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Geography shares a common root word, geo, and also highlights the application of spatialized thinking in social and natural environments, from local to global scales of analysis. Geography is composed of both physical and human geography. Especially physical geography shares some aspects with the geosciences, however, the geosciences program includes deep time (i.e., the longer timescales that impact deeper Earth layers), all Earth layers, and other planetary bodies. 

Geosciences course offerings are complementary to Geography and Geography majors, especially when focusing on physical Geography, can apply Geoscience courses and vice versa. 

Geography and Geosciences are available as a B.A., which puts more focus on broader interests as you will explore a minor as well. Geosciences also is available as a B.S. degree, which emphasizes the context of STEM disciplines.

The programs have synergies and similarities, but differ in focus, school/college and offered degrees.

Focus

Geosciences is interdisciplinary and offers instruction on the interconnectedness of the Earth layers, providing an Earth systems lens to your STEM education at ����̽̽. Fields of study include: 

1. Solid Earth processes and materials.
2. Land-surface processes and interactions.
3. Atmospheric and climatological processes – all of which include how living things, including humans, interact with the Earth and other planetary systems.
    

Environmental Studies and Sciences are also interdisciplinary programs with a systems lens, but at timescales that are adapted to the living world (typically decades). For environmental studies, the explicit focus is on environmental sustainability and justice. Environmental sciences typically exclude the explicit study of rocks or the Earth and other planetary bodies, but instead focusses on the ecosystem context in shallow Earth layers including vegetation and soil. 

College/school

Additionally, Geosciences and Environmental Studies are offered through the College of Arts and Sciences, while Environmental Science is offered through the Rubenstein School. This means that school/college-specific course requirements vary greatly.

Degree/program

• Geosciences is available as Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Sciences degree and we also offer a minor.
• Environmental Studies is available as Bachelor of Arts degree and also offers a minor.
• Environmental Science is available as Bachelor of Sciences degree, there is no minor.
• Additionally, Geosciences is a comparatively small program. If you are interested in studying the Earth or environment with the geosciences focus, the smaller cohort of students and close relationships with faculty are an added bonus!

Due to the interdisciplinary nature of our programs, our department offers a wide range of classes. Courses benefit students who are still deciding on their major or who are majoring in another discipline. For example, if you are a student who is interested in economics or business, Geography of the Global Economy will be of interest to you. If you are a student interested in political science, take a political geography class. Want to learn more about weather, climate, and the Earth system? Enroll in the introductory Weather Climate and Landscapes class, Environmental Geology, or Earth through time.

On average, the department has 80 majors and 65 minors. Geoscience is a new program and we do not have the final numbers yet, but they are in the double digits. This makes our department a place where we know our students as well as they know us.

Currently, there are twelve full-time faculty, four lecturers, and two research faculty members. We represent the range of different fields of geography and geosciences and are accomplished teacher-scholars. By this, we mean that our faculty are not professors who hide away in labs or are locked behind their office doors. They are actively involved in both teaching and research. We encourage undergraduate students to become involved in their research and provide excellent support to students who are interested in conducting their own research. See our faculty profiles to learn more.

We have many courses that satisfy catamount core requirements. Here are some examples:

• GEOG/GEOL 1010. Topics In: First-Year Seminar. WIL1. 
• GEOG 1014. Topics In: FYS: Sustainability. SU, WIL1.
• GEOL 1025. Topics In: LASP Seminar. Mountains to Lake 0 or 4 Credits.N2. 
• GEOL 1040. Interdisciplinary Earth. N1, QD, SU. 
• GEOL 1100. Earth Through Time. N1. 
• GEOG 1200. Weather, Climate & Landscapes. N1
• GEOL 1400. Environmental Geology. N2.
• GEOG 1760. Global Environments & Cultures. D2, S1, SU.
• GEOG 1770. Geography/Race&Ethnicity in US. D1, S1.
• GEOG 1780. Society, Place, and Power. S1, SU.
• GEOL 2105. Earth Materials. N2, SU.  
• GEOL 2405. Environmental Geochemistry. N1, OC. 
• GEOL 2410. Geohealth. N1. 
• GEOL 2525. Geocomputing. QD. 
• GEOL 2605. Mars, Moons & Asteroids. 3 Credits. N1. 
• GEOL 3105. Earth Materials w/lab. N2, SU. 
• GEOL 3405. Environmental Geochem w/lab. N2, OC. 

This has historical reasons: once upon a time we were housed in different departments (Department of Geography = GEOG prefixes and Department of Geology = GEOL prefixes). We merged in 2022 to form the Department of Geography and Geosciences, but the course prefixes stayed the same because many of the same courses continue to be taught. Note that all GEOL courses and some GEOG courses count for the Geosciences program, and all GEOG courses count for the Geography program. See the full course list and the additional information for the major to learn more.

You can indeed study rocks, but also air, water, plants, soil, and more. Geosciences is interdisciplinary and emphasizes the interconnectedness of the earth's layers. Our program fields of study include i) solid Earth processes and materials, ii) land-surface processes and interactions, and iii) atmospheric and climatological processes. All of this includes how living things, including humans, interact with the Earth and other planetary systems.

Our program emphasizes flexibility and interdisciplinarity with offerings within our department and across campus.

Majors and minors will take foundational and core courses (see details here [add the webpage]), and majors will further take electives and ancillary courses.

1. Foundational courses: several courses that introduce the breadth of the discipline and provide important context for midlevel courses.
2. Core courses: at the intermediate and advanced level in several categories (also called subfield requirements) that emphasize the interconnectedness of Earth layers and processes.
3. Earth and Planetary Materials
4. Land-Surface Processes & Interactions
5. Atmospheric and climatological processes
6. Practice Requirement

Note that our courses are often interdisciplinary and many contain practice elements, thus it is not difficult to satisfy these categories. After that, you can either continue exploring the breadth of the discipline with courses from multiple categories or specialize in one or two categories.

1. Electives: can be additional Geosciences courses and/or courses with the prefixes ASTR, BIOL, CEE, CHEM, CS, ENSC, ENVS, GEOG, NR, STAT, PHYS, or PSS.
2. Ancillary courses: We have flexibility there as well. Depending on your degree (B.A., or B.S.) you will take calculus and/or statistics, chemistry and have the option to apply biology, additional chemistry, computer science, or physics courses. We offer guidance on decisions on ancillary courses but intentionally refrain from requesting the same prerequisites for all students because trajectories, interests, and career choices are highly variable. 

• Make inferences about complex systems from observations of the natural world combined with experimentation and modeling.
• Solve problems requiring spatial and temporal (i.e., 3D and 4D) interpretations.
• Work with uncertainty, non-uniqueness, incompleteness, ambiguity, and indirect observations.
• Integrate data from different disciplines and apply systems thinking and are technologically versatile.
• Apply a field- and data-based, hypothesis-driven approach to environmental challenges.
• Communicate evaluation of scientific information orally and in writing to various audiences.

Geography and Geosciences

Department chair Professor Shelly Rayback srayback@uvm.edu

Department office Jennifer Reay Jennifer.Reay.1@uvm.edu

Geosciences program

Professor Julia Perdrial Julia.Perdrial@uvm.edu

Urban, Community, and Regional Planning:

Professor Meghan Cope Meghan.Cope@uvm.edu

Environmental Studies

Professor Cheryl Morse (she/her) Cheryl.Morse@uvm.edu