2016-2017 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]
Courses
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IDCE 333 - Development Mgmt in Developing Countries
In attempting to fulfill the real and perceived needs and aspirations of their people, “developing” countries have employed (through both coercion and agency) various approaches to manage development policies. Yet such development initiatives and the processes of implementing them face enumerable structural constraints, both local and global. This course engages with these concerns and introduces students to the administrative and policy contexts of development in “third world” settings. We critically examine some of the central administrative paradigms and practices that have been used to implement post-war development policies. Consequently, we explore such ideas and practices as public bureaucracy, the new public management, and good governance in developing countries. Significantly, too, the course examines major conditions that third world states encounter as they pursue post-war development aspirations, including public debt, international immigration, international free/fair trade, and crime and violence.
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IDCE 334 - Planning and Zoning for Community Developers
This master’s-level course introduces students to the field of planning and zoning for community development. The course work focuses on the practical application of planning theory. We will be covering issues concerned with both ‘short term’ or ‘current’ planning as well as with longer term planning, which is referred to as ‘advanced planning’. The theoretical basis for the ‘nuts and bolts’ for all planning is offered in a CDP theory course, devoted principally to—and in the context of—planning for people and places.
Utilizing governmental regulation and police powers within a contemporary theme, the class will examine land development incentives, controls and related fields: who does what, why, and when. Special attention will be given to the needs of the planning practitioner (e.g., how to read schematic plans). The student will be exposed to many skills necessary to join the planning and zoning profession at the entry level. And the student will have the basic background with which to relate to and communicate with the profession, whether that is from the perspective of a non-profit, a community development staff member, or a private developer. As detailed in the syllabus below, a multitude of planning and zoning subjects will be discussed, comprehensive and sustainable planning as well as disaster planning. The aim of the course is not to study each topic in depth, but to provide the student with a comprehensive appreciation of the professional field along functional topics and techniques.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 335 - Strategies for Community Organizing
The objectives and strategies of community organizers in the United States since the early-20th century are reviewed, from Hull House to Alinsky to faith-based organizing. The course concludes with a discussion on whether globalization makes a difference or whether community organizing does. When possible, discussions with regional veterans will be part of the course. Reading load is moderate.
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IDCE 339 - Spatial Statistics with R
The objective of this course is to introduce students to the broad range of spatial statistical techniques available in the R statistical software to manage, visualize and estimate models applicable to spatial data. This course is ideal for students who want to learn R, study in depth spatial statistical techniques developed by the research community, and apply them to address research questions of their own interest. Topics include an introduction to R, how spatial data are managed and mapped using R, different functions that assess spatial point patterns, extensive capabilities of R to create a variety of spatial weights, global and local tests of spatial autocorrelation, fitting simultaneous and conditional autoregressive models, and geostatistical analysis. Different spatial statistical techniques will be demonstrated during the class and students will work on weekly assignments in order to master the material.
Prerequisites: IDCE302 Python Programming (or another introduction to programming course) and IDCE388 Advanced Vector GIS.
Prerequisites: IDCE302 Python Programming (or another introduction to programming course) and IDCE388 Advanced Vector GIS. Or by permission
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annually
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IDCE 340 - Fundamentals of Youth Work
Youth workers are the front line staff at youth serving organizations, such as the Boys and Girls Club and youth centers. Youth workers have been referred to as “wizards” because they succeed with young people where other individuals and institutions have failed. Despite the critical role youth workers play in the lives of young people, they receive very little professional development or training; this comes to the detriment of the youth, the youth workers, and the field. There are emerging efforts in the United States to professionalize youth work and provide youth workers with critical training. This course is a one strategy to that end.
This course covers how to work with young people in a positive youth development framework—focusing on building protective factors (e.g. positive discipline, making referrals, and building relationships with families), reducing risk factors (e.g. violence, mental health problems, sexual behavior, and substance abuse) and building professional skills in program development and management. Reflection on youth work practice will be a key teaching and learning strategy in the course. Students in this class will be both community youth workers as well as Clark students. For Clark students who are not currently doing youth work, they will be matched with youth workers for an apprenticeship opportunity. Each week, a different youth development professional in the greater Worcester area will co-facilitate the course session. In this way, students have the opportunity to network with those working in the field.
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IDCE 341 - Nongovernment Organizations: Catalysts for Development
Many practitioners and theoreticians, disillusioned with governments in the development process, propose building nongovernment organizations (NGOs) as development catalysts. This seminar explores the proposal in light of the difficulties and progress NGOs have experienced.
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IDCE 342 - Dynamic Modeling of Human/Environment Systems
The transition to “sustainable futures” will be achieved through a process of social-technical integration and innovation. Pivotal to this innovation is the participatory application of environmental models to represent baseline systems and to forecast what those systems may look like in the future. Environmental systems are complex, open systems. The course material has three parts: 1) An overview of methods and approaches to modeling; 2) the state of the art for modeling environmental processes; and 3) tools and models for management. Current and future developments are also discussed. The approach to the course is one that simplifies complex systems, introducing students to modeling software and tools using practical examples from climatology, ecology, hydrology, geomorphology and engineering. A group project applies one model or a cluster of models to a real place/issue of interest to students. The course text has an associated website containing color images, links to web resources and chapter support pages, including data sets relating to case studies, exercises and model animations.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall
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IDCE 344 - Going Local: Community Development and Planning
The purpose of this seminar is to introduce students to theories, debates and practical strategies regarding the development of urban communities. Students gain an enhanced understanding of the complexities inherent to the concepts of community and participation. They critically analyze “community” as a set of social relations, as a local economy, as a built environment, and as a political organization. Students begin to recognize the importance of race, gender, age, class, identity, and culture in working with communities. Finally, they examine the roles and effectiveness of the methods, models and strategies used by informal neighborhood organizations, banks, private developers, local nonprofits, and government agencies in rebuilding communities and their economies. Case examples and articles from across the United States will be used. Worcester’s neighborhoods—which provide excellent examples of physical, social, and economic development strategies—will be highlighted throughout this course. Worcester’s Piedmont and Main South neighborhoods will be a particular focus throughout the semester.
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IDCE 345 - CDP Practice: Reflection and Deliberate Practice
The Reflection and Deliberate Practice seminar provides students an opportunity to develop a professional identity as a youth worker. By working through an action-reflection- theorizing- action cycle, students learn to reflect-on and reflect-in practice, ultimately increasing their effectiveness as youth work professionals.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 346 - Practicum in Community Development and Planning
Engages students to work as a team on a critical community-development project. Students gain skills in field research, applied qualitative and quantitative data analysis, multidisciplinary teamwork, negotiation with clients, and writing professional reports. Practicum clients and topics have included a project with the Worcester Public Schools to involve public-school students in urban secondary-school reform and work with the City of Worcester and two community-development corporations on assessing the economic impact of housing production in low-income neighborhoods.
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IDCE 352 - Conflict in Sudan and the Horn of Africa
This seminar explores the historical and cultural context of current political and military conflicts in Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, and Eritrea. We will examine issues of racial, ethnic, and religious identities in the region using academic sources, policy documents, and visual and oral narratives. Students will become familiar with the debates relating to ethnic and sectarian violence, forced migration, famine, and humanitarian aid through multi-disciplinary social science analysis and experiential case studies. The course combines delving into local and national circumstances for people living in the region and an interrogation of the objectives and practices of transnational actors.
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IDCE 354 - Beyond Victims and Guardian Angels: Third World Women, Gender and Development
How did Third World women and gender concerns enter economic development discourses? How have Third World women and gender been conceptualized within development practices? In turn, how have feminist theories about women and gender shaped economic development discourses? In exploring these issues this graduate seminar will eschew the divide between theory and praxis that plagues development literature
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IDCE 355 - Global Health: Epidemiologic Perspectives
This course will explore current issues in global health from a multidisciplinary perspective, with emphasis on the tools of epidemiology. At a time of immense global changes, we will examine the changing spatial and temporal patterns of disease in developing and industrialized countries; the major social, demographic, and environmental determinants of health and health disparities; and public-health approaches to global health problems at the population level. The course will prepare you to use the scientific and medical literature to research public-health problems; integrate a range of disciplinary perspectives on health; and analyze public-health problems from a population perspective. The course has a seminar format with class discussion and student presentations. Case studies will include problems related to environmental health, such as air pollution and respiratory conditions; infectious diseases, such as malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDS; and chronic conditions, such as type 2 diabetes.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 357 - Sex and development: the intersection of sexuality, morality, and modernity
This course explores historical and contemporary efforts to regulate sex, birth, death, and fertility as part of ideas about moving towards modernity, progress, and building healthy, stable, moral and productive societies. Drawing on approaches ranging from demography to anthropology and global health, we will explore the theoretical conceptualization of sex, sexuality, fertility, mortality, morbidity, and population growth and examine large and small scale attempts to control and alter sexual behavior and demographic patterns in different societies.
Prerequisites: ID120
ID125 or
ID121
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IDCE 360 - Development Theory
An interdisciplinary graduate seminar which provides a critical overview of classical and contemporary theories of development by introducing students to writings on development across many disciplines (political economy, anthropology, geography, sociology, feminist theory). The seminar encourages students to think historically, politically and analytically about the multiplicity of development processes and the complex relations of power that underlie them.
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IDCE 361 - Development Program and Project Management
This course is an introduction to the professional field of development management. Over the semester, we will explore patterns of success and failure; obstacles to and possibilities for effective, project-induced change; intended and unintended effects of intervention; and the challenge of sustainability. The course methodology emphasizes case studies, action learning, and group participation and encourages students to take an active part in the course through project teams, discussions, working groups, and role-playing sessions. We begin the course with discussions of the political and institutional contexts of development management and strategic planning. The second part of the course carries us through the project cycle, including: participatory project identification; needs assessment and planning; construction of logical frameworks; professional communication and proposal writing; design of performance indicators; budgeting; and monitoring and evaluation. We then conclude with discussions of leadership and project implementation, then explore advocacy as an example of a non-project approach to social change.
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IDCE 362 - Energy System Transitions
This course explores energy systems, both the technological and social dimensions, with a focus on the potential for a low-carbon transition in electricity systems, transportation systems, and other energy systems (buildings, manufacturing, etc). The social structures and processes that reinforce and perpetuate fossil fuel reliance will be interrogated, as will the opportunities and challenges of alternatives. Fundamental tensions associated with systemic versus incremental change, centralized versus decentralized systems, and infrastructural lock-in versus flexibility will be explored through semester-long team projects in which students will contribute to existing, on-going, actual initiatives designed to advance energy system change. These projects will require students to learn through assessment of and engagement with non-academic “real-world” energy system transition initiatives.
Prerequisites:
EN 101 Environmental Science and Policy: Introductory Case Studies
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 364 - Educational Policy Issues in “Developing” Countries: Governance, Management, and Financing
This course examines some of the most significant policy issues that “developing” countries grapple with in their efforts to improve the capacity of “human resources” to meet the assumed needs of the new knowledge economy. The course focuses on key policy issues in a variety of national settings in the areas of governance, management, and financing of education. It examines the basic socio-economic needs and conditions that drive educational policy in “developing” countries, the practical and ideological considerations that influence policy responses, and the results and implications of various policy choices. While focusing on these broader issues, we explore the role of different stakeholders, including the state, local, regional and international organizations, and citizens in these policy debates and practices. Additionally, we will critically examine globalization’s impact on educational policy, particularly its ideological influence on the financial and management arrangements for the provision of education.
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IDCE 366 - Principles of Negotiation and Mediation: An Overview of Conflict Resolution Approaches
This skills-based course offers an overview of the principles of conflict management that can be applied internationally as well as interpersonally. A general framework for the understanding of conflict is presented that Includes: power-, needs-, interest-, and relationship-based conceptualizations of conflict management. Gives students a theoretical as well as practical experience of working effectively in conflict contexts. It explores some of the psychological obstacles that impede the resolution and implementation process and engages in a number of experiential exercises that help the student develop the wide range of skills needed to transform conflict relationships.
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IDCE 370 - Emerging Scientific Worldviews and Global Sustainability
In this course, alternative scientific worldviews are considered as potential means of reconciling the destructive relationship between modern civilization and the Earth, and the rift in modern science between matter and spirit. Our basis is a critical and creative exploration of the literature, supplemented by numerous video screenings, guest lectures and intellectually stimulating discussions. We will begin by critically examining defining characteristics of the dominating scientific view of the Earth and universe and themes such as modernism, materialism, reductionism and duality. We will explore how these attributes are influencing scientific conduct, government policy and human behavior, and consider various limitations and flaws of this worldview from the perspective of contemporary sustainability and social challenges. Emerging and alternative scientific paradigms are then examined from diverse fields such as ecology, biology, quantum physics, neuroscience and life sciences. Other alternative worldviews scrutinized include Gaia theory, non-duality and the unified field, in addition to indigenous worldviews and spirituality. Insights from these diverse areas of inquiry are meshed together to propose an alternative view of humanity, the Earth and universe based on principles such as consciousness, oneness, non-duality, interconnectedness and holism. It will be argued that this could provide the necessary human intelligence to guide society towards sustainability and unprecedented human development throughout this century. The practical and policy implications of this emerging vision of reality will also be thoroughly explored in relation to diverse areas such as climate change, environmental management, international politics, human and economic development, health and agriculture.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 376 - Spatial Database Development
Spatial database development, a key component of GIS project management, focuses on the organization of location-based data. Participants will learn database development best practices, data collection and standardization, and how to apply topological rules to a database. Throughout the course, students will work on final database projects which will build skills required in professional GIS positions, with an emphasis on collaboration and real-world applications of data.
Prerequisites: P=IDCE 310
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IDCE 377 - Introduction to Global Health & Social Change
Global health examines the impacts of structural inequalities on the health of populations and suggests ways to ease the burdens of disease and premature death. Students in this course will gain familiarity with the history, politics, and possibilities of global health as a discipline of study, professional field, and vibrant arena of activism and social change. Central to the discipline are the principles of cultural sovereignty and self-determination. We will center solutions arising from the global South as we interrogate the political and ethical dimensions of the changing roles of the global health professional.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annual
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IDCE 381 - Critical Cartographies: Mapping Culture, History, and Power
This interdisciplinary seminar explores the political and cultural effects of cartographic projects in different colonial and post-colonial settings. The first half of the course focuses on the role map-making technologies have played in these projects, while the second half directs attention on a series of case-studies. These include: state formation, the management of mobile populations, the creation of political forests, and the re-territoralization of sovereignty following the neo-liberal turn, among others.
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IDCE 382 - U.S. Environmental Pollution Policy
In this course, we study approaches to regulating pollutants in air, water, and land in the United States. The course will provide an in depth review of the process of environmental policymaking in the U.S., while exploring the pros and cons of different regulatory approaches. The course has four primary objectives: (1) examining the trades-offs inherent in crafting pollution policy; (2) the role of science in the policy making process; (3) the different approaches used to motivate various societal players to act in ways that minimize the release of environmental pollutants; and (4) business perspectives on environmental policy and risks. The course draws on a wide range of academic and professional materials, including economic theories, political science, environmental law and policy, and technical/scientific information.
The Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act are two of the major environmental statues in the United States, which we will explore as part of the course. Each law has spurned a wide range of regulations and standards, which have been shaped and modified by subsequent legal decisions, new scientific data, and changing administrations. We study these laws by studying their key provisions and the resulting regulations, and by analyzing their implementation in specific cases. The following key questions are addressed: At what point in the pollution generation process to intervene? What type of intervention to take? What societal issues to consider in the regulatory decision? At what level of government to regulate? How to apportion the responsibilities among different levels of government? What scientific data to use and what analytical methods to apply? How to motivate polluters to comply with the regulations?
In addition to these major media-based statutes, we will also focus on emerging environmental issues, including the environmental risks and debate surrounding the expanded role of “fracking” in oil and natural gas production in the United States, and the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act. Because of the advanced and ever-changing nature of the material for this course the readings are taken from many sources: excerpts from books, published articles, the web, the Federal Register, internal reports from research organizations, and so on. In addition, students perform independent research on specific topics, especially recent relevant case studies.
The course has a seminar format. Students have regular writing assignments, give presentations in class, and are expected to actively participate in class discussions. Attendance is mandatory except for well justified personal hardship cases. In addition to the weekly seminars, the course will include a seminar on environmental databases, data manipulation, and data presentation. The seminar will include instruction on some of the advanced functions and features of Microsoft Excel.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 383 - Cultures in Exile
This course explores both the concept and context of exile in the contemporary world from the perspective of those who experience it, create cultural artefacts about those experiences, and contribute to transformations—small and large—of the communities and cultures that define their identity in exile. While we will draw on social science analyses of exile, home, belonging, diaspora, transnationalism, and so forth, special emphasis will be given to narratives exploring these concepts created by exiles themselves.
Prerequisites: A Qualitative Research Methods class, such as:
IDCE 30285 - Qualitative and Quantitative Research Methods
IDCE 30283 - Qualitative & Quantitative Research Methods: Intermediate
IDCE 30290 - Participatory Research Methods
IDCE 30291 - Qualitative Research Design and Methods
PSYC 306 - Qualitative/Interpretive Methods
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall
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IDCE 387 - Workforce Development and Urban/Regional Employment
Needless to say, in the knowledge-based society the race to achieve higher levels of development and productivity has become very much one of expanding the human capital base of societies and countries. Thomas Piketty in his book Capital in the 21st Century has called it the “rising human capital hypothesis”. In the same book, however, he also poses a very provoking question: “Has the apparently growing importance of human capital over the course history been an illusion?” This question is extremely relevant, especially when we hear and see all kinds of ways in which we destroy or waste “human capital”. Workforce development encompasses a variety of employer-based, place-based, and people-based policies, strategies and programs to boost the employability, skill base and education of workers, improve the matching of workers and employers in labor markets, increase the competitiveness of industrial sectors, urban areas and regions, and to address multiple kinds of labor market dislocations resulting from enterprise restructuring, deindustrialization, technological modernization, and occupational obsolescence. This course examines, first, basic theories about the functioning of labor markets (neoclassical, human capital, segmentation/dual labor markets) and the structural forces behind the deterioration of jobs, such as the growth in low-wage employment, globalization, declining quality of jobs, unemployment, and labor market deregulation. Secondly, the course examines the workforce development regulation of the USA, the variety of workforce development strategies and programs (adult education, employability programs, work-first, sectorial/cluster-based, career-ladders, etc.), and the role of various actors (government, community colleges, labor market intermediaries, unions, networks) in the formation and implementation of such programs. Also, we ask about the evidence on the performance of programs under the various approaches. Thirdly, we examine the specificity of programs to support a variety workers (youth, women, immigrants, low-wage workers, incumbent workers) overcome various kinds of labor market disadvantage. Finally, the course explores the connection between workforce development policies and community/regional economic development, especially in small and midsize cities and their regional context: industrial cluster development, the emerging green economy, and the new agriculture, uses of leading edge technologies in the food industry. The course relies mainly on material from the US and Western Europe, but with applicability to other regions of the world.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varies
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IDCE 388 - Advanced Vector GIS
This course builds upon the concepts of GIS introduced in Introduction to GIS, and focuses on the more advanced analytical vector GIS tools. Topics include exploratory spatial data analysis, spatial statistics, interpolation techniques, 3D data presentation and analysis, network analysis and multi-criteria decision making. Hands-on laboratory exercises illustrate GIS applications in natural resource management, global change, environmental justice, urban and environmental planning, public health, and census data analysis. Students work individually and in groups to develop solutions to a weekly spatial problem, using ArcGIS or GeoDa software. Final project is required. Knowledge of basic statistics is useful. This is a prerequisite for the 5th year masters program and is a requirement for the GISDE masters program.
Prerequisites: GEOG 190 /GEOG 390 /IDCE 310 .
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 390 - CDP Research Seminar
The general objective of the seminar is to engage students of the CDP Program (Accelerated MAs and 2-year MAs) in the process of defining, preparing, and shaping their final projects in order to meet the requirements of the CDP Program. Students will prepare proposals for one of the three possible kinds of projects they can choose to complete the CDP Program: (1) Research paper; (2) Practitioner Project or (3) Thesis. These projects have distinctive characteristics because they require approaching problem definition, research and practice in no equal terms. The seminar discusses some of these differences. However, more specifically, the seminar focuses on producing a good navigational chart for your project, a fluid proposal for a doable (and meaningful) project. The seminar starts with a “self-interview” about “what-do-you-want-to-do.” Then, it continues into crafting a proposal with a defined question, an applied problem, or a hypothesis; a working bibliography; and a methodological section.
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IDCE 391 - GISDE Professional Seminar
Required for M.A. in Geographic Information Sciences for Development and Environment. The seminar is restricted to GISDE M.A. students and focuses on applications of GIS and formulation of the research proposal. Examines applications of GIS to environment and development.
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IDCE 395 - Culture, Environment, and Development
This course/seminar explores a wide variety of themes at the intersection of culture, development and contemporary environmental problems. The course/seminar is built on two key premises: first, humans are part of nature as each society exists within the natural world, and second, environmental problems are social problems as they concern human relations with the natural world and the politics of resource access, use and control. We investigate these issues through an examination of infrastructure development, natural resource management, resilience, and agricultural knowledge and innovation. Falls under the Land, Food, and Natural Resource Governance signature.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Varies
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IDCE 397 - Master’s Thesis
Master’s degree candidates may register while working on research for their thesis or published paper.
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IDCE 398 - Internship
Academic experience taking place in the field with an opportunity to earn credit.
Prerequisites: Permission of instructor needed.
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IDCE 399 - Directed Study
Students construct an independent study course on a topic approved and directed by a faculty member. Offered for variable credit.
Anticipated Terms Offered: every
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IDCE 30102 - Case Studies in Environmental Issues and Policy Analysis
Many environmental policy issues are considered “messy” problems. These types of complex problems are characterized by scientific uncertainty, difficulty making progress on one dimension without trading off progress on another, and differences in underlying values leading to very different decisions. Examples include evaluating the risks and benefits of new chemicals, managing the multiple uses of natural resources, and using nuclear energy for climate mitigation policy. Through a series of case studies, this course will introduce students to a range of approaches for structuring and analyzing complex environmental problems, including decision-tree analysis, value of information, benefit-cost analysis and benefit-risk analysis, multi-attribute analysis, data synthesis techniques, and uncertainty analysis. Students will gain a working knowledge of these methods and the strengths and limitation of the different approaches, be able to construct simple models using DecisionTools software, and communicate the results and uncertainties to decision-makers.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 30103 - Networks and Analytics of Development
This course introduces students to advanced analysis of data related to development and interpretation and communication of quantitative data. We begin with an overview of theoretical approaches to data analysis, explore their use, and guide students in applying them to individual projects. We will learn ways of organizing, analyzing, visualizing, and presenting data from publicly available national and international databases. The first half of the semester will include quantitative analytics, visualization, and presentation of health-related data. The second half of the semester will consist of ways of researching mobile, hidden, and vulnerable populations using social network analysis. Social network analysis, not to be confused with social networking, is a specialized methodology that examines the patterns of relationships among individuals, community, countries, etc. to identify who the most important people are in a network, who has the most influence or social capital, sub-groups, and if time permits, “hidden or shadow networks”. SNA can also be used to evaluate collaboration, coalition, and partnership networks.
This course will assume that students will have basic information/quantitative literacy and are not intimidated by data and numbers.
Classroom sessions include lectures, discussions, and lab sessions. Course open to IDCE graduate students; ID seniors or ADP students with previous analytics experience. If space permits, graduate students from other departments may request permission to enroll in the class.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Spring 2017
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IDCE 30104 - Citizen Engagement in Urban Design
The course will expose students to the tools and techniques needed to enhance citizen engagement in urban design, urban revitalization, urban environmental preservation, and public space management and restoration. Course draws from domestic and international case studies.
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IDCE 30106 - Political Economy of Urban and Regional Revitalization
We demand quite a bit of our regional economies: we want them to grow and to provide jobs; we want those jobs to provide a living wage. We want the private enterprises that comprise the urban and regional economies to earn enough profit or generate enough revenue to make significant contributions to workers’ health care and pensions, on the one hand, and to public budgets in order to fund a range of public goods including schools, roads, and environmental stewardship, on the other. In short, we care about the functioning of the urban and regional economy, the outputs of that economy, and the distribution of those outputs. Some metropolitan regions are on an upward trajectory on the “bundle of these indicators” (i.e., providing sufficient jobs at living wages in the context of a metropolitan regional economy where a high quality of life is widely enjoyed). Others, however, are not. This course will take a political economy approach to examining proposals for inventions that are aimed at significantly altering metropolitan regional trajectories.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30184 - Gender Analysis of Power and Conflict
Explores the experiences of women and men in armed conflict and in the time just after conflict. We investigate dynamics of masculinities and femininities and their power consequences. We look at how diverse local and international actors roll back or exacerbate gendered inequities and violence.
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IDCE 30185 - Sustainability and the Role of Higher Education
Sustainability and the Role of Higher Education Course. This course explores both the theory and practice of sustainability and sustainable development by examining the role of higher education in promoting change toward sustainability. The societal role of higher education involves more than providing formal course instruction for enrolled students; institutions of higher education are also critical places of discovery and innovation, centers for political discourse, and catalysts for political action and social change. This course explores the unique potential that institutions of higher education have to contribute to a sustainability transition. The focus on the university provides a lens for examining how organizations with complex structures make a myriad of decisions with environmental consequences, a context for considering the broad role of education in sustainable development, and a framework and perspective with direct and personal connections for us consider the challenges of promoting sustainability. In addition to reading and writing about the challenges of sustainability and the role of the university in promoting sustainable practices in society, we will engage directly with the challenges associated with promoting sustainable behavior and fostering institutional and social change through team projects right here in the Clark and Worcester communities. Graduate students enrolled in this course should be prepared to take on a leadership role with an associated team of undergraduate students.
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IDCE 30186 - Social Enterprise Practicum
This course involves the operation and organizational development of a 501c3 nonprofit corporation, the Community Development Training Institute (CDTI). The organization is transitioning from historic (1984) to a new governance structure–a student-run and inspired nonprofit, operated by graduate students and alumni at Clark University. The hope is to create a solid base in professional skill areas, to develop relationship networks and begin formulating training and consultancy resources to use in the future. The goal is use CDTI as an institutional base where we can promote mainstream classic and alternative community development tools and implementation strategies. In the process, students seek to shift community development discourse and practice by employing socially and ecologically transformative processes and practices. This will be accomplished by offering consultancy services and offering our innovative skills and ideas to clients. Some of this will be fee based and pro bono. Additionally, we will be promoting alternative tools and strategies by developing training programs for interested community organizations. The students will be responsible for the successful and ongoing operations of CDTI. During the ‘credit period’ with CDTI, students will learn about social enterprise governance which will prepare them for possible board membership after the credit period. During the credit period, students will provide staffing capabilities and consultancy to the CDTI student board. Board membership is solely by invitation only, extended after demonstration of capabilities, post-credit period time commitment, interest, and team-work propensities.
A component of the work will also be grounded in theory with academic elements; namely, exploring state of the art community development strategies, social enterprise and implementation accompanied by corresponding literature and research.
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IDCE 30189 - Strategic Use of Technology in Community Development & Planning
An introductory course intended to develop technological fluency for those whose responsibility will involve deciding whether and when to invest in information technology systems (ITS) in community development projects and initiatives, and how to develop and manage ITS to promote human well-being. As such, the course investigates the use of ITS as a platform to organize, collaborate, and augment network building, improve human well-being, and improve data access for communities. Methods of deploying technology in support of diverse global citizenry will be an overarching theme.
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IDCE 30203 - Program Evaluation for Youth and Community Development Initiatives
This course provides students with skills required to apply research methods to the assessment of youth and community development programs. By gaining exposure to the various types of program evaluation (e.g. process evaluation, impact evaluation, empowerment evaluation, etc.), analyzing evaluation case studies, and working on an actual evaluation of a program. Students will leave this class with an understanding of the importance of and challenges involved in conducting high quality program evaluations. Students will gain enough skill to assist in the development and implementation of evaluations.
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IDCE 30204 - Advanced Community Development Finance and Research
This Masters or PhD level course is designed for students who demonstrate competence in real estate or business finance and/or have successfully completed an introductory course ‘Community Development Finance’. An expansion of a basic Community Development Finance course, this course includes advanced lectures on financial feasibility sensitivity; market analysis; real estate appraisal; the RFP process; project mediation & implementation; construction contract negotiation; tax increment financing & bonding; loan guarantees; tax credits; brownfield financing and other complex public & private finance partnership concepts/programs/issues. Students are expected to be knowledgeable of debt and equity underwriting techniques and rationale. They also are required to have the ability to construct an Excel spreadsheet. A two hour introductory course ‘Community Development Finance’ DVD, produced by the instructor, is available to assist in ascertaining potential students’ competence for this level of study. Alternates every other year, in spring, with Advance Community Development and Planning Policy—Advanced/Long Term; ½ unit, in 2nd module;
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IDCE 30205 - Climate Change, Energy and Development
This course explores climate change, energy and development from multiple perspectives, disciplines and scales. Fusing perspectives from both the natural and social sciences, this interdisciplinary course will grapple with diverse themes and issues at the intersection of environmental science and policy. Climate change related topics deal with the evolving science of climate change, current observations, extreme weather and long term impacts, in addition to climate ethics and international climate governance. Our analysis of climate change will also include an examination of geoengineering, carbon capture and storage and the phenomenon of climate denial. Energy related themes deal with renewable energy (wind and solar), gas fracking, methane hydrates and an examination of the pros and cons of nuclear energy. Development dimensions then deal with human dimensions of climate change and energy challenges and address ethical and economic perspectives, diet and food and human security. This is a graduate level course, required for all Environmental Science and Policy (ES&P) graduate students.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 30209 - Research Project Development for Environmental Science and Policy
This course provides students with perspective on and skills in developing and managing research projects at the nexus of environmental science, technology, and policy. This course aims to: 1) guide students’ understanding of the research process, its principles, approaches, and challenges; 2) introduce some specific research methods and techniques (qualitative, quantitative, and mixed); and 3) engage students with their own individual research process. In addition, the course will provide a forum for focused discussions related to professional development for emerging careers in environmental science and policy. This course may be repeatable for credit.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annually
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IDCE 30212 - Introduction to Quantitative Methods
Introduces the most standard methods of statistical analysis, which are essential for serious research. Considers data sampling and descriptive and inferential statistical techniques for analyzing geographic data. Includes graphic techniques, tests of hypotheses and regression. Students use computer spreadsheets for statistical analysis. No prior exposure to statistics is assumed. The course is one for which graduate students may receive credit. A skills course for geography majors. A statistics course for environmental majors. Fulfills the Formal Analysis requirement.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30213 - Master’s Final Research Paper
A year long seminar for second-year IDCE master’s degree students writing their final research paper.
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IDCE 30216 - Sustainable Fisheries Management
Most of the important New England commercial fishing areas are still in serious trouble. There is an intense and on-going debate over what kinds of drastic measures are needed to enable recovery and what can be done for the fisherman whose livelihood has been dependent on the fisheries. Even fisheries which presently appear successful, such as lobster fishing in Maine, present warnings that current practices may not be sustainable. And there are similar concerns in other coastal regions in the U.S., in Canada, and in other parts of the world. Fisheries represent an interaction between human systems (fishing communities and their cultural, economic, institutional, and legal settings) and biological systems (the commercially desired fish species and the ecosystems which support them). One approach to thinking about humans interacting in complex systems is through simulation games with role-playing. We will supplement a review and interpretation of the historical and contemporary debate on the sustainability of fishing practices with gaming exercises using (simplified) models of fisheries. A second approach is to look closely at how particular fishing communities respond to stresses; we will try to draw lessons from an ongoing NOAA project in a mid-coastal Maine lobster fishing community. There will be opportunities for students to report on fishing practices around the world and for further work on dynamical modeling of fisheries.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30217 - Economic Fundamentals for International Development
This course is primarily intended for students entering the IDCE masters program. Its objectives are to introduce economic history, as well as microeconomics and macroeconomics to the noneconomist, while illustrating practical applications of these techniques in real-world situations. A flexible seminar format is used, in recognition of the diverse backgrounds and perspectives that students bring to this class.
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IDCE 30218 - Community Development Decision Making & Negotiations
This graduate level course will integrate negotiations with the process of making strategic decisions. The field of community development is practiced at all levels (e.g., manager, technician, project director, and support staff) and at all venues (e.g., government, and non-profit/for profit). Success in the community demands compromise and solution fitting for both basic and complex situations. Very often issue resolution involves two or more competing parties with disagreements over ultimate goals. Achieving a “win-win” scenario is an objective of competent negotiators. Students will learn the skill of negotiations, including the importance of information, the value of time and negotiated ‘position’ planning and execution.
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IDCE 30221 - Education and Development
Education (formal, non-formal and informal) has played a strategic role in shaping society over the past century, and continues to inform development at the community, national and international levels. This course examines the historical evolution of education and explores its continued local and global relationship to the process of international and community development.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30225 - Grant Writing for Community Developers
Students go through a step-by-step process to gain fundamental grant research and writing skills. Writing problem statements, goals and objectives statements, program activities, evaluation templates, and logic models are covered. Students learn about public and private funding sources. The end product of this seven-week module is a completed grant proposal for an organization of the student’s choosing.
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IDCE 30229 - Program Monitoring and Evaluation
This course examines the evolution of the range of paradigms, methodologies, and methods of program and project monitoring and evaluation. It focuses on qualitative, participatory, and empowering approaches and helps students develop the range of practical skills and tools necessary for developing and conducting program evaluation. The course emphasizes the iterative action and reflection cycles of conceptualizing, planning, collecting, analyzing, interpreting, utilizing, and communicating data. The course examines a range of evaluation methodologies including participatory evaluation, utilization-focused evaluation, empowerment evaluation, outcome and impact evaluation. Students will be required to work with a local or international agency/program in the development, implementation, and assessment of a monitoring and evaluation plan.
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IDCE 30231 - Humanitarian Assistances in Complex Emergencies/Disasters
Disasters and Complex Humanitarian Emergencies (DCHE) have become increasingly common. Within the context of an emerging global political economy, effective delivery of humanitarian assistance has become complex and controversial. This course explores the theoretical and policy issues in DCHE with an emphasis on the roles of governmental and nongovernmental organizations in them. Drawing from a wide variety of case studies, this course will focus on the factors that shape risks and the vulnerability of affected populations and responses of government and NGOs. This course will provide students with comprehensive insights into the needs and policy challenges in DCHE situations and equip them with the awareness, understanding and skills that are essential for effective service in a humanitarian crisis. It will be particularly useful for those interested in working with international and governmental organizations as well as NGOs. This is a reading-intensive, interdisciplinary course designed for a range of backgrounds and experiences.
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IDCE 30235 - Trafficking: Globalization and Its Illicit Commodities
This course turns a critical eye towards the different cultural, political, and economic processes that make contemporary forms of “trafficking” possible. It examines these transnational processes from three different vantage points, each composing one part of the course as a whole. Part one will engage many of the key concepts that inform the existing literature on “trafficking” (e.g. commodification, shadow economies, transnational criminal networks, and regulatory authority) to explore both their assumptions and their limits. Special attention is focused on the ways scholars, policymakers, and activists have historically constructed trafficking as a “problem” either for analysis or action, and how the different legal and policy frameworks created to combat it have changed over recent decades. Part two examines the above concerns in greater detail through a series of case-studies on different forms of human trafficking, the global market for organs, genetic information, animal parts, and endangered species, among others. Part three will consider some of the opportunities and dilemmas (theoretical, methodological and ethical) such practices present for those who wish to study, to manage, or to advocate on behalf of those affected by different forms of trafficking.
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IDCE 30238 - Public Communication Seminar
This master’s level course introduces students to public presentation, professional writing, and record keeping skills as used in public and private planning practice and the community development field.
Gain experience verbally communicating professional objectives, research findings, and various viewpoints through improved public presentation skills in informal and formal settings. Obtain necessary tools for producing professional written documents and organized and accurate record keeping principles as it relates to the project management and public administration tasks of planners and community development practitioners. Students will also become familiar with strategies to avoid common communication pitfalls in the field. The class format is structured around various public speaking activities with opportunities for peer and instructor feedback as well short, focused technical writing tasks that reflect practicing planners’ typical assignments
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IDCE 30239 - Microfinance, Gender & Newliberalism
Today, micro-finance is the dominant policy in the poverty alleviation strategies world-wide. The 2006 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to a Mohammad Yunus, a leader in micro-finance in Bangladesh. Increasingly micro-finance is used as important instrument in development policies concerned with income generation, sustainable development, gender inequality, empowerment, reproductive health, education, good governance etc., Hence, the need to develop increasingly flexible, responsive and sustainable financial products constitutes perhaps the most compelling challenge facing in development interventions. This course will take an in-depth critical look at micro-finance from developmental, political economy and operational perspectives. It is based on case studies and analysis of microfinance models and experiences in different geographical regions in order to understand the strengths and weaknesses of micro-finance based financial intermediation in development. It will also examine the strategic planning, implementation and evaluation strategies of micro-finance projects. The purpose is to provide a sound theoretical and practical knowledge of micro-finance.
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IDCE 30240 - Community Development Planning Studio
The community planning studio is an applied, results-driven exercise typically required in planning (and architecture) graduate programs. The objective of the exercise is to place students in direct contact with a real-life planning scenario in an urban setting, working with real organizations and community stakeholders. The topic of the studio changes every year. Students tackle one common problem working in teams to address distinct dimensions of the task at hand. In previous years, students assessed the capacity of community-based organizations in Holyoke (MA) to pursue federal funding from the Dept. of Education, and provided support to a network of community-based organizations and Clark University to plan for the development of the Main South Promise Neighborhood Partnership, Worcester (MA). Depending on the nature of the project, students used a variety of research and local planning methods: surveys; strategic use of data; interviews; multi-media; economic analysis; needs assessments.
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IDCE 30241 - Environmental Toxicology
Focuses on the assessment of hazardous properties of toxic chemicals in the environment and on development of public-health policy. Covers the principles of absorption, distribution, excretion, and toxic action of chemicals on humans; animal testing; and human epidemiology. Also covers assessment of public-health risks on the basis of animal and human test results, development of standards for air and water contaminants, and uncertainty in regulating hazardous chemicals.
Prerequisites: One semester of organic chemistry or permission of the instructor.
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IDCE 30243 - Seeing Like a Humanitarian Agency
Since World War II, several different but overlapping regimes have emerged to help structure humanitarian responses to large-scale forms of displacement. In what ways do these evolving regimes enable humanitarian agencies to “see,” and in what ways does their particular field of vision differ from that of states, academics, policymakers and the displaced themselves? What kinds of blind-spots (theoretical, methodological, and ethical) inevitably result? This seminar will explore these questions from three different vantage points, each composing one part of the course as a whole. Part one will provide an overview of the literature and the main concepts of the course. Special attention is focused on the ways scholars and policymakers have historically constructed displacement as a “problem” either for analysis or action, and how these concerns have shifted over the past three decades. Part two will consist of ethnographic studies of humanitarian interventions in different geographic settings, which will highlight the relevance (and limits) of concepts and methods drawn from the social sciences, including anthropology. Part three will address some of the opportunities and dilemmas humanitarian emergencies present for those who wish to study or to manage them.
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IDCE 30245 - Natural Resource Management
Natural resource management is the planning and operation of ecosystem components and processes for human benefit. Management of natural resources can be approached from many sometimes conflicting perspectives such as exploitation versus conservation. The purpose of this course is to explore the science of natural resource management by examining the fundamental topics that include ecology, climatology, and economics; latest concepts and technology such as mathematical modeling and life cycle analysis; and policy and institutional frameworks such as planning and policy development.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30248 - Gender and Health
This course introduces students to social science perspectives on the intersection of gender and health. In the course we will examine theoretical approaches to gender and health, such as feminist and political economic perspectives, and explore historical and contemporary case studies that analyze particular dimensions of gender, health, and sexuality. We will explore health issues such as health disparities along lines of gender, race and class, the regulation of reproductive health by nation-states and the “development industry”, and political and social struggles for reproductive rights. We will also consider some dimensions of gender and occupational health, and contemporary health challenges such as gender violence and HIV/AIDS. These issues will be explored mainly in the context of developing countries with some cases drawn from the United States.
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IDCE 30250 - People and Places: Theories of Community Development and Planning
This course deepens students’ understanding of social, economic, and political forces that shape places. Students learn to critique assumptions, values, and methods of various approaches in order to more effectively apply them to actual cases. Topics covered include political economy of urban areas, race, social construction of space, and planning models and theories.
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IDCE 30253 - Sustainable Communities
Communities around the world are taking a lead role responding to sustainability challenges, including climate change, by pursuing various forms of sustainable communities which seek to re-imagine the relationship between human societies, the built environment, and ecological systems. This course will explore the different approaches to sustainable community development and it will interrogate the assumptions, philosophies, and economic models that underlie these different approaches. It will investigate the many dimensions of sustainability that are valued in lived communities, including ecological integrity, economic security, empowerment, responsibility, and social well-being, and it will consider the extent to which different approaches to sustainable communities support these goals. Case studies will be drawn from around the world.
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IDCE 30261 - Immigration and Knowledge-Driven Industries
Deepening economic and cultural globalization has transformed the dynamics of migration. In 1990, there were 120 million international migrants and by 2000 there were 180 million. Among the migrants we find both highly skilled and not so skilled ones. They move for numerous reasons, but undeniably the global demand for their labor and services (mainly in rich countries) is a fundamental one. For poor countries, the growing share of their skilled moving to and residing in rich countries (brain drain) represents a staggering loss, and the outflows may entrap countries into further pauperization. In the receiving countries, immigrants find employment in practically all segments of the labor market yet we see a strong bifurcation. Large numbers are going into the lower echelons of the labor market as menial service and manual laborers but also more educated immigrants are increasingly fitting into the upper echelons of the knowledge-based economy. In the receiving countries, we listen to arguments about critical occupational shortages, labor displacement and replacement, and competition between domestic and foreign born workers. In addition, we also hear stories of distorted incorporation, doctors from poor countries unable to practice in the receiving country because of certification problems, or mathematicians working as cab drivers because they lack language skills. With globalization, we are also witnessing the creation of transnational communities of professionals connected to global value chains, processes of offshoring, and the diffusion of know-how. This course will be divided into three sections. First, we will learn about general theories of migration, especially to explain global flows of labor with multiple kinds of human capital attributes (selectivity), and to understand the complex political economy of the current global distribution and circulation of talent, and regulatory regimes. Secondly, we will learn about the processes of incorporation that both professionals and proletarians experience in the labor market of receiving countries. We will address both supply-side factors (human capital, demography, entrepreneurship, etc.) and supply-side factors (economic restructuring, technology, industrial organization, geographic division of labor, deskilling, labor flexibility, internal labor markets, etc.) In this section, even though we will consider some material from the European experience, the emphasis will be on the incorporation of immigrants in three critical sectors of the US national and regional economies: high-tech, bio-tech and health. Finally, we will examine the workforce development practices and strategies needed to meet the current and future development needs of these industrial sectors, and how such strategies are considering the incorporation of foreign born workers (career ladders, sectorial strategies, public-private partnerships between “ed’s and med’s” and communities, labor market intermediaries, regional economic development strategies, workforce development networks, and transnational networks).
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30262 - Web Mapping and Open Source GIS
This course introduces core principles and procedures of spatial database development and open source GIS and internet mapping. This course emphasizes a hands-on learning approach to real-world problem solving. Several programming languages will be used simultaneously to gather, manipulate, and display spatial data on the web. Topics to be covered include spatial data representation, principles of open source database design and management, open source internet mapping, and online mapping applications development with spatial databases. All tools used by the course are free and open source, meaning they can be used, modified, and distributed without cost anywhere with an internet connection.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30264 - Environmental and Social Epidemiology
Epidemiology investigates the distribution and determinants of health at the population level, in contrast to medicine, which traditionally has focused on health in individuals. Social epidemiology tries to understand how social and economic factors influence population health and contribute to disparities in health. This course will cover basic principles of epidemiology and social epidemiology and the use of epidemiologic methods to study the associations between environmental exposures and the risk of disease. We will also investigate how social and economic factors influence environmental exposures, particularly among susceptible populations. Lectures, discussions, problem solving.
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IDCE 30272 - Environmental Justice in Latin America
Environment and Justice in Latin America From fishing communities along the Baja California coast, to indigenous organizations in the Peruvian Amazon, to citizen coalitions in the Argentine Patagonia, growing numbers of communities and groups are contesting development plans and projects considered to be socially, culturally and environmentally damaging. This seminar explores the intersection of environment, social justice, democracy and human rights debates in contemporary Latin America. We will examine the drivers of economic development in the region and link them to specific examples of socio environmental conflict emerging from extractive industry activity, large-scale infrastructure projects and energy development among others. We will examine how communities respond to such conflict and consider emerging initiatives that seek more inclusive and environmentally sustainable forms of development.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30275 - Gender in Development Planning
This mini-course explores the rationale for incorporating gender into development planning and analysis and builds knowledge, expertise and skills, which will enable course participants to integrate gender analysis into their various fields of academic and professional responsibility. We clarify approaches and identify tools for gender analysis in the context of participatory research, institutional change and community empowerment. We also explore methods of gender analysis for their usefulness to national policies and programs and for the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programs and projects
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IDCE 30277 - Sustainable Consumption and Production
The increasingly unsustainable pressure on the Earth’s natural systems calls for radical changes in the way people in the industrialized and in the rapidly growing economies satisfy their appetite for goods and services. Some believe that innovation in technologies is our great hope, while others emphasize the need to change the consumption patterns of individuals and societies. Both necessitate changes in institutions, values, and social arrangements. This advanced seminar examines the role that changes in technology, institutions and culture might play in bringing about the necessary change toward more environmentally sustainable development. Four types of innovation are discussed: in the production process, in product design, in function delivery by way of products and services, and in a larger sociotechnical system. The course draws on theories of technological innovation, consumer behavior and institutionalism as well as empirical case studies from the United States, Europe and some developing countries. The course considers the key drivers of change, such as government policy, market forces, cultural norms, activities of mission-oriented organizations, social movements and others.
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IDCE 30281 - Community Needs and Resource Analysis
Community Needs and Resource Analysis students develop skills in identifying and analyzing community issues through community resources and first-hand community observations and contacts.
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IDCE 30282 - Community Based Health Research
This advanced IDCE course will provide students with an overview of community health through a “hands on” experience in conducting research in the field. A trans-disciplinary course, it will draw on and integrate the theoretical and methodological perspectives of fields including medical anthropology, community and population public health, and medicine. As part of a global health initiative within IDCE and in collaboration with UMASS Medical, it will be an advanced course that builds on methods and health courses across the department that use both qualitative and quantitative approaches.
In this course, students will work on an ongoing community-based health research project that uses social network analysis and storytelling to understand pregnancy-related advice sharing networks and to try to understand perinatal cultural practices and beliefs.
The project, “Networks of Informal Helpers in Perinatal Care Practices and Beliefs among Immigrant Women in Worcester, MA”, will use a mixed-methods cross-sectional design by integrating network surveys with semi-structured interviews with immigrants and refugees in Worcester. Since we are interested in the quality, intensity, and trust in information-sharing health networks, a mixed-methods approach will allow us to complement network structures with case-level ethnographic understanding of health-seeking behavior and decision-making related to health treatment.
The specific aims of the research project include:
- Use Social Network Analysis to understand the networks of information sharing about pregnancy in immigrant communities in Worcester, as well as identify the natural helpers who are most commonly referred to for pregnancy-related information.
- Enhance the capacity of local providers to convey culturally-appropriate health messaging to African-born patients, and to engage patients in primary care instead of free health clinics.
Over the course of the semester students will work in teams to design and conduct a study, using qualitative or quantitative approaches or mixed methods that combine the two. They will also develop a literature review to situate their work in the appropriate literature. Student teams will also be meeting with residents and faculty from the University of Massachusetts Medical School for debriefing. Each group will present their study to the class and team partners and also critique the study designs of the other project groups. Preliminary assignments include a research design, critiques of the research design and methods of recent journal articles, data collection, data analysis, and reporting on results.
This course requires a significant time commitment outside of class for the research in the community. It will also have a steep learning curve at the beginning for those not familiar with SNA.
Since this is an advanced course, students will be expected to be familiar with quantitative data analysis techniques (univariate and some bivariate) and be comfortable using data analysis tools such as Microsoft Excel, and nVivo or equivalent software for the qualitative research. Only students who have taken a research methods course and who are able to pass a basic qualitative and quantitative data analysis screening will be admitted to the class.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annual
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IDCE 30287 - Fundamentals of Environmental Science
This foundation science class will give you the literacy and skills you need to understand the science behind environmental problems that affect us all: Water pollution; air pollution; environmental health risks; population growth and the over-exploitation of natural resources. It will also strengthen your math skills and quantitative ability. It has three main objectives. Knowledge Objective: That students be able to describe and understand how principles from science (especially Physics and Chemistry), as well as methods from Math, are used to model two main types of environmental problem: 1) problems of pollution; and 2) problems of natural resource over-exploitation. Skills Objective: That students be able to apply simple, yet powerful mathematical models to such problems, manipulating quantitative data and interpreting diagrams and tables that use these data. Attitudes Objective: That students become comfortable with handling quantitative data, equations and models, and more confident in their own abilities to understand and apply scientific and technical information.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall
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IDCE 30289 - Community Development Finance
This course introduces students to the field of community development, with a particular focus on finance. The class explores the roles of various “field actors,” such as developers, community-based community-development corporations, other nonprofits, for profits, banks, local governments and low-income residents. Students learn about the use of governmental subsidies to achieve public purposes, hot and cold commercial and housing real-estate markets, the basics of identifying financial feasibility gaps in public-spirited projects, the financial analysis necessary to attract debt and stimulate equity investment, strategies to fill the gaps in community needs and funding and ways to sustain projects. Familiarity with Excel spreadsheets is useful.
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IDCE 30290 - Participatory Research Methods
Explores a range of participatory, action-oriented and empowering approaches and methods of inquiry. The course provides a learning environment and a process that enables students to deepen their understanding of the theory and practice of participatory research. It provides an opportunity to practice specific methods and strategies and to develop critical criteria and skills for implementing and assessing participatory methods. The course balances the theoretical and conceptual dimensions of participatory research and inquiry (through readings, case studies and reflection on personal practice) with the application of participatory skills, methods and strategies.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30291 - Qualitative Research Methods
Provides an introduction to qualitative inquiry and explores the major assumptions, language and logic of qualitative research. The course emphasizes the modes of thinking and specific practices of qualitative research and focuses on conceptualizing and designing qualitative studies. It explores the issues and practices of qualitative inquiry; emphasizes strategies for developing research questions; and covers methods for data gathering, analysis and interpreting qualitative research.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Fall or Spring
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IDCE 30292 - Participatory Development Planning
The course combines participatory theory and practice in a seven week module. The first two classes will cover the rationale for using participatory tools in development planning and action. The second two classes will introduce a wide variety of participatory data collection, analysis, and planning tools. The next two meetings will be conducted in a field setting (probably a Friday night and all day Saturday) in either Manchester or Concord, New Hampshire with Bhutanese refugees. Your role as a member of the class will be to lead exercises in the workshop, using some of these tools. The goal will be to help the refugee community advance from its present state of semi-disorganization all the way through a process culminating in a community action plan that the entire group both supports and will implement. Our final class will be a review of the action plan and an evaluation of the methodology. Grades will be based on field performance and two short (6 pages) papers. One will focus on evaluation of a particular tool and its usefulness in our exercise. The second will be your design of a community planning exercise for an urban setting. Nepali speakers are especially urged to take the course.
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IDCE 30296 - Nonprofit Management I
This class will be taught from the perspective of community spirited action associated with civil society. Missions of examined organizations will include social services; economic justice; human rights and advocacy; and housing endeavors covering both programs and projects. Topics will include a coursework related to mission selection and definition; gender-related trends; administrative and governance issues; budgeting; personnel management; public relations; and leadership approaches. These are generally generic topics relevant to both nonprofits and NGOs. The course will prove valuable for students intending to work for—or start-up—a U.S. nonprofit (NP) or an international nongovernmental organization (NGO). The course will compare issues associated with domestic NP and international NGOs. Generally, this skills course will inform the students how to start and/or operate a NP along with the basic core elements of running–or working within a NP or NGO. Also, this course would be useful to those interested in governmental services at the local or regional levels, including potential careers in housing, economic development, equity advocacy, environmental planning or other enterprising nonprofit organization. This course is a prerequisite for IDCE 30298.
Anticipated Terms Offered: annually
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IDCE 30297 - Displacement and Development in the Contemporary World
This course investigates the development practices and theories that have emerged to address population displacement in its various forms. It looks at the relationship between forced displacement and the nation-state, the changing nature of humanitarian emergencies in a globalising world, and the role of diaspora. The course also explores the issues around urbanisation, urban development and displacement, and transnational networks and associations in development processes and agendas.
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IDCE 30306 - GIS for International Development in Practice
This course introduces the use of geospatial technologies in development and humanitarian response. The course will cover how geographic information systems (GIS) are used for data creation, mapping, and analysis in the context of international development and humanitarian response. In addition, the course will explore the multiple ways in which NGOs and international organizations leverage GIS. Topics covered will include, among others, data creation, crowd sourced mapping, mobile technologies, and support of GIS in resource constrained settings.
Prerequisites: P=IDCE 310
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IDCE 30309 - Research Practicum: Health, Communities, and the Environment
This course is a substitute for the individual Masters Final Project course IDCE30213 when the student is working as part of a larger project team. The course is designed to coordinate, guide and implement team project research efforts that are new or ongoing in the Health and Environment IDCE Signature domain. Each student has a specific task and role in the larger team effort, and her/his efforts make a significant contribution to the success of the larger project. The course supports - and is supported by - the ongoing Holliston Health (H2). Project H2 is a multi-dimensional project that draws from environmental science and policy, epidemiology, GIS, hydrology, water engineering, political and social networks, and health anthropology. Students can take the course for 0.5 or 1.0 course credit (as they could with IDCE30213). Students not only learn how to develop their own research focus/questions in the context of the larger research goals, they learn mixed methods for data gathering and processing, as well as valuable team-project collaborative learning that is highly sought-after professionally.
Anticipated Terms Offered: annually
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IDCE 30310 - Transitional Justice: Theoretical Debates, Institutional Frameworks, and Development Impacts
Never forget” and “never again” are promises-to remember the horrors of the past and to prevent their reoccurrence in the future. Present circumstances shape the possibilities of what can be done to realize both goals in the wake of mass atrocities. This course examines: 1) how these circumstances affect understandings of what “transitional justice” means to different actors; 2) the myriad forms it takes in different contexts (e.g. criminal proceedings, truth and reconciliation commissions, reparations, and memory projects); and 3) the impacts these initiatives have upon post-conflict reconstruction and development.
The course is divided into two sections. The first section is philosophical and historical in orientation. The focus is upon the ethical issues, political events, and the legal mechanisms out of which the concept of “transitional justice” emerged and has since become institutionalized. The second section consists of topic-focused case studies on development-related issues - ranging from displacement and corruption to sexual violence and climate change - in different countries such as Yugoslavia, Argentina, Cambodia, Guatemala, Rwanda, among others. The details shed light on both the implementation of transitional justice proceedings in concrete settings, creating the basis for informed comparative discussions.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Bi-Annually
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IDCE 30325 - Controversial and Emerging Environmental Issues at the Science-Policy Interface
This graduate course examines cutting-edge and controversial environmental challenges situated at the nexus of environmental science and environmental policy. Through a series of in-depth case studies, each week we tackle a specific controversial or emerging environmental issue from two perspectives: (1) scientific evidence framing understanding of the issue and (2) policy implications and desirable countermeasures to tackle the issue. By combing both social science and natural science perspectives, we will tackle a broad array of emerging topics at the forefront of scientific understanding and policy action. Topics will include marine plastic waste, urban waste treatment options, nuclear energy and waste, carbon capture and storage, nitrogen use, pesticides (neonicitinoids and glyphosphates), GMOs, methane emissions in agriculture, gas fracking, and natural resource (fish stocks and water) management, and deforestation. We will examine each of these issues from a range of geographical scales and locations. Some cases will be centered on the USA (e.g gas fracking) whilst others will be focused globally (marine plastic waste and fishing stocks). Other cases will involve a multi-national comparison of policy responses (e.g. GMOs, pesticides etc.). Our study of scientific evidence shaping understanding of the nature and dangers of the environmental challenge will highlight scientific uncertainties. It will also contrast differing scientific conclusions regarding the same environmental phenomena. Our study of policy will scrutinize both existing policies in place to manage the specific problem, and new or additional policy actions required for further addressing the problem. This graduate course is of especially high relevance to Environmental Science and Policy students, or other graduates interested in gaining scientific and policy literacy in an array of cutting edge environmental challenges. ES&P major undergraduate enrolments will be considered after consultation with the instructor.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Varies
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IDCE 30327 - Ideologies of Race in Development
This course explores the inherent silences in development discourse regarding “race”. We will explore how the colonial projects of civilizing the “primitives” was primarily a racial project that continues into modern day development. We synthesize historical, political, and anthropological approaches to examine how the beliefs in “racial” hierarchies dominated the ideologies of social evolution, eugenics, the missionary project, colonialism, slavery, and current international development. We will also explore how this racial discourse was appropriated by global resistance movements. This is a graduate seminar course. Students will be expected to lead a seminar discussion and write a 20-25 page research paper.
Anticipated Terms Offered: varied
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IDCE 30330 - Introduction to Community Health and Social Change
The public health system in the US is not a straightforward or easily navigable structure. Different organizations have a wide range of responsibilities, roles, and investments in the population’s health, whether they realize it or not, and questions of who is responsible for health have been debated for centuries. With a new ideology backing public health in the US, that every citizen deserves healthcare, it’s important to look at what that means, how far that goes, and who it leaves out. This course will examine the many intricacies of public health by focusing on the defined responsibilities and functions of health and healthcare agencies through an examination of case studies as far ranging as seat belt laws and Hurricane Katrina. We will consciously employ an analytic lens that highlights power, privilege, health disparities, and health justice as we consider a variety of public and community health challenges.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annual
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IDCE 30360 - Spatial Analysis for Health
This graduate-level course provides an introduction to Geographic Information Science and its application in public health research and practice. Each week incorporates a lecture and a computer lab that focuses on a health-care issue. Topics covered may include mapping disease rates, analyzing health outcomes, access to health care and health resources, environmental justice, exposure assessment, and social determinant of health. Students will learn how to visualize and analyze health-related and demographic data, and how to geocode tabular data. They will have the opportunity to develop their GIS skills using commercial and open source GIS software and to conduct their own independent research on a topic of their interest.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annually
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IDCE 30365 - Global Issues in Education
An upper-level undergraduate (juniors and seniors) and graduate seminar. The course will use the logic and principles of international and comparative education to explore the phenomena of education and international development as they pertain to a range of intersecting and cross-cutting themes. We will examine education historically and currently through issues such as globalization, aid and development, gender, youth, HIV/AIDS, and displaced and migrant communities.
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IDCE 30391 - Introduction to Public Policy: Context and Analysis
Nonprofit and public affairs professionals are faced with finding viable solutions to increasingly complex public problems-from raising revenue to fix congested roadways to reducing poverty. To do so they often rely on policy analysts to investigate problems, formulate solutions, forecast outcomes, and choose between competing policy proposals. This course introduces students to the major institutions and processes involved in the development and implementation of public policy in the United States. We will examine why some problems reach the public agenda, why some solutions are adopted and others rejected, and why some policies appear to succeed while others appear to fail. The course will also explore a number of contemporary issues in American public policy that can impact the work of nonprofit and public affairs professionals such as education, health, social welfare, immigration, and the environment.
Anticipated Terms Offered: Annually (Module)
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IDCE 30393 - Seminar in Social Applications of GIS
Seminar in Social Applications of GIS Geographic Information Systems (GIS) is a powerful tool for data visualization and analysis. This graduate-level seminar investigates how GIS is used to understand and respond to an array of social, economic, and environmental issues. Specific topics will include: community mapping, local government decision making, geo-demographics, sustainable development, urban and regional planning, disaster preparedness and emergency management, health, poverty and environmental justice, and hunger vulnerability. Students will read and critically evaluate current literature on these topics and facilitate class discussions. Some applications will be illustrated through case studies with hands-on GIS exercises.
Prerequisites: GEOG 190 /GEOG 390 /IDCE 310 - Intro to Geographic Information Systems .
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IDCE 30396 - Politics and Policy: Responses to Sustainability, Climate Change, and Energy
This course critically examines various political and policy measures implemented across the globe in response to various sustainability, energy and climate change challenges. Through multiple case studies we will approach the broad theme of environmental politics, governance and policy from three dimensions: global, national and city-level. Global level political and policy frameworks will focus on the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol. National level responses will focus on policy solutions and climate governance in the context of the European Union (Emissions Trading Scheme and various GHG emission and renewable energy targets) and the USA (taken as an example of a nation without an effective national climate policy). After examining the socio-cultural factors, strengths, impacts and limitations of international and national level political responses to climate change and sustainability we will then analyze the experiences of several frontrunner cities around the globe implementing innovative policy responses to climate change in the building sector. These cases will include several large cities from Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore, Tokyo), USA (Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle, Houston and New York) and Australia (Sydney and Melbourne). We will also examine innovative policy initiatives by other small communities around the USA to hasten societal transitions towards sustainability.
Anticipated Terms Offered: annually
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IDCE 30397 - People on the Move Research Studio
Refugee Integration in Worcester
People on the move, including refugees, migrants, and undocumented movers, can be hard to incorporate in standard social science methodologies and difficult to include in participatory research. The first third of this full-semester participatory research studio familiarizes students with innovative techniques for producing knowledge of mobile people’s lives, livelihoods, and concerns in a collaborative way, and promotes understanding of local, state, and national policies for refugee support, integration, or management. During the middle of the semester, students will participate in an action research project with refugee participants, agency staff, and other researchers (project may change from year to year). Analysis of data, write-up, and community sharing take place in the final part of the semester. This year, we will be exploring Refugee Integration in Worcester-Best Practices with community partners and practitioners.
ID or IDCE research methods course - can be taken concurrently
Prerequisites:
Anticipated Terms Offered: annually
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IDCE 30398 - Innovation and Societal Transformations Toward Sustainability
This course examines the various forms of scientific, social, technical and political innovation required to drive societal transformations towards sustainability. In particular, we will focus upon the way by which science (and universities in particular) contribute to societal innovation through cross-sector networks with various stakeholders from government, industry and civil society. We begin by examining the evolution of the modern research university and the global emergence of the entrepreneurial university and technology transfer to industry. After identifying trends and problems with traditional forms of technology transfer and university-industry collaboration, we will consider the need for alternative forms of university-stakeholder collaborations for tackling complex sustainability problems. From here our course will explore through case studies various emerging innovation attempts around the world to trigger societal transformations towards sustainability. Various analytical lenses used include “living laboratories”, “climate experiments”, “environmental governance” and “sustainability transitions”, in addition to emerging concepts of “co-design”, “co-production” and “co-creation” for sustainability. The examination of real-life partnerships (particularly in the New England region) for spurring innovation towards sustainability will form a key component of this course. Students will also gain firsthand knowledge via field trips to Boston (University of Boston) and the City of Cambridge (MIT and Harvard) and live SKYPE interviews with key actors in various locations across the USA and Canada.
Anticipated Terms Offered: annually
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IDCE 30399 - MDGs and the Post 2015 Development Agenda
This course explores the politics and practice of global development “policy” by critically examining the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including their systems of design, targets, participation, commitments, responsibilities, implementation, accountability, and funding. The course draws on the analytical framework of global public policy and governance that examines the complexity and tensions of pursuing international development cooperation in the context of national sovereignty. We will also explore the contradictions inherent in efforts to “improve lives” around the world. The course consists of three inter-related sections. For the first few weeks we will examine concepts of global development policy and planning by exploring the various frameworks that underpin post-war development governance. This approach will help us understand how various stakeholders - states and institutions - construct the global development apparatus. In part II of the course we will explore the history, politics and core principles of the Millennium Development Goals and the new Sustainable Development Goals, as well as their aspirations, achievements and failures. The final section will look at the multiple consequences (intended and unintended) of the post-2015 development agenda.
Anticipated Terms Offered: annually
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IDCE 39901 - Directed Study
Students construct an independent study course on a topic approved and directed by a faculty member. Offered for variable credit.
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IDCE 39902 - Directed Study
Students construct an independent study course on a topic approved and directed by a faculty member. Offered for variable credit.
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