Sustainability is about choices made within specific environmental, economic, social, and cultural contexts. Sustainability scholarship involves creating, integrating and harnessing new knowledge to protect and improve social and natural systems and their interactions. The Department of Community Sustainability (CSUS) is an interdisciplinary department that addresses contemporary issues of sustainability in agriculture, recreation, natural resources, and the environment. The Department of Community Sustainability (CSUS) was formerly called the Department of Community, Agriculture, Recreation, and Resource Studies (CARRS).
Consistent with its mission to assist in the development of sustainable communities, the department offers three undergraduate majors linked by a common core in community sustainability. These three majors - Environmental Studies and Sustainability (ESS); Sustainable Parks, Recreation and Tourism (SPRT); and Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources Education (AFNRE) – share a set of courses centered on community sustainability. The CSUS graduate program offers two graduate majors: Community Sustainability (MS and PhD) and Sustainable Tourism and Protected Areas Management (MS and PhD). In both undergraduate and graduate programs, CSUS embraces international as well as domestic applications, engagement, and opportunities.
Undergraduate
CSUS undergraduate programs are designed to educate scholars and practitioners who are able to create, integrate and harness new knowledge to protect and improve both social and natural systems.
Graduate
CSUS offers three graduate degree programs to prepare scholar-activists interested in sustainability, recreation and tourism, food systems, agriculture education and international development for research, community engagement and knowledge production.
Featured in the News
-
How professors remember your name: the strategy and science behind memorization
Published on September 21, 2023 by The State News
-
Michigan's free well water testing program runs out of funds
Published on September 17, 2023 by The State News
-
Op/Ed: My adolescent daughter had a rare form of cancer. Here's what we think caused it.
Published on August 10, 2023 by Indy Star
-
Michigan State University receives seed funding for sustainable agriculture collaborations
Published on July 28, 2023 by Michigan Farm News
-
Right-Wing Think Tank's Climate 'Battle Plan' Wages 'War Against Our Children's Future'
Published on July 26, 2023 by Common Dreams
Events
-
Oct 16
CSUS Hamm-Norris Seminar Series- Maria Claudia Lopez & Cavallini Igor Johansen
October 16, 2023 12:00PM – 1:00PM Natural Resources Building Room 338 or Zoom
Join the CSUS department for the Hamm-Norris seminar series where CSUS community members share about their latest scholarship and research. October 16th features Maria Claudia Lopez & Cavallini Igor Johansen.
-
Nov 1
CSUS Hamm-Norris Seminar Series- CRFS
November 1, 2023 1:00PM – 2:00PM Natural Resources Building Room 338 or Zoom
Join the CSUS department for the Hamm-Norris seminar series where CSUS community members share about their latest scholarship and research. November 1st features a team from the Center for Regional Food Systems.
-
Nov 29
CSUS Hamm-Norris Seminar Series- Jake White & Doug Bessette
November 29, 2023 12:00PM – 1:00PM Natural Resources Building Room 338 or Zoom
Join the CSUS department for the Hamm-Norris seminar series where CSUS community members share about their latest scholarship and research. November 29th features Jake White and Doug Bessette.