Environmental System Sciences / Climate Change and Transformation Science

"Climate Change and Transformation Science" is a new interdisciplinary 2-year Master programme offered within the Environmental Systems Sciences study programme. It is fully taught in English by internationally leading experts in their field. The programme is hosted mainly by the Wegener Center for Climate and Global Change at the University of Graz, but offers links with other institutes, faculties and institutions. 

The Idea of the Programme:
There are many interdisciplinary programmes on climate change out there, offered at great Universities. We believe, however, that our curriculum is exceptional in a very important way: after your studies, you will often work in either the natural sciences - related to the physical foundations of climate change or its impacts on the physical environment - or in the social and economic sciences, working on the societal impacts, options to adapt to climate resilience or to transform societies into towards sustainability and net-zero carbon emissions. Many programmes are broad in all these aspects, but ultimately you may suffer from not knowing any discipline in depth. Disciplinary programmes provide in depth knowledge, but often fail to expose students to the interdisciplinary context climate research is embedded in. We believe that our programme offers you an education which is closer to real life needs: depending on your background and interests, you can choose to specialise in either natural or social sciences, but at the same time you will learn about the basic concepts, research questions  and state-of-the-art knowledge of the other field.  In cross-cutting modules you will collaborate with each other on real world problems. Just as in real life, pysical climate scientists often collaborate with social scientists, and as scientists collaborate with stakeholders outside academica. In short: you will develop strong disciplinary expertise, but at the same time study and experience interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary asepcts of climate change.