• Location: Asturias region of Spain
• Dates: May 12th - June 1st, tentative
• Faculty leaders: Prof. Pablo Toral, International Relations and Prof. Amy Tibbitts, Spanish
• Credit: 1.0 unit, with 0.5 unit Global Experience Seminar reflection companion course (total 1.5 units)

Course description: The region of Asturias in Spain serves as a laboratory to study the development and confluence of sustainable practices linked to environmental clean-up, economic revival, cultural heritage, and tourism. As a region recognized for its natural beauty (think Seattle) and heavy industrial past (think Pittsburgh,) Asturias has emerged as unique for its innovative thinking, reinvention, and self-promotion, to become a European Union high-tech hub, all anchored around implementing more sustainable practices and a healthy economy. This course examines and interrogates this transformation and offers important lessons, such as the importance of building a resilient community around creativity, constant innovation, generous social welfare plans, and sustainability.

• Location: Kyushu, Japan
• Dates: TBA
• Faculty leader: Prof. Susan Furukawa, Japanese, Prof. James Rougvie, Geology
• Credit: 1.0 unit, with 0.5 unit Global Experience Seminar reflection companion course (total 1.5 units)

Course Description: How can volcanoes and temples help promote sustainability and community resilience? Students explore answers to this question during a two-week tour of the island of Kyushu in southwestern Japan. In particular, we look at how natural and cultural heritage and associated tourism are being used to sustain many aging and depopulating communities. These demographic trends threaten developed countries worldwide, and the problem is particularly acute in Japan. Students visit UNESCO World Heritage sites, UNESCO Global Geoparks, and UN Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems and consider how these designations promote regional identity and sustainable development while also facilitating vital conservation efforts.

Spain: Socially-Responsible Sustainable Development in Nature’s Paradise