser, chair of the Department of Technology, told USA Today the program has received more applicants than it can handle.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology has launched a minor in energy studies. MIT's student energy club, which only had a few hundred members a few years ago, now has 1,700 members.

University of California-Berkeley has seen an increase in its introductory energy class from less than 50 students 10 years ago to nearly 300.