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This one year MSc degree is designed to equip students with essential knowledge about environmental sustainability, and policy and governance frameworks for environmental action, while also developing key professional tools to enable graduates to apply policy-oriented skills creatively in their future careers. The programme takes an international perspective on environmental issues and explores the increasingly complex environmental challenges that societies and governments face across the globe, addressing contemporary environmental debates such as Climate Change, Water Policy, Energy Security and Sustainability, and Urban Resilience. Teaching is focused on areas and skills within environmental policy-making, and an integrated group-project module provides practice-based insights into the policy-making process. Students can enhance their own specialist research interests during the completion of a thesis or internship in the third trimester. Students may gain practical experience in policy analysis, environmental assessment, cost-benefit analysis, public participation, and risk management. Key professional skills for future career development include leadership, problem-solving, communication, media skills, report writing, group work, presentation skills and project management.

Course Description

All students undertake 90 credits across a range of modules that help them develop foundational knowledge and skills in policymaking, and equip them to employ these new skills to manage a diverse range of contemporary environmental challenges. In addition to taught modules, students undertake a practice-based studio module, and can also pursue their own specialist interest through completion of a thesis or internship.

Programme Outcomes

• On successful completion of the programme students should be able to: Appreciate environmental policy research, develop skills as autonomous researchers, and recognize the value of research as an input into improved policy making and policy implementation.
• Understand how environmental policy is operationalised within the wider political, institutional and legal frameworks, and understand the social, economic and political context that informs approaches to achieve sustainable development.
• Apply their professional knowledge using tools and transferable skills to generate integrated and evidence-based responses to environmental challenges, including climate change, to achieve a more resilient and sustainable future.
• Demonstrate effective research, policy analysis tools and evaluation skills and the ability to develop evidence-based policy proposals.
• Communicate effectively verbally, graphically and through written documents and to communicate concepts, knowledge and conclusions to peers, specialist and non-specialist audiences within an interdisciplinary environment.
• Work effectively both on their own and as part of a team in an interdisciplinary context.
• Understand the challenges and responsibilities of assessing tradeoffs in their response to environmental challenges and be open to critically assessing, debating and reflecting on these, and acting in the interests of the common good.
• Acknowledge the spatial consequences of policy approaches, and recognize the importance of fairness in environmental policy processes and outcomes.