The College will establish the Climate and Community Leaders Initiative (CCL) in collaboration with Williams-Mystic in fall 2025, Dean of the College Gretchen Long and Executive Director of Williams-Mystic Tom Van Winkle announced in a Feb. 13 email to the classes of 2027 and 2028. According to its website, the program will provide students with specialized climate-focused opportunities throughout their time at the College.
Students will generally join the program as rising sophomores and spend a semester at Williams-Mystic, followed by a program-specific Winter Study experience during their first year in the program and a paid summer internship. Participants will also have the opportunity to present at an on-campus research summit in their junior or senior year, according to the initiative’s website. For the inaugural cohort, entry to the program is open to rising sophomores and juniors, but Van Winkle said it will likely be limited to rising sophomores in future years in an interview with the Record.
According to Long, planning for the initiative came out of discussions about Williams-Mystic’s future, following the program’s proposed closure last year. “As we work for Williams-Mystic’s future, a central priority is to boost enrollment from Williams students,” Long wrote in an email to the Record.
The program combines a focus on the environment with career preparation. “I’m trying to ensure that the Williams-Mystic program and Community Climate Leaders really meets the strategic goals of the College, and this effort does that,” Van Winkle said.
While the CCL program is grounded in the study of climate change and coastal resiliency, it is geared toward students of a variety of academic backgrounds, Van Winkle said. “An economics major might explore sustainable investment strategies with SeaAhead [an ocean-focused venture capital firm], analyzing how financial policy can support ocean conservation measures,” he said. “An English major might decide to use their storytelling skills in an internship for an environmental nonprofit, creating … advocacy campaigns that elevate the voices of coastal communities.”
“The Williams-Mystic Program, and the Climate and Community Leaders Initiative will give our students the chance to learn from multiple perspectives … combined with a strong experiential learning component that has been a highlight of the Williams-Mystic program,” Long wrote.
Regardless of whether they study at Mystic in the spring or fall, students will enroll in a Winter Study experience focused on leadership and climate advocacy during their first year in the program, Van Winkle said.
Students will then work in paid internships organized by the program for the following summer, with the option to continue them for a second summer, according to Van Winkle.
“As we get to know the student [at Mystic]… We will work … with [them] to set them up [with] paid internships for the following summer,” Van Winkle said.
Van Winkle said that, in addition to offering students new experiential learning opportunities, the initiative will help first-year and sophomore students complete the complete the College’s degree requirements. “This is a way to check all those boxes in these different divisional requirement areas, do it as a sophomore, and still have the opportunity to do other things later on,” he said.
The application, which is available this year to first-years and sophomores, opened on Monday, Feb. 17, and will close March 17. All applicants will receive interviews before decisions are made by the end of March, according to Van Winkle.
He said that supporting the program will be a significant task for the small staff at Williams-Mystic. “This is going to be a pretty significant administrative lift, in addition to all the other things that we do,” he said. “It’s promise a little, deliver a lot, and do really well with our initial students.”
From Van Winkle’s perspective, the work will be worthwhile. “We have a lot of work to do to create an environment that is going to be sustainable for … generations to come,” he said. “I think that we need really smart people leading the charge.”
“If you want to make a difference in the world, if you want to make a difference in the environment, this is the kind of program that you’re going to really be stoked about,” he added.
