Academic Team:
Shaul Cohen (scohen@uoregon.edu)
First-Year Experience Seminar Instructor
Niha Panjala (npanjala@uoregon.edu)
FIG Assistant
5 credits
UGST 109 First Year Experience Seminar – 1 Credit
CRN: 16238: W: 5:00PM-6:50PM, CAR 121
GEOG 341 Population and Environment- 4 Credits
CRN: 12273: TR: 2:00PM-3:20PM, FEN 110
About the FIG:
The Carnegie Global Oregon Ethics Program is a convocation-to-commencement community for UO students who are interested in exploring the complexities of living and working in ethical ways in a world marked by challenges they encounter in their professional and personal lives. CGO members come from majors throughout the University. The program begins with the Carnegie Global Oregon FIG, and brings first-year students together with continuing sophomore, junior, and senior “Carnegies” to forge a group that transcends backgrounds, interests, and career paths. Now entering its fourteenth year, the CGO has created unique educational opportunities for students, and has fostered a culture of excellence that shapes its members and prepares them for a life of leadership, service, and success, marked by an ongoing pursuit of a more ethical world.
The CGO gathers every week of the academic year in a workshop/discussion format, and after each meeting shares a meal together to continue the conversation, plan service programs, and share information about issues on campus and elsewhere. In addition to its own activities, CGO members regularly participate in special sessions designated for them with guests from campus, across the country, and around the world. A key element of the CGO is this opportunity for small-group engagement with remarkable guests (a partial list can be found at https://carnegieglobal.uoregon.edu/a-history-of-cgo-guests/), among them influential figures from sectors including government, business, the military, finance, the clergy, journalism, and education, and activists from many different spheres.
Deep-Dive FIG: Please note this FIG contains an intermediate course at the 300-level. This course has been vetted by First Year Programs to ensure first-term students can achieve success. The instructor will be available to assist students along the way.
What is a FIG Runway?
Carnegie Global Oregon is a FIG Runway, in which you take a year-long seminar with the same professor and peers. After the fall FIG courses, students enroll in 1-credit seminars in winter and spring to continue exploring the CGO theme. The majority of CGO students remain active in this vibrant learning community throughout their years at the university. This provides a supportive mix for sophomores, juniors, and seniors who meet weekly for class and a meal to explore areas of ethical concern. For more information, visit carnegieglobal.uoregon.edu
GEOG 341 Population and Environment - CoreEd or major satisfying course, 4-credits
This course will focus on the challenges that population growth presents to the world community, particularly in social and environmental terms. It will broach the issue of sustainability: Can the planet support our species given our current behaviors and structures? If so, at what cost to the quality of human and other life? If not, what might be done to rectify our current course?
Population Geography entails much more than these fundamental questions. We will ask why people chose to live where they live (if they have a choice). We will examine those environments in which people have thrived, and try to understand the elements of that success. We will look for common patterns, and the lessons taught by situations which depart from the norm. We will look at evidence of environmental degradation, and try to understand what impacts are caused by population and "over population."
The course draws upon demographic statistics, philosophical arguments, environmental analyses, and the world around us. We will read and discuss the theories of Thomas Malthus, Karl Marx, Antonio Gramsci, Peter Singer, Garret Hardin, Paul Ehrlich, Ester Boserup, and others, but in an accessible manner.
Meet Your FIG Assistant and Instructor!