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By LORI BENNEAR, Stanback Dean, Nicholas School of the Environment

When I first came to Duke more than 20 years ago, I was drawn to the Nicholas School by many of the same things that define it today: a deep commitment to interdisciplinary inquiry, collaborative colleagues, exceptional students, and a determination to tackle environmental problems that matter.

Those problems have only become more complex.

Climate change, the energy transition, threats to human and planetary health, biodiversity loss, and pressures on our oceans and coasts do not fit neatly within traditional academic boundaries. They are simultaneously scientific, technological, economic, policy, and human challenges. Solving them requires us to understand not only how natural systems work, but also how people, institutions, markets, and technologies interact with those systems.

The Nicholas School is made for problems that defy simple solutions.

Our faculty bring deep expertise across the physical, biological, technical, and social sciences. We are home to climate scientists and ecologists, oceanographers and geoscientists, toxicologists and environmental health researchers, economists and policy experts, and scholars working on energy systems, technology, conservation, and governance.

That breadth is unusual. But our real strength is not simply that all of those experts are here. It is that we bring them together.

The Nicholas School is interdisciplinary by design. Our faculty and students work across fields to ask questions that no single discipline can answer on its own. We connect fundamental discovery with applied research, policy, and practice. And we work with communities, governments, nongovernmental organizations, and the private sector to develop, test, and refine solutions that can make a difference in the world.

We are now building on that strength by accelerating research in four broad areas where the Nicholas School has exceptional expertise and the opportunity for even greater impact: the energy transition; climate science and nature-based solutions; environmental and planetary health; and oceans and coastal systems. These areas reflect both the urgency of the environmental challenges before us and the distinctive capabilities of our faculty.

This same interdisciplinary approach shapes how we educate our students. Nicholas School students learn to work across disciplinary boundaries, to understand environmental problems from multiple perspectives, and to translate knowledge into action. They study and conduct research in Durham, the Duke Forest, and at the ÌÇÐÄ´«Ã½ Marine Laboratory, and through partnerships that extend across Duke and around the world.

Our students increasingly arrive with interests that span the university itself—biology and economics, computer science and conservation, engineering and public policy, health and the environment. That breadth is not incidental to a Nicholas School education. It is central to it.

Much has changed since I first arrived at Duke. Our science has become more sophisticated, our partnerships have expanded, and the environmental challenges facing society have become more urgent. But the fundamental strength of the Nicholas School remains remarkably consistent: we bring together people with different forms of expertise to understand complex environmental problems and develop solutions that work in the real world.

That was what drew me to the Nicholas School more than two decades ago. It is what makes serving as dean such a privilege today. And it is why I remain extraordinarily optimistic about what this community can accomplish.