B.A. in Geography

The B.A. requires a minimum of 48 credits, including 44 credits in geography and environmental systems courses and 4 credits in other disciplines. Students must complete the following 14 credits of core courses:

  • GES 102 – Human Geography [3]
  • GES 110 – Physical Geography [3]
  • GES 286 – Exploring the Environment: a GeoSpatial Perspective [4]
  • GES 386 – Introduction to Geographic Information Systems [4]

In addition to the core courses identified above, a minimum of 30 additional credits in other departmental electives is required. Distribution requirements for these are as follows:

Four human geography courses, chosen from the sequences GES 320-369, 420-469 and sections of selected topics courses (GES 302 or 400) that are designated by department faculty as meeting the distribution requirement.

At least one of these four courses must be at the 400-level.

Two upper-division physical geography electives chosen from the following sequences:
GES 305-319, 405-419 or sections of special topics courses (GES 302 or 400) designated by department faculty as meeting the distribution requirement

Four additional GES electives, three of the courses must be at the 300 level or above, and at least one of which must be a 400-level course.

Internship and independent study do not count toward the minimum number of credits required for the B.A. degree.

All students, upon declaring the geography major, will be expected to take GES 286 and a statistics course the first semester each course is offered, following satisfaction of any prerequisites.

Other courses – All students must complete an outside statistics course to be selected from among the following: STAT 121, 350, 351 or 355.

For GFR students a 300 level writing or a WI course is required. (Note: all GEP students are required to take a WI course).