Environmental Scientist definition

The Departments of Biology, Engineering, and Mathematics & Statistics, in collaboration with other departments, offer a special major in Environmental Science. The Environmental Science major consists of a series of prerequisite courses, core courses, several elective courses for the major, and a thesis. Each Environmental Science major will take at least six credits in a primary department, which can be Biology, Engineering or Mathematics & Statistics. Students in this major are advised by the chair of the Environmental Science committee and a faculty member from the primary department.

Note: An interdisciplinary minor in Environmental Studies is described in the Course Catalog (available here and ) By definition, a minor consists of at least five courses in the area of concentration and a culminating exercise such as a comprehensive examination, senior thesis or capstone seminar.

All students majoring in Environmental Science must complete the following prerequisites and core program:

Prerequisite courses

CHEM 010 Introductory Chemistry
CHEM 022 Organic Chemistry (Chemistry 32: Organic Chemistry II recommended)
Two Mathematics or Statistics courses (not including MATH 001 or 003); STAT 011 recommended.
BIOL 001 Cellular and Molecular Biology
BIOL 002 Organismal and Population Biology

Core courses

BIOL 036 Ecology
ENGR 004A Introduction to Environmental Protection (or ENGR. 057 & 066)
POLS 043 Environmental Policy and Politics
ECON 076 Environmental Economics

Elective courses

Students whose primary department is Biology must take three credits in Biology from the courses listed below. Students whose primary department is Engineering must take Engineering 032, 057 & 066 and two more of the Engineering courses listed below (an independent project in Engineering may substitute for one of these), and at least one Math course listed below (Math 027 & 33 are recommended). Students whose primary department is Mathematics and Statistics must take four of the Math courses listed below, including Math 027 & 033. In addition, majors in Environmental Science must take at least two courses (in addition to those from the primary department) from the following list:

Senior paper or thesis

All Environmental Science special majors write a thesis (1 or 2 credits) to be read by two faculty who are participating in the program, at least one of whom is in the student's primary department.

Goals

The thesis (SP 096) satisfies the senior comprehensive requirement for the special major in Environmental Science. The objectives of the thesis are to demonstrate the student's ability to:

1) Conduct a careful, independent literature search on a current topic using primary sources;

2) Write a critical review of current publications, addressed to readers who are ecologists and/or environmental scientists and written at the technical level of sophistication of a Special Feature article appearing in the journal Ecology;

3) Demonstrate an integrated understanding of ecological issues in light of current social, political and economic contexts;

4) Identify a problem of current environmental concern and present a management strategy that takes into account both biological and socio-political/economic realities.

Selection of a topic

The topic should be selected early in the first semester of the senior year.

1) The student must select a topic that is amenable to comprehensive treatment. The chosen topic must be examined from both biological and management perspectives.

2) The topic should be selected from areas of student interest and developed in consultation with faculty.

3) The topic may be a literature review and synthesis, a field research project, or a combination of the two, as agreed on in discussions with faculty.

Format

Noncompliance with the following standards will adversely affect the evaluation of the paper. Books on scientific writing, e.g. Pechenik (2010) or Day and Gastel (2006) (available in Cornell Library), should be consulted frequently.

1) Title. The paper must have a brief, informative title that clearly identifies the subject matter.

2) Format. The paper must be typed, double-spaced, with one-inch (2.5cm) margins (top, bottom, right, and left). Use Palatino or Times-Roman 12 point type.