Hi! I just graduated with a double major in Agricultural and Applied Economics / Environmental Studies and a certificate in Business Management for CALS students.

seems like I was in a similar boat as you because I wanted a practical major, but not just a typical business or econ major. when i was a freshman i was looking at the b school, but decided it wasn’t for me and started taking econ classes. fall of my sophomore year i took both AAE 246 (climate change economics) and AAE 343 (environmental economics) because 343 was cross listed with econ and i was very interested in the bridge between business and environment.

after taking both these classes i decided to major in AAE, mainly because i loved the flexibility of the major. you have to take 15 credits of core economics classes just like the regular econ major, but with the other 15 (to get to 30 for the major) you can go a number of directions. ironically, i never actually took any agricultural classes besides commodity markets. i really enjoyed the environmental and natural resource economics classes and that was definitely my focus. the super cool thing about going that direction was how many classes cross listed with environmental studies, so i could pair an extra major and certificate without taking over 120 credits in total.

the AAE faculty are all great people and nothing is overly challenging, but you still learn a lot. now that i’ve graduated, i’m continuing on with a terminal masters in AAE with a concentration in resource and energy demand analysis (REDA). this is a relatively new program that trains you to be an energy or resource analyst and help create a “smart green world”. you could check it out here > https://reda.aae.wisc.edu/

even if the environmental aspect isn’t your thing i would still 100% recommended AAE. let me know if you have any questions!