Changing global drivers are eroding ecosystem resilience. As change continues, determining the implications of ecosystem transformations must be coupled with “climate change education” and evidence-based undergraduate biology curricula to train the next generation of scientists. My dissertation addresses each need in turn. First, I use remote sensing and field studies to understand the drivers and effects of poor subalpine forest recovery following large, stand-replacing wildfire in the U.S. Northern Rocky Mountains. I ask: (1) how extensive is forest conversion to sparse or non-forest three decades after the 1988 Yellowstone fires, and what drives its distribution? (2) how does forest conversion affect subalpine forest understory plant communities, aboveground carbon stocks, and the potential for forest recovery? and (3) how do anomalously frequent (125-year fire-return interval) fires alter understory plant communities? I complement these studies with the development and assessment of new undergraduate curricula on systems thinking and biogeochemical cycling, incorporating gameplay and simple simulation modeling to ask: how do student attitudes toward and understanding of the nitrogen cycle change following game- and inquiry-based learning? Subalpine forest conversion 30 years after the 1988 fires was extensive, covering ~41,000 hectares of previously forested area primarily at higher elevations and further from surrounding unburned forest. While much of this area appears “locked in” to sparse or non-forest, other areas may yet recover to forest owing to seed pressure from ex situ and in situ sources. Understory plant communities increasingly resembled meadow communities where tree densities were lowest, and aboveground carbon stock recovery was diminished. Understory communities were also affected by minimal forest recovery following anomalously frequent fire, with shifts toward shade-intolerant species and species from lower elevation zones adapted to drier conditions. Finally, undergraduate students in an intermediate general ecology course self-identified improved attitudes toward and understanding of the nitrogen cycle, largely attributing these changes to gameplay of “The N Game” and active lecture. This research elucidates how changing climate and disturbance will alter forest ecosystems and how evidence-based teaching approaches may help train undergraduate students to address these and other global challenges.