Earth and Environmental Sciences - PhD

The EES Department offers a graduate program linked to nationally prominent research in key areas of Earth & Environmental Science. Our internationally recognized faculty work closely with students on their research projects and offer engaging and cutting-edge graduate courses. Active research discussion groups, weekly departmental lunches and seminars, and an annual graduate student research symposium all facilitate broad discussion, collaboration, and a dynamic intellectual environment.

EES offers both the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Earth and Environmental Sciences. Under a broad Earth-systems umbrella, students do basic research in many of the subdisciplines of ecology, environmental science, biogeochemistry, geology, geochemistry, and geophysics. The M.S. requires at least 24 credit hours of coursework, a total of 30 credits, and a thesis that we expect to be of publishable quality. The Ph.D. requires additional credit hours (depending on your entry level), and of course a dissertation, on the road to which there are two exams designed to assess, respectively, your overall training (qualifying exam), and your specialized expertise relevant to your dissertation proposal (proposal defense).

Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES) is a diverse department that blends contributions from geologists, ecologists, and environmental scientists. Its goal is to stimulate learning about the fundamental physical, chemical, geological, and biological processes that shape Earth’s natural environment. It seeks to promote understanding of Earth systems and their components by supporting geological and biological study of how these systems function and interact.

The department’s fundamental work lies in basic research and field-based experiential education, but it also actively cooperates with other students and scholars to examine the ramifications of human interaction with the environment.