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This website features work from the completion of Phase 1 of the SCALES Project.

We are currently seeking partnerships for Phase 2.

Content Knowledge

  • Your Site and Natural Processes

    This is the second part of a four-part, semester-long project. The first part consisted of finding a site. Now the task is to find evidence on your site of its environmental history and ongoing natural processes. The objective, through the examination of your site and its context, is to explore how natural processes shape cities.

    Read more: Your Site and Natural Processes

  • Select a Site

    In 2016, MIT will celebrate the hundredth anniversary of its move from Boston's Back Bay to the current location in Cambridge. To honor that occasion, this year the class will focus on MIT's former and current neighborhoods, so you should select a site within the designated boundaries in Cambridge or the Back Bay. The site should be between four and eight blocks. Ideally, it should include more than one type of land use. And it should be a place that intrigues you. Reflect on why it interests you, why you are drawn to it. What questions does the place raise, for which you hope to find answers this semester?

    Read more: Select a Site

  • Journals

    In many fields, the journal (or sketchbook, field notebook, or lab book) is an important aid both to the process of research and discovery, and to the documentation of that process and its product, the findings, in more formal papers or books.

    Your journal is a place to begin puzzling out some of the ideas that you will explore further in each of four assignments: Select A Site; Natural Processes; Change Over Time; and Traces and Trends. The first step in preparing to write the journal is to read the guide for that assignment: to familiarize yourself with what the assignment is asking you to do; to figure out what kind of background information and evidence you will need to accomplish that task. You will gather that information and evidence in class discussion, in the required readings, and on field trips.

    Read more: Journals

  • Case Question 6

    Case Write-up Questions
    The following selected case has questions to be addressed and written up. Students should work in teams of three to four. The questions address aspects of the case that need further analysis.

    In one page! What is the solution to the problem of income inequality in a developed nation?

    Read more: Case Question 6

  • Case Question 5

    Case Write-up Questions
    The following selected case has questions to be addressed and written up. Students should work in teams of three to four. The questions address aspects of the case that need further analysis.

    Case: "A Framework to Think About Pollution," Darden UV5687.

    Comment the following Statement: Carbon Tax Markets have the chance to solve the property rights problem that exists in CO2 emissions.

    Read more: Case Question 5

  • Case Question 4

    Case Write-up Questions
    The following selected case has questions to be addressed and written up. Students should work in teams of three to four. The questions address aspects of the case that need further analysis.

    Case: "Reforming Social Security Around the World," Kellogg KEL493.

    Answer for one country only: How would you change the social security system in (US, France, or Japan)?

    Read more: Case Question 4

  • Public Participation and Group Decision-Making

    There is an ongoing debate between political philosophers and dispute resolution professionals regarding the most appropriate means of conceptualizing the public interest (with regards to the use of natural resources or patterns of urban development). The philosophers believe "deliberative polling" that provides a snapshot of what the "average citizen" prefers should be sufficient for elected officials to determine what actions to take in the public interest. Dispute resolution professionals argue the public interest can best be understood as the product of a consensus building dialogue among contending interests (not individuals) and that public officials armed with polling data can never know or produce on their own the public interest.

    Read more: Public Participation and Group Decision-Making

  • Ocean and Climate

    Problem set focused on paleoclimate from the course Climate Physics and Chemistry.

    Read more: Ocean and Climate

  • Final Research Paper

    Students are also responsible for a 20 page research paper exploring an environmental issue in which they are interested and which will be due in the final class. 

    Read more: Final Research Paper

  • Essay 3

    Your third essay, like the second essay, should explore a question or problem that has emerged from your reading. You may not be able to arrive at an answer or a solution, but over the course of your essay, you should at least be able to refine the central question or identify a range of solutions for your problem. By the end of your third essay, your readers should be able to see what they have gained by exploring this question or problem with you. Stay close to the texts as you explore your chosen issue. Do not wander through the theoretical stratosphere.

    Read more: Essay 3

Notice something that doesn’t seem right? Want to make a suggestion or provide feedback about how something is classified? 
Please reach out to esi [at] mit.edu and include SCALES Website in the subject of your email.
Feedback and any actions taken with regards to the feedback, will be shared as they are addressed.