This course will not be offered W10 

This course will examine how climate change is affecting nature-based tourism, conservation and sustainable development in the Virgin Islands. It is a comparative course that will contrast conditions in two U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI - St. Thomas and St. John) and two British Virgin Islands (BVI - Tortola and Virgin Gorda).  Students in the course will examine the following questions:  Is nature-based tourism on small island territories sustainable?How does tourism impact the natural resources being commoditfied?  How does tourism affect the local economies? That is, is there a trickle-down effect?  Is there an informal sector to the economy – how does it operate?  How do the islands deal with issues like solid waste disposal, recycling, access to fresh water, protection of natural areas and biodiversity, energy, land use, and sustainable development?  What is the impact of in- and out-migration on these economies?  Can these economies be diversified? What is the social and economic structure of these islands like?  The price of land and how is it distributed? This course will be taught in Ann Arbor but it will have a mandatory field trip component in the Virgin Islands. The bulk of the class meetings will occur in the first half of the semester. Regular classes will be held in Ann Arbor on Tuesdays and Thursdays in January and February.  There will be a field trip to the Virgin Islands during spring break to visit field sites and examine the issues discussed in this course in more detail.  Daily discussions of assigned readings, etc. will occur during this time as well.  All the readings and topics for discussion will be completed by the end of the spring break field trip.  We will be based on St. Thomas and make day-trips to the other islands.  After returning from the field trip in early March students will work on their research papers.  There won't be regular class meetings till April when students re-group to discuss and report on the results of their papers.