Every GRS student moves through the same foundational sequence — a deliberately structured arc that takes you from orientation to capstone, with real-world experience built in along the way rather than tacked on at the end. In your first years you'll build the conceptual foundation of the major — understanding what global resource systems are, the issues shaping them, and the frameworks used to analyze them. As you move into upper-level coursework, that foundation gets applied across agricultural, food, natural resource, and socioeconomic systems, developing the cross-disciplinary lens GRS is built around.

GRS requires proficiency in a single world language through the intermediate level — the equivalent of four semesters of coursework (1010, 1020, 2010, and 2020). Language isn't just a graduation checkbox here. It's a practical tool for the international work GRS students do — in communities, organizations, and field settings where showing up with some fluency changes what's possible.

Fifteen credits of coursework focused on the world outside the United States — drawing from history, politics, sociology, economics, religious studies, anthropology, and related fields. The goal is to build genuine fluency in how the world works beyond a U.S. lens: the forces, systems, and perspectives that shape communities, economies, and environments elsewhere. Up to three credits can be earned through faculty-led travel courses, and the University's International Perspective list is your guide to what qualifies.

See the International Perspective List

Every GRS senior completes an independent research project — a sustained, faculty-mentored inquiry into a topic of your choosing within global resource systems. If research is part of your plan, this is your chance to go deep, develop real methodology skills, and build a foundation for graduate study. If research isn't your path, it still matters: the skills you build — asking precise questions, synthesizing complex information, making a defensible argument, and communicating findings clearly — are exactly what employers across every sector are looking for. Either way, you'll graduate with a piece of work you can point to.

GRS closes with a team-based capstone course where you'll work alongside your peers to develop responses to real challenges in global resource systems. After four years of building your own knowledge and skills, this is where you put them to work collectively — applying systems thinking, drawing on your area of specialization, and producing solutions that reflect the full depth of what the major has prepared you to do.

GRS is an interdisciplinary major by design — which means it requires a strong technical foundation in a specific field to give that breadth somewhere to land. Every GRS student completes a second major, minor, or certificate in an approved area of their choosing, building the domain expertise that makes their systems-thinking skills actionable. Options span a wide range of fields, from agriculture and environmental science to economics, political science, public health, and beyond. Some careers require accredited degrees in a specific field — if that's your path, talk to both your GRS advisor and your specialization advisor early to make sure your plan lines up.

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The international internship is the defining experience of the GRS degree — five or more weeks embedded with a host organization anywhere in the world, doing real professional work in your area of specialization. It's not a study tour. It's not short-term volunteering. It's structured, supervised, and academically supported before, during, and after through two dedicated courses: GLOBE 3200 prepares you to go, and GLOBE 3210 helps you make sense of what you experienced when you return.

Learn More About the GLOBE Internship