Geography BS/Geography MS

Career and Academic Opportunities

Today’s competitive job market demands from students the knowledge, skills, and relevant job experiences that will set them apart. Our B.S./M.S. Double Dawgs program combines through our B.S. degree integrative real-world training focused on understanding the earth’s environment (in relation to global and regional systems as they interface with economic, social, and political contexts) with advanced specialized training gained through our M.S. degree. Our unique combination of breadth and depth helps graduates stand out and launch them into a broad range of rewarding careers in education, business, government, and nonprofit organizations. Our graduates take up positions providing instruction, training, and other educational services at all levels of the education sector (K-12 institutions, colleges and universities that award at least a two-year degree, continuing education, and informal education organizations, and higher education institutions) and beyond. Our B.S./M.S. program also provides an excellent research foundation for the Ph.D. degree. Our graduates enter the private sector providing a wide range of skills and analytical capabilities, including broad environmental science, locational principles, visualization and GIS skills, among many others. Graduates seeking to enter the public sector, projected to remain ~18 percent of the U.S. workforce over the next decade, find the combination of our Geography's broad integrative emphasis on addressing real-world problems and issues with advanced individualized training to be an asset, particularly at the local and state levels where policy innovation, implementation, and bottom-line responsibility reside. Roughly nine percent of the U.S. workforce (12 million individuals) is employed by an estimated 1.4 million nonprofit organizations, whose causes and values span the entire political spectrum. Because nonprofits typically strive to create a better world (as defined by their mission statements), they offer great opportunities for job seekers hoping to make a difference. Many B.S./M.S. Double Dawgs graduates successfully take up careers in this sector, leveraging the breadth/depth nature of our training.