Ashley School of Global Development and the Environment

A Nexus for Environmental Problem-Solving

The Ashley School at Cornell CALS is a dynamic hub for addressing complex challenges facing people and the planet in the 21st century. Emphasizing education with impact, we contribute our broad interdisciplinary expertise to pioneer practical solutions, emphasizing real-world engagement with communities in New York state and more than 30 countries around the globe to improve lives and livelihoods and promote environmental stewardship.

This is our global perspective on how we support society.

As the only Ivy League university with a Land-Grant mission, we uniquely integrate world-class research and education with community engagement in service of the public good. Our faculty, students and partners coalesce around urgent themes – from climate resilience and biodiversity loss to sustainable agriculture and food system transformation – working with stakeholders to create solutions that are locally grounded and globally relevant.

Leveraging our two distinguished sections – Global Development and Natural Resources and the Environment – the school takes a transdisciplinary approach to integrate ecological science, social innovation and community engagement to foster sustainable, resilient and prosperous futures.

Collaborating across disciplines

Disciplines coming together to solve problems across the world

With a focus on global development and natural resources and the environment, the new school is a dynamic hub for addressing complex challenges facing people and the planet in the 21st century.

Explore our sections

A man speaks to students standing in a field of crops

Our dynamic learning atmosphere and academic culture goes beyond purely technical work to provide deep analysis and transformative solutions.

Fragments and sheets of ice breaking apart on Oneida Lake

We bring together faculty, students and partners from across Cornell and beyond to address interconnected environmental and societal challenges.

A dog, dog handler, and researcher inspect a row of grape vines for spotted lanternfly.

Our outreach model centers community stakeholders in every phase of the research process, ensuring relevance and real-world impact.

By the numbers

600

Undergraduate students

140

Graduate students

107

Faculty

News

Historic gift endows Cornell CALS Ashley School

The Department of Global Development and the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment have been combined to establish a new school: the Cornell CALS Ashley School of Global Development and the Environment.

Read the full story on the Cornell Chronicle

Illustration of the Earth in green with photo of cows grazing on the left side and crops on the right side

News

July 15, 2026

The diet that could remake modern agriculture

New study asserts that systematic change in food production and consumption requires real political capital and will.

Cornell Atkinson
Ashley School of Global Development and the Environment
Agriculture

News

June 11, 2026

Patrick Webb, renowned international scholar, to lead Ashley School

Patrick Webb, a globally influential scholar of nutrition, food and agriculture policy, and humanitarian assistance, will join Cornell July 1 as the inaugural executive director of the Ashley School of Global Development and the Environment in...

Ashley School of Global Development and the Environment
Global Development Section
Natural Resources and the Environment Section

Yuqing Chen, a doctoral student and the study’s first author, searches for and counts baby oysters attached to shells in trays in Yonkers, New York.

News

June 9, 2026

Farmed oysters may boost New York’s dwindling wild populations

A new study offers genetic evidence and proof that farmed eastern oysters are adding to and breeding with wild eastern oyster populations in the western and central Long Island Sound.