ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.—The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded the Bard College Environmental and Urban Studies (EUS) Program a $621,000 grant to support the continued development of the EUS program on the Annandale campus. The program’s innovative curriculum integrates the study of living and built environments with the environmental and social sciences, and provides students with unique research and internship opportunities in the Hudson Valley.

“The EUS Program’s potential is extraordinary because of the resources of our natural and built local environment, and because of the resources of affiliated institutions such as the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, and the presence in the Hudson Valley of practitioners in the field,” said Dean Michèle Dominy, speaking on behalf of Bard’s presidentially-appointed Environmental Commission. “The support from the Mellon Foundation will provide funding for a dedicated administrative/faculty director to help the program realize this potential. Funds will also support courses taught by local practitioners, student internships, and conference travel, as well as faculty course development.”

The Environmental and Urban Studies (EUS) major at Bard focuses on empirical studies to provide students with skills to understand the interconnectivity of living and constructed systems. This approach capitalizes on transformations within an array of social and natural sciences, from systems theory to environmental toxicology, and furthers Bard’s holistic approach to ecology and development through studies of the Hudson River estuary and valley, using the river as a laboratory for an integrated understanding of global environmental transformation. EUS is linked to Hudsonia and the Bard College Field Station on campus, the Bard Globalization and International Affairs Program in New York City, and a rich variety of internship, junior year abroad, and local programs. Students also draw on resources at the Bard Center for Environmental Policy, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, Cary Institute, and The Rockefeller University laboratories.