A New M.S. in Climate Program Focuses on Disaster Management

The Columbia Climate School recently announced its new master’s degree program: the M.S. in Climate, a two-year, 50-credit degree for young and mid-career professionals as well as future academics who want to become climate leaders at the community, state, national and international levels.

The program, which will kick off in fall 2025, features advanced certificate options in Climate and Disaster Management, Climate Systems and Analytics, and Climate and Food Systems, to offer students an in-depth exploration of these key areas.

We sat down with Jeffrey Schlegelmilch, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at the Columbia Climate School, to hear more about the Climate and Disaster Management certificate and the opportunities it will offer across sectors.

Tell us a bit about the main goals of the certificate in Climate and Disaster Management and how it fits into the M.S. program.

The certificate in Climate and Disaster Management recognizes that when we look at the impacts of disasters as well as their relationship to climate change and climate impacts, there’s really no sector that is spared or that doesn’t have some shared responsibility—whether it’s finance, sustainable development, nonprofits, humanitarian organizations, governance structures. They’re all part of the potential solutions for addressing climate-related disasters.

We’re designing the certificate to provide a well-rounded, holistic understanding of this relationship between climate change—and the climate more generally—and disasters, along with the various sectors of civil society and types of partnerships that are needed to create more robust, three-dimensional solutions to the challenges that we face.

Which subject areas will be covered and what kind of courses will this certificate include?

We will have a survey course on climate and disaster management, where each week will be a module focused on a different aspect of disaster management. For example, we have a module focused on administrative structures, or how we organize to respond to disasters. We have one focused on climate and disaster. We have one focused on equity, social vulnerability and disasters, behavioral health and how that factors in technology research methods. Each week of the course will offer a different block from the building blocks that come together to form a holistic perspective on disasters.

Other courses will do a bit of a deeper dive. We have one course on applied disaster research methods. In other words, how do we take different quantitative and qualitative approaches and apply them in the context of disaster research? We have a course on post-disaster economic and housing recovery, which are big drivers on what happens after a disaster, on how communities recover and how well they do. We have an additional course on building equitable community partnerships. We’re really trying to take that theme of equity and suffuse it through all of our courses.

We’re developing another course in the area of disaster finance. How do we pay for disasters during economic loss, through grants and government spending? There are new emerging financial vehicles for all of this, so this will be a brand-new course.

We’re also working across some of the other certificate areas to look at where we can have different, shared electives. There’s a lot of overlap between the disaster and climate adaptation themes with some of the other certificate areas, and we want to build on those overlaps. 

Who do you see as the ideal candidates for this program?

That’s what I really love about this program: It has such a diversity of people in it. If you look at other existing disaster management programs, they are designed around preparing people to be emergency managers or risk managers, which is very important. But at the end of the day, the emergency manager or the risk manager, they’re working with their organization’s leadership, or the private sector, or the nonprofits are working with all of these other facets of civil society. Because of the nature of the Climate School and the students that we attract, we get the whole circle of people around the emergency manager as well, including some folks who do want to serve in that emergency management role.

What happens in all of these other areas that we rely upon to coordinate with, to function and to support these ideas of climate adaptation and climate resilience? We will have a diversity of students from those backgrounds too.

It seems like a little bit of a cop out for me to say there really isn’t an ideal student, but I mean that sincerely. I think the courses and the curriculum benefit from having that diversity of representation—professionally and in all other ways—because it means we’re really engaging in discussions and bringing in value, opinions, expertise of the students from their varied experiences, and the discussions are providing a more holistic and three-dimensional understanding of how this all comes together.

What will this certificate add to the existing options available at the Climate School?

In the course I teach on disaster management, I always ask my students on the first day, why are you taking this course? And for roughly two-thirds of them, it’s always an answer, like, ‘I don’t know, but this seems really important.’ Then they’ll usually talk about how they’ve experienced a disaster, they’ve witnessed it from a close relative, or maybe they’re just seeing it on TV and they’re two or three degrees removed. Some come in with a very clear understanding of what they want to do, but the majority sense that it’s something important and want to learn more about it.

It’s okay if you don’t know exactly what you want to do with it. I think simply recognizing that this is an important part of the future that we’re looking at, and that we welcome and value all of the expertise that we bring in as educators. And the students bring an expertise based on their experiences and their perspectives. It’s really a lot of fun harnessing that.

In this program, we also do a lot of very practical exercises that are drawn from our experiences and working with partners in the field, and really try to create as many opportunities as possible for this program to be not just theoretical, but represent how we actually apply these lessons in the messiness of the real world.

Do you have any advice for students who might be considering this program?

All I would say is take full advantage of being in New York City, being at Columbia, being among such a diverse group of faculty and students. You don’t have to know precisely where you want to go with your career, but if you have a general direction, take advantage of the opportunities that are available to explore and participate with different groups.