Small student-faculty ratio in a close, mutually supportive collegial atmosphere.
Strong faculty commitment to teaching and providing students with a wide range of research opportunities.
Three degree programs serve different career objectives.
Extensive field experience through in-course field trips, a week-long Junior Seminar trip and independent study.
Required Senior Project that demonstrates to employers and graduate schools the ability to complete a major independent research project.
Extensive computing, analytical, field, and scale-modeling equipment accessible to all students. All students have access to all departmental facilities, producing special opportunities usually reserved for graduate students at other institutions.
Key Benefits
An appreciation of the place and role of humanity on the Earth today and in the context of geologic time.
Research skills developed by a hands-on approach to learning, independent study, and field experience.
Critical reading, writing, and thinking skills.
Sound preparation for graduate study in geology and environmental geology.
Excellent preparation for professional employment, especially in the environmental geology fields of hydrogeology and land use.
An understanding of how the Earth works today and has worked through geologic time.
Endorsements
“I can say without hesitation that the fieldwork I did in Alaska was the most important part of my academic undergraduate experience. Now that I’m in graduate school, I realize that the experience I got in Alaska is rare even for students at the graduate level.” Chris Turner ’98, graduate student in hydrogeology at Waterloo University.
Department ranks in the top 2.5 percent among private undergraduate institutions in production of eventual Ph.D.s in earth sciences since 1920.
About half of students receive outside funding to complete out-of-state field research projects.
“The number of graduates in geology has been greater at this institution [Allegheny] than at many other larger, research-oriented schools…” Independent reviewer’s comments on departmental National Science Foundation grant proposal.