南伊利諾斯大學艾德華茲維爾分校

Environmental Sciences at SIUE

The mission of the environmental sciences program is to cultivate students’ perspectives of environmental issues and provide students with refined knowledge of environmental issues at the local, regional and global scale. The program will increase the student’s technical competence in addressing and analyzing these issues, their origins, ramifications and resolutions. The environmental sciences program at SIUE is designed to enhance and promote professional education and career opportunities in a wide area of interests.

Faculty from several departments in the College of Arts and Sciences provide mentoring, direction and instruction. Practicing professionals also lend their expertise to this program. A close relationship is maintained with industries and environmental agencies so that both students and faculty members can incorporate real-world issues in their studies and research.

The program offers challenging environmental research opportunities, which may be related to the campus, home, municipality, business and industry, state or federal government, consulting firms, and various advocacy groups. The department has access to a variety of instrumentation, such as an atomic absorption spectrometer, an Inductively-Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometer, computer access to Geographical Information System, several gas and liquid chromatographs, a mass spectrometer, nanoparticle analyzer, carbon-nitrogen-sulfur analyzer, a variety of sampling equipment (automated water samplers, low and high volume air samplers, several soil and sediment coring devices) and a LI-COR 6400 photosynthesis system.

Emphasis Options

Environmental Biology

Required core courses (8-9 hours): ENSC 505, 506, 510, and a 3- or 4- hour 400- or 500-level statistics course
Thesis (1-6 hours): ENSC 599 or Final Research Paper (1-3 hours): ENSC 597
Required emphasis courses (9 hours): ENSC 540, 550, and either ENSC 528/528L or 520
Electives: 9 hours minimum

Career Opportunities

Students completing the graduate program in environmental sciences have career opportunities with governmental agencies, private industries, consulting firms and educational institutions. Areas of responsibility may include environmental field or laboratory research and analysis, environmental policy and law, environmental remediation, solid and hazardous waste management, groundwater pollution control, water management, air quality management, environmental and ecological risk assessments, and restoration environmental engineering. According to a recent report by the U.S. Department of Labor, employment of environmental scientists and specialists is projected to grow 11 percent through 2024, which is faster than the average for all occupations in the United States.