Social Studies Degrees

Environmental Studies

The Environmental Studies Program is designed to enhance students’ awareness of the seriousness and complexity of regional and global environmental problems and to underscore the consequences and impacts of the human experience on the habitability of planet Earth.

Our concentrators learn to think, speak, and write clearly and articulately about environmental issues from a variety of perspectives.

The program is located within the Division of University Studies with teaching faculty coming from a number of departments and applying their knowledge and expertise to teaching and research endeavors that cross disciplinary boundaries.

The concentrations in environmental biology, environmental economics, environmental geography, and environmental geology all have a required core of ENST courses that ensures a common experience and an interdisciplinary flavor to the curriculum. At the same time, students gain depth in a particular discipline by taking a specified suite of courses in biology, economics, geography, or geology.

DEGREE REQUIREMENTS
The MA in Environmental Studies
program requires a minimum of
44 credit hours, including corecompetency
courses, an 18 credit
core curriculum within the major,
12-16 elective credits (four
courses), and an exit project.
Students may choose to specialize
in the areas of Policy and
Administration, Environmental
Planning, Environmental
Nonprofit Management, or
Geographic Information Systems.
Prior to graduation, students
complete an exit project, which
may be an applied research report,
an original project design, a policy
analysis and evaluation paper, or a
research project.

Master of Arts in Environmental Studies
INTRODUCTION
The Master of Arts in
Environmental Studies prepares
students for careers in
environmental policy and
management through a broad,
interdisciplinary course of study.
The task at the core of the
graduate Environmental Studies
program is the development of
human institutions, organizations,
and behaviors that restore and
protect the environment, requiring
careful study of both natural and
human systems and their
interdependence.
PROGRAM DESCRIPTION
The program is one of three
interdisciplinary degrees in the
University’s Environmental
Academic Studies Program,
coordinated through the
Environmental Institute. The
mission of the MA program is to
educate students with a core
foundation in environmental
science and environmental policy
for professional careers that will
“bridge the gap” between
environmental scientists and
public policy professionals in
order to protect the integrity,
diversity, and resilience of
existing ecological systems and to
create sustainable human
settlements. The MA degree
consists of four components: core
competencies, core classes,
electives, and an exit project.
Core courses are shared with the
MS in Environmental Science and
the MS in Environmental
Engineering, to allow students
from the three masters programs in
environmental studies, science, and
engineering to interact and learn in a
cross-disciplinary setting. Four
electives may be used to specialize
in a track. Finally, all students
complete an exit project.
RESEARCH
Members of the Master of Arts in
Environmental Studies faculty have
wide-ranging research interests,
including environmental policy,
environmental technology,
environmental land-use planning,
risk analysis, citizen participation,
environmental health, energy
studies, global climate change,
water-resources policy and planning,
brownfields redevelopment, and lake
paleontology. They have published
in leading journals in these fields.
An MA faculty member serves on
the editorial board for the
International Journal of Global
Environmental Issues.