Environmental Data Science

Today's environmental problems — think climate change, water quality and availability, human health, forest management and conservation — are increasingly complex and involve vast amounts of data. Environmental Data Science majors can help address these challenges by mastering the methods and developing the tools needed to translate complex data into usable facts and figures. You'll develop analytical, decision-making, and data modeling skills that are critical for the job market and for pursing ongoing research to solve complex problems.

Students majoring in environmental informatics take core courses in topics such as forest science, geospatial analysis, environmental economics, and natural resources policy. Additional computation courses in the following areas are also required: business analytics and database technology, remote sensing, systems development, programming, forest photogrammetry, data science, and statistics.

Career options

• Ecological forecasting specialist
• Ecosystems services consultant
• Environmental data scientist
• Environmental engineer 
• Environmental modeler
• Cartographic technician
• Geospatial analyst
• GIS data engineer
• Machine-learning engineer 
• Sustainability analyst
• Software engineer
• Technology consultant