Graduate Course Descriptions - Earth, Environmental and Geographical Sciences

Offered Fall: Yes, Odd Years Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 3-0-2
Prerequisites: GC 100, BI 111 or BI 112, and junior standing.

This course introduces students to the fundamentals of biogeography. Biogeographers are primarily interested in answering questions like “why do organisms live where they do?” and “what are the spatial patterns by which organisms are distributed?” Students will be able to explain, analyze, and interpret vegetation-environment relationships, vegetation dynamics, disturbance ecology, human impacts on plants and animals, dispersal, extinction, and conservation through discussions and readings and then apply their knowledge in field-based lab exercises.

Notes: Field work is required during scheduled lab time.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: Yes Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 3-0-2
Prerequisites: GC 225, BI 412 or DATA 109 or GC 235, and junior standing. 

This course introduces fundamental remote sensing topics essential for monitoring the Earth’s resources and characterizing environmental problems. We examine the interaction of electromagnetic radiation with the Earth’s surface and atmosphere, and the platforms used to observe the Earth system. Students will be able to explain and apply digital image processing techniques and their theoretical underpinnings in the context of aerial images, satellite images, LIDAR, unmanned aerial vehicles, and ground-penetrating radar and make appropriate interpretations.

Notes: Field work may be required. Contact instructor for more information.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 3-0-2
Prerequisites: BI 210 or GC 100 or GC 101, MA 111 or higher, and junior standing, or instructor permission.
Co-requisites: None

Hydrology provides students with an advanced understanding of physical and chemical water properties and how they relate to the Earth and environmental sciences. This course examines storage and transport of water in the ground, on the surface, and in the atmosphere, as well as the human dimensions of water resources, including management, water quality and natural hazards. Students will be able to perform professional hydrological sample collection, data analysis and resource assessment techniques. Students will attend formal lectures infused with informal discussions and applied exercises, and will gain professionally relevant knowledge skills and abilities through field-, analytical-, and computation-based labs.

Notes: Field work may be required. Contact instructor for more information.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: On demand
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0
Graded: A/F

Prerequisites: Graduate standing, or senior standing with instructor permission.
Co-requisites: None

This seminar course provides a broad survey of sustainability science, the discipline that explores how interactions between humans and the environment affect our ability to meet the needs of current and future generations. Students will be introduced to the field’s fundamental themes, current developments and debates, and unresolved questions through critical discussion of literature and presentations. They will begin to integrate ideas from disciplines such as Earth System Science, resource economics, geography, and development studies.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: Yes Offered Summer: No Offered Other: On demand
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0
Graded: A/F

Prerequisites: Graduate standing or senior standing with instructor permission, and GC 501
Co-requisites: None

This course provides graduate students with the skills to develop research proposals that meet either their thesis or project practicum requirements and can attract organizational funding support. Students will explore the general aspects of scientific writing, learn about the review process, and discuss examples of successful and unsuccessful grant proposals. They will then identify a research problem, review existing literature, and develop a draft proposal that will be reviewed and critiqued by their peers.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes, Odd Years Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 3-0-2

Prerequisites: Graduate standing and instructor permission.
Co-requisites: None

This course introduces students to the fundamentals of biogeography. Biogeographers are primarily interested in answering questions like “why do organisms live where they do?” and “what are the spatial patterns by which organisms are distributed?” Students will be able to explain, analyze, and interpret vegetation-environment relationships, vegetation dynamics, disturbance ecology, human impacts on plants and animals, dispersal, extinction, and conservation through discussions and readings and then apply their knowledge in field-based lab exercises.

Notes: Field work is required during scheduled lab time.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes Offered Winter: Yes Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 credits
Hours (Lecture-Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0
Graded: A/F

Prerequisites: Graduate standing.
Co-requisites: None

This unique course introduces students to Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and develops the foundational skills necessary to work with spatial data. Students will learn to acquire, manage, and analyze spatial data, develop technical proficiency in GIS software, critically evaluate methodologies, and consider the ethical uses of spatial data. They will also develop research skills by designing and implementing a research project, exploring a chosen topic, and preparing a professional presentation.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes Offered Winter: Yes Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0
Graded: A/F

Prerequisites: Graduate standing.
Co-requisites: None

The course examines how race, class, and gender have influenced environmental decision-making, and explores how groups of people that have been disproportionately affected by environmental problems have organized to address those issues. We examine how laws and policies contributed to environmental injustice, and how they have been used to achieve environmental and social equity. Students develop deeper understandings of the history of the environmental justice movement, contemporary environmental justice issues, and directions forward for the field.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes, Even Years Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 3-0-2

Prerequisites: Graduate standing and instructor permission.
Co-requisites: None

This course introduces students to fundamental topics in landscape ecology, the field concerned with the analysis of the relationship between ecological processes and spatial patterns on the Earth’s surface at landscape scales. Students will become proficient with key concepts, methods of analysis, and their importance in land management and conservation. Students will use analysis operations and their theoretical underpinnings to explore pattern-process relationships relating to vegetation, climate, habitat fragmentation, fire, and invasive species.

Notes: Field work may be required. Contact instructor for more information.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: Every other year.
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0

Prerequisites: Graduate standing.
Co-requisites: None

This graduate-level course explores gender and the environment from an intersectional perspective. Through case studies ranging from the local to the global scale, we will discuss power, politics, identities, inequalities, social movements and ecological crises. Building upon critical debates and theoretical frameworks from the fields of political ecology, feminist geography, gender and women’s studies, ecological anthropology and environmental sociology, this course strives to engender your analytical and creative abilities to solve gender-based environmental problems at the local scale. In the process, we will further develop professional skill-sets that include communications, writing, programming, design, debate, research and public speaking. 

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: Yes Offered Summer: No Offered Other: No
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 3-0-2

Prerequisites: Graduate standing and instructor permission.
Co-requisites: None

Description: This course introduces fundamental remote sensing topics essential for monitoring the Earth’s resources and characterizing environmental problems. We examine the interaction of electromagnetic radiation with the Earth’s surface and atmosphere, and the platforms used to observe the Earth system. Students will be able to explain and apply digital image processing techniques and their theoretical underpinnings in the context of aerial images, satellite images, LIDAR, unmanned aerial vehicles, and ground-penetrating radar and make appropriate interpretations.

Notes: Field work may be required. Contact instructor for more information.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: every other year
4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0

Co-requisites: None

This course explores historic, economic, political and environmental factors affecting community planning. Students analyze the most pressing issues in community development, including: housing shortage, current demographic, and technological changes in American cities; the possibility for a major urban revitalization; the importance of social equity as a major planning objective; the importance of public participation in the planning process; the role of planners in responding to current major environmental challenges; and planning policies in different countries.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: Yes Offered Winter: Yes Offered Summer: Yes Offered Other: No
2-6 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 0-0-6
Graded: S/U

Co-requisites: None

Internships are increasingly important in preparing students for careers. They help students apply skills and knowledge learned in the classroom to real world situations, explore a given profession and gain practical experience in the working world. Once a student has identified an organization for which they will intern, they will work with their organizational supervisor and the EEGS Department to complete satisfactory documentation detailing their internship experience and performance in order to earn credit.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: Contact department for information.
2-4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0

Co-requisites: None

Special study of problems and/or regions that are not part of the regular offerings.

Notes: Field work may be required. Contact instructor for more information.

View the Catalog entry.

Offered Fall: No Offered Winter: No Offered Summer: No Offered Other: Contact department for information.
1-4 Credits
Hours (Lecture - Discussion - Lab): 4-0-0
Prerequisites: Graduate standing

Directed Studies credit permits students to work with a faculty member on a specialized topic or project that enhances a student’s professional development involving research, practical experience and/or community engagement. Once a student has identified a faculty member who will serve as the instructor of record, they will engage in that work and complete a set of deliverables commensurate with the nature of the topic and number of credits of the course. 

View the Catalog entry.