Center for Climate and Sustainable Futures

Himalayan Environment and Society in Transition

Bhutan
Semester
15 Weeks
18 Credits
Fall 2025
Sep 1 - Dec 12
Closed
Spring 2026
Jan 26 - May 7
Open
Program Costs
  • Tuition$23,550
  • Room & Board$7,950
  • Total$31,500
Application Deadlines
Fall 2025
May 1, 2025
Spring 2026
November 1, 2025
Semester Program

Himalayan Environment and Society in Transition

Paro Valley,
Bhutan

Students work in high valleys where altitude shapes both ecology and culture, with prayer flags and cypress forests framing daily field studies. From alpine meadows to glacial rivers, students cross high passes with plant presses in hand, surveying biodiversity while tracing how hydropower, climate change, and rural land pressures test Bhutan’s conservation ideals. Here, Gross National Happiness makes stewardship a national mandate, but modern development forces new compromises. Students engage with monastic communities where cultural practices inform approaches to land and forest stewardship, and the landscapes themselves serve as living texts for understanding conservation. Field notes become evidence, evidence sparks dialogue, and dialogue helps bridge scientific findings with community choices on forests, grazing, and rivers.

  • Trek Chelela ridges, record DBH, canopy cover, and species counts along altitudinal transects to model forest shifts.
  • Analyze Punakha land use with ArcGIS, ground-truthing watershed health against on-site biodiversity indices.
  • Hold interviews with monks and community leaders near Tiger’s Nest, exploring ties between Buddhist ritual and conservation ethics, then code emerging themes.
  • Facilitate community dialogues on balancing Bhutan’s carbon-negative policies with pastoral and agricultural livelihoods.
  • Conduct Directed Research: frame a stakeholder-driven question, collect and analyze field data with faculty guidance, and present actionable findings to local partners.

Academics

This academically rigorous program follows a six-day/week schedule. Each program combines theory learned during classroom sessions with field-based applications. The interdisciplinary curriculum is designed to help students actively discover and understand the complexities of environmental, social, and economic issues in Bhutan.

Major academic themes include:

  • Mountain and forest ecology and conservation
  • Climate change
  • Geology and hydrology of mountain regions
  • Forest and natural resource management
  • Environmental governance
  • Gross National Happiness and the influence of Buddhist philosophy on conservation
  • Urban migration and development
  • Agriculture and food security

Courses

On the Himalayan Environment and Society in Transition program, you will take three 4-credit disciplinary courses, one 2-credit religion and culture course, and a 4-credit capstone Directed Research course. Courses are participatory in nature and are designed to foster inquiry and active learning. Each course combines lectures, field exercises, assignments, tests, and research. All courses are taught in English.

Click on the
to view a description and download the syllabus.
SFS 2010
Language, Religion, and Culture of Bhutan
2 credits
SFS 3040
Political and Socioeconomic Dimensions of Environment
4 credits
SFS 3060
Mountain Ecology
4 credits
SFS 3050
Land Use, Natural Resources, and Conservation
4 credits
SFS 4910
Directed Research – Bhutan
4 credits

Core Skills

You will gain practical skills in the field such as: GIS and mapping, species identification and distribution mapping, forest and biodiversity surveys, camera trapping and mist netting, protected areas assessment, quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis, research design and implementation, and research presentation.

Field Sites

You will visit different ecosystems and communities which may include mountain ecosystems, subalpine conifer forests, alpine meadows, rural villages and small towns, subtropical broadleaf forests, high-altitude mountain passes, monasteries and sacred sites, and agricultural communities.


Other Bhutan Programs

Semester

Himalayan Environment and Society in Transition

15 Weeks
18 Credits
Fall 2025
Sep 1 - Dec 12
Closed
Spring 2026
Jan 26 - May 7
Open

More Information

Program Costs
  • Tuition$23,550
  • Room & Board$7,950
  • Total$31,500
Summer Session 1

Forests in the Land of the Thunder Dragon

6 Weeks
6 Credits
Summer 2026
Jun 1 - Jul 12
Open

More Information

Program Costs
  • Tuition$7,500
  • Room & Board$4,000
  • Total$11,500

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