Ross Climate Week 2025: Bringing Sustainability Into Everyone’s Job Description
Now in its third year, Climate Week at the Ross School of Business is a student-led initiative bringing critical climate and sustainability topics to the forefront of business education through panels, lectures, and workshops designed to empower MBAs to become climate-conscious leaders.
History of Ross Climate Week
Climate Week at Michigan Ross is a week-long series of lectures, panels, and workshops designed to upskill our business students on sustainability topics pertinent to their future careers. This is the third annual Ross Climate Week, specifically focusing on the intersection of sustainability with traditional business functions. The sessions this year included:
- Climate Change 101
- Climate Tech Entrepreneurship Panel
- Responsible Sourcing Panel
- Environmental Finance and Impact Investing Lecture
- Emerging Technologies for Net Zero Lecture
- Emerging ESG and Climate Reporting Lecture
- Every Job is a Climate Job Panel
We had three faculty members participate in the sessions, along with six University of Michigan alums.
The planning team for this year’s Ross Climate Week consisted of six Erb Dual Degree students: Rena Lahn, MBA/MS ’25, Josh Phan-Gruber, MBA/MS ’25, MacKensey King, MBA/MS ’26, Radhika Handa, MBA/MS ’26, Maithilee Kanthi, MBA/MS ’26, and Katelyn Parsons, MBA/MS ’26. Here, Rena and Josh, both third-year Erb students, explain why Ross Climate Week was so important to them.
Why We Got Involved With Ross Climate Week
Rena: Ross Climate Week was created to educate fellow graduate peers on the criticality of environmental challenges and the necessity of interdisciplinary solutions. We need everyone to understand that their work and personal lives are being affected and are affecting the planet around us. Personally, having been on the planning team since the conception of Ross Climate Week, this week of events has proven to kickstart important discussions about how to push for more sustainable solutions, no matter which career path our peers are pursuing post-graduation.
Josh: This was my first year involved in RCW, but it’s something I’d wanted to contribute to for a long time. I believe it’s essential to show that climate literacy isn’t just for sustainability teams, it’s core to leadership across every part of business. There is a real need to bring topics of sustainability and climate into more conversations at the business school, and I wanted to be a part of making that happen.
The Importance of Climate Week
Rena: Not everyone has the ability to do a dual degree (such as Erb students who are pursuing a Master of Business Administration as well as a Master of Science in Environment and Sustainability), yet everyone should understand the tangible ways we, as future business leaders, can engage with climate change. I want my peers to feel comfortable asking about sustainability initiatives, assessing the downstream effects of any changes, and evaluating business decisions more holistically. By combining U-M’s resources and Ross alumni expertise, Ross Climate Week encourages students to become change agents within their organizations.
How Business and Sustainability Work Together
Josh: In many places, solar is now the cheapest power source. The same kind of cost-effective innovation is needed across many sectors to meet urgent climate challenges. Markets are powerful tools for scaling solutions, and when businesses are empowered to think long term and innovate, sustainability and profitability can go hand-in-hand. Climate change is happening now, and business is uniquely positioned to innovate and deploy solutions with speed and scale.
Beyond Ross
Rena: Ross Climate Week has always been completely student-run, but without the wonderful community here, we never would have had the opportunity to put this all together. These sessions were designed to build upon the standard MBA curriculum and to fill any gaps for the average MBA student regarding climate and sustainability issues. We hope that the current MBA population leaves Ross with a better understanding of climate change and that these efforts within the walls of Michigan Ross continue.
