Climate Futures: Science, Society and Politics MSc

Overview

Climate change has become one of the most defining crises of our time, affecting every corner of the world. From extreme weather to food and water insecurity, the future of our planet relies on qualified specialists to deliver solutions to help combat these problems.

Our Climate Futures Masters will provide you with a holistic understanding of the climate crisis, delivering the scientific, social and political approaches you’ll need to respond creatively and effectively to the unprecedented, complex and dynamic challenges of a changing climate.

The transdisciplinary design of this course means you’ll be engaging with multiple perspectives from world-leading climate experts across the University— giving you a comprehensive and extensive skill set that’ll enable you to challenge failed strategies and provide innovative solutions going forward. You’ll be taught by academics and researchers who are dedicated to providing climate solutions and are directly engaged in a wide variety of groundbreaking research surrounding the climate crisis, meaning you’ll be at the helm of innovations as they happen.

Here at Leeds, we also offer a uniquely active, immersive learning experience with the chance to put theory into practice and get involved in exciting, climate-based projects across the campus, city and beyond.

This means that, once you graduate, you’ll be equipped with the in-depth knowledge, skills and practical experience that’ll empower you to contribute towards meaningful climate action and pursue a challenging yet rewarding career that contributes to sustainable paths for our future.

Learning and teaching

The programme will adopt a blended approach to learning, developing digital offerings alongside immersive face-to-face teaching.

You'll be provided with the basis material you’ll need to give you the core level of knowledge and understanding needed for the course, no matter what your background, followed up with digital materials to assess your own level of learning.

Traditional lecture-style content will be delivered digitally (e.g., as screencasts) and through the reinforcement of clearly structured core preparatory reading that maps onto the online and face-to-face activities directly. Your time with teaching staff will be spent in face-to-face group sessions, including research skills & Continuing Professional Development (CPD) tutorials, challenge-based workshops (e.g. seminars, debates, hackathons, discussions), practical work (e.g. laboratory work, fieldwork and computer-based sessions) and oral/poster presentations.

Assessment

You’ll be assessed using a broad range of methods that will not only test your knowledge but will give you first-hand experience in producing and completing ‘real-world’ tasks. Each assessment has been carefully designed to provide you with diverse opportunities to develop and demonstrate key transferrable skills that will prepare you for your career, whilst gaining deeper insights into the topics being discussed in each module.

Career opportunities

The climate crisis has become one of the greatest challenges of our time. It’s a multidimensional problem that needs to be treated as such to reach holistic solutions for the future.

Because this MSc takes a transdisciplinary approach, you’ll have the broad knowledge base surrounding the three critical areas needed to tackle climate change: climate science, social studies and political systems/theories. You’ll also be equipped with lifelong skills for collaborative problem solving and teamwork. The sheer scope of skills and understanding you’ll learn could give you the edge when you graduate and open a lot of doors in terms of career opportunities in industry.

A bachelor's degree with a 2:1 (hons) in any subject.