Applicable only to students admitted during the 2013-2014 academic year.

Environmental Science and Engineering

Institute of the Environment and Sustainability

Graduate Degrees

The Institute of the Environment and Sustainability offers the Doctor of Environmental Science and Engineering (D.Env.) degree.

Admission

Program Name

Environmental Science and Engineering

Address

Institute of the Environment and Sustainability
La Kretz Hall, Suite 300
Box 951496
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1496 

Phone

(310) 825-9901 

Email

mgordon@ioes.ucla.edu.  

Leading to the degree of

D.Env. 

Admission Limited to

Consult department. 

Deadline to apply

December 31st  

GRE (General and/or Subject)

GRE: General 

Letters of Recommendation 

3 

Other Requirements

In addition to the University’s minimum requirements and those listed above, applicants are required to have completed a master’s degree in some field of the sciences or engineering with a GPA of at least 3.5. Generalist master’s degrees in areas such as environmental sciences or public health or medical degrees may be accepted for admission if the applicant presents a record with appropriate courses in the sciences and engineering and other special qualifications such as research experience.

Applicants for the D.Env. degree must have an excellent scholastic record and must be acceptable to the admissions committee. The overall academic record, including Graduate Record Examination (GRE) scores and Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or International English Language Testing System (IELTS) examination scores (for students whose native language is not English), must reflect exceptional verbal and quantitative skills and drive toward academic achievement.

The program is also interested in special qualities, awards, and achievements not reflected in the student’s academic record.

Before being accepted unconditionally into the program, all students must have taken the following courses: (1) biology — one year of introductory biology with laboratory; (2) chemistry — one year of general chemistry with laboratory, including analytical methods, and one quarter of organic chemistry, no laboratory required; (3) mathematics — one year of calculus plus one course in elementary statistics; (4) physics — one year of introductory physics with laboratory. Any of these courses may be taken after an admitted student has arrived at UCLA, and one or more of these prerequisites may be waived based on consideration of the applicant’s record of science and engineering courses. 

Master’s Degree

None.

Doctoral Degree

Advising

Students are advised in general terms by the program graduate adviser, but a specific program is planned in consultation with each student’s individual faculty adviser. Students should meet with those individuals several times a year to plan their programs. Ongoing evaluations of academic progress are made at the end of each quarter in courses completed toward degree requirements, grades in all coursework, performance in the examination sequence, and performance in the Problems Courses. The primary assessment is by program faculty with review and assistance as needed by the student’s adviser and the Environmental Science and Engineering Faculty Advisory Committee.

Major Fields or Subdisciplines

Specialties within the program include (but are not limited to) the assessment and management of hazardous substances in the air, soil, and water environments; migration of contaminants in surface and groundwater; health risks of toxic substances; mitigation of adverse effects on the biological environment; restoration ecology; and environmental economics. Also, students may balance their work with a greater emphasis on either the science/engineering or science/policy side of their specialty.

Foreign Language Requirement

None.

Course Requirements

Course requirements consist of core courses, elective courses, environmental science and engineering seminars, a technical writing course and problems courses.

Core Courses. Eleven core course requirements must be satisfied. All core courses must be taken on a letter grading basis (not for S/U grading). Courses must be taken from the following categories:

Environmental Science (four courses). Courses that describe the characteristics of terrestrial, air, and water environments; the biota; the geological, biological, chemical, hydrological, and atmospheric processes of the environment; and the interrelationships between these compartments. Required courses are as follows: Environmental Health Sciences 212, 225, 240, 264.

Environmental Engineering (three courses). Courses in engineering, mathematics, and the applied physical and life sciences covering topics such as modeling of environmental systems, fate and effects of environmental contaminants, design and evaluation of pollution control systems, plus courses that describe the tools and methods needed to address environmental problems, such as field and laboratory analytical methods, statistics, computer science, and advanced applied mathematics. Required courses are as follows: Civil and Environmental Engineering 153, 155 and one elective engineering course to be approved by the program faculty.

Environmental Management, Law, and Policy (two courses). Courses that relate to the social and institutional factors relevant to environmental problem solving such as the development and implementation of regulations, dynamics of public participation, and socioeconomic analysis of current and historical trends in environmental and energy policy. Required courses are as follows: Environment C234, Urban Planning M264A/B (same as Law 290).

Analytical Tools and Methods (two courses). Courses that introduce students to the tools and methods required for interdisciplinary research such as probability and statistics, decision analysis, geographical information systems (GIS), numerical analysis and experiment and survey design. Two courses approved by the program faculty. Suggested courses are: Biostats 100A/B, 110A, CEE 103, 110, EEB C219, ENV 297A, Geog 299A/B/C/D/E/F, Management 217A, Public Policy 203, Stats 100A/B, 101A, Urban Planning M206A/B.

Elective Courses. Four courses selected to provide depth in one area for students whose previous degrees emphasized disciplinary breadth or to provide additional courses in an area related to a student’s goals within environmental science and engineering. Elective courses will be selected in consultation with the student’s academic advisor and must be approved by the program faculty. All elective courses must be taken on a letter-grading basis (not for S/U grading).

Credit for Prior Work. Entering environmental science and engineering students may already have completed some of the required coursework in their undergraduate and graduate work. Three of the 11 core courses can be waived based on prior coursework. Any other course requirement satisfied by previous work must be replaced with an elective in any field of environmental science and engineering that is pertinent to the goals of the student. Thus, a minimum of 12 core and elective courses must be completed after admission to the program. A minimum of 10 core and elective courses must be taken at UCLA or another University of California campus.

Environmental Science and Engineering Seminar. While completing core and elective requirements, full-time students must attend the equivalent of two quarters of weekly seminars in the general area of environmental science and engineering, either by enrolling in a seminar course or attending 16 separate departmental seminars each year.

Effective Technical Writing Course. All students must enroll in Environment M412 during the first or second year.

Problems Courses. Problems courses constitute intensive multidisciplinary applied research directed toward the solution of current environmental problems. Students are required to quantify and measure necessary parameters, perform critical evaluations, edit and process technical and socioeconomic information, meet deadlines, and communicate through a final report to the competent lay person as well as to the technical specialist. Sometimes two or three faculty from different academic disciplines oversee a team of student researchers. Before proceeding to the problems courses, students must have completed eight of the required core courses, successfully passed all core and elective courses taken (B- grade or better), and maintained a cumulative grade-point average of 3.0 for all classes taken after entering the Environmental Science and Engineering Program. Twenty-four quarter units of Environment 400 must be completed during the three quarters prior to advancement to candidacy. The requirement may be met by completing three consecutive quarters (eight units per quarter) on a single theme; or as a minimum, at least two consecutive quarters devoted to a single theme plus one quarter participation or activity approved by the faculty. Enrollment in more than one problems course per quarter is not allowed. No more than eight units of other coursework may be taken when enrolled in a problems course.

Problems Course Workshops. All students must enroll in Environment M410 A-C before advancing to candidacy.

Normally, problems course credit is only earned from courses offered through the Environmental Science and Engineering Program. However, students may petition the faculty for permission to earn problems course credit through multidisciplinary environmental projects offered in other departments at UCLA.

Teaching Experience

Not required.

Written and Oral Qualifying Examinations

Academic Senate regulations require all doctoral students to complete and pass University written and oral qualifying examinations prior to doctoral advancement to candidacy. Also, under Senate regulations the University oral qualifying examination is open only to the student and appointed members of the doctoral committee. In addition to University requirements, some graduate programs have other pre-candidacy examination requirements. What follows in this section is how students are required to fulfill all of these requirements for this doctoral program.

A two-tiered examination sequence, consisting of written and oral examinations, is required for advancement to candidacy to the D.Env. degree. The examinations must be successfully completed before the internship can begin. The purpose of the examinations is to test the student’s understanding of the core and breadth areas, the master’s field, current issues in the environmental field, and subjects covered in students’ problems course experience. The written examination is administered by the program faculty. The written examination may be repeated once. The University Oral Qualifying Examination is administered by the doctoral committee, a four-person faculty committee that guides the student through the remainder of the program. Generally, the doctoral committee is appointed during the second year of the student’s tenure at UCLA. The oral examination may be repeated once.

Internship. After advancement to candidacy (see below), students begin an internship in their field of interest at an outside institution. Arrangements for the internship are the students’ responsibility but program faculty will assist. The institution and the nature of the appointment must be approved by the doctoral committee and the Chair of the Environmental Science and Engineering Faculty Advisory Committee. Supervision during the field training experience will be by the doctoral committee and the field program supervisor. A letter of agreement between UCLA and the institution is required. During each long session quarter of internship the student must register at UCLA for eight units of Environment 599.

No later than nine months after advancement to candidacy, at the beginning of the internship, the candidate is required to present a written prospectus of the dissertation and defend it before the doctoral committee.

Advancement to Candidacy

Students are advanced to candidacy upon successful completion of the written and oral qualifying examinations.

Doctoral Dissertation

Every doctoral degree program requires the completion of an approved dissertation that demonstrates the student’s ability to perform original, independent research and constitutes a distinct contribution to knowledge in the principal field of study.

Final Oral Examination (Defense of the Dissertation)

Required for all students in the program.

Time-to-Degree

Well-prepared students who hold strong baccalaureate and master’s degrees should be able to complete the requirements for the D.Env. degree in 13 to 15 quarters, including the internship period.

Termination of Graduate Study and Appeal of Termination

University Policy

A student who fails to meet the above requirements may be recommended for termination of graduate study. A graduate student may be disqualified from continuing in the graduate program for a variety of reasons. The most common is failure to maintain the minimum cumulative grade point average (3.00) required by the Academic Senate to remain in good standing (some programs require a higher grade point average). Other examples include failure of examinations, lack of timely progress toward the degree and poor performance in core courses. Probationary students (those with cumulative grade point averages below 3.00) are subject to immediate dismissal upon the recommendation of their department. University guidelines governing termination of graduate students, including the appeal procedure, are outlined in Standards and Procedures for Graduate Study at UCLA.

Special Departmental or Program Policy

A recommendation for termination for student who is not advanced to candidacy is made by the program faculty. A recommendation for termination for a student who is advanced to candidacy is made by the doctoral committee. A student may appeal a recommendation for termination to the Environmental Science and Engineering Faculty Advisory Committee. In addition to the standard reasons outlined above, a student may be recommended for termination based on the inability to communicate (in writing or orally) as required for success in the program area.