Environmental Engineering BS/MS

Major: Environmental Engineering
Degree Awarded: Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering (BSENE) and Master of Science (MS)
Calendar Type: Quarter
Minimum Required Credits: 225.0
Co-op Options: Three Co-op (Five years)
Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) code: 14.1401
Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) code:
 17-2081

About the Program

The Environmental Engineering BS/MS program allows students to develop technical depth and breadth in their professional and related area, which enhances their professional productivity, whether in industry or as they proceed to the PhD. The undergraduate courses provide the necessary technical prerequisite understanding and skills for the graduate studies—a natural progression. Because the technical concepts of engineering are common, the MS in a related discipline is readily achieved. 

Additional Information

For more information, visit the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering webpage.

Admission Requirements

Students must have a GPA of at least 3.2 and have taken coursework sufficient to demonstrate a readiness to take graduate coursework.

Degree Requirements

General Education/Liberal Studies Requirements
CIVC 101Introduction to Civic Engagement1.0
COOP 101Career Management and Professional Development *1.0
ENGL 101Composition and Rhetoric I: Inquiry and Exploratory Research3.0
or ENGL 111 English Composition I
ENGL 102Composition and Rhetoric II: Advanced Research and Evidence-Based Writing3.0
or ENGL 112 English Composition II
ENGL 103Composition and Rhetoric III: Themes and Genres3.0
or ENGL 113 English Composition III
PHIL 315Engineering Ethics3.0
UNIV E101The Drexel Experience1.0
General Education Requirements **15.0
Engineering Core Courses
CAEE 361Statistical Analysis of Engineering Systems3.0
CHEM 101General Chemistry I3.5
CHEM 102General Chemistry II4.5
ENGR 111Introduction to Engineering Design & Data Analysis3.0
ENGR 113First-Year Engineering Design3.0
ENGR 131Introductory Programming for Engineers3.0
or ENGR 132 Programming for Engineers
ENGR 210Introduction to Thermodynamics3.0
ENGR 220Fundamentals of Materials4.0
ENGR 231Linear Engineering Systems3.0
ENGR 232Dynamic Engineering Systems3.0
MATH 121Calculus I4.0
MATH 122Calculus II4.0
MATH 200Multivariate Calculus4.0
PHYS 101Fundamentals of Physics I4.0
PHYS 102Fundamentals of Physics II4.0
PHYS 201Fundamentals of Physics III4.0
Environmental Engineering Requirements
BIO 220Essential Microbiology3.0
CAEE 202Introduction to Civil, Architectural & Environmental Engineering3.0
CAEE 203System Balances and Design in CAEE 3.0
CAEE 212Geologic Principles for Infrastructure & Environmental Engineering4.0
CHE 211Material and Energy Balances I4.0
CHEM 230Quantitative Analysis4.0
CHEM 231 [WI] Quantitative Analysis Laboratory2.0
CHEM 241Organic Chemistry I4.0
CHEM 242Organic Chemistry II4.0
CIVE 240 [WI] Engineering Economic Analysis3.0
CIVE 320Introduction to Fluid Flow3.0
CIVE 330Hydraulics4.0
CIVE 430Hydrology3.0
CIVE 431Hydrology-Ground Water3.0
ENVE 300Introduction to Environmental Engineering3.0
ENVE 302Environmental Transport and Kinetics3.0
ENVE 410Solid and Hazardous Waste3.0
ENVE 421Water and Waste Treatment II3.0
ENVE 422Water and Waste Treatment Design3.0
ENVE 435Groundwater Remediation3.0
ENVE 460Fundamentals of Air Pollution Control3.0
or ENVE 465 Indoor Air Quality
ENVE 485Professional Environmental Engineering Practice1.0
ENVE 486Environmental Engineering Processes Laboratory I2.0
ENVE 487Environmental Engineering Processes Laboratory II2.0
ENVE 491 [WI] Senior Project Design I3.0
ENVE 492 [WI] Senior Design Project II3.0
ENVE 493 [WI] Senior Design Project III3.0
ENVS 230General Ecology3.0
Technical Electives ***8.0
MASTERS DEGREE COURSES
ENVE 516Fundamentals of Environmental Biotechnology3.0
ENVE 727Risk Assessment3.0
ENVE 660Chemical Kinetics in Environmental Engineering3.0
ENVS 501Chemistry of the Environment3.0
Graduate Policy Course3.0
Sustainable Water Resource Engineering
Public Finance and Cost Benefit Analysis
Benefit-Cost Analysis for Infrastructure
Theory and Practice of Policy Analysis
Methods of Policy Analysis
Overview of Issues in Global Health
Graduate Electives 430.0
Total Credits225.0
*

Co-Op cycles may vary. Students are assigned a co-op cycle (fall/winter, spring/summer, summer-only) based on their co-op program (4-year, 5-year) and major.

COOP 101 registration is determined by the co-op cycle assigned and may be scheduled in a different term. Select students may be eligible to take COOP 001 in place of COOP 101.

**

 General Education Requirements.

***

Technical Electives:

Graduate Electives:

One Specialization Track: 

One Cognate Sequence:   

  • a 4-course coherent sequence in addition to the specialization, either in environmental engineering, environmental science, or related STEM field. Advisor must approve of courses chosen. 

Writing-Intensive Course Requirements

In order to graduate, all students must pass three writing-intensive courses after their freshman year. Two writing-intensive courses must be in a student's major. The third can be in any discipline. Students are advised to take one writing-intensive class each year, beginning with the sophomore year, and to avoid “clustering” these courses near the end of their matriculation. Transfer students need to meet with an academic advisor to review the number of writing-intensive courses required to graduate.

A "WI" next to a course in this catalog may indicate that this course can fulfill a writing-intensive requirement. For the most up-to-date list of writing-intensive courses being offered, students should check the Writing Intensive Course List at the University Writing Program. Students scheduling their courses can also conduct a search for courses with the attribute "WI" to bring up a list of all writing-intensive courses available that term.

Sample Plan of Study

First Year
FallCreditsWinterCreditsSpringCreditsSummerCredits
CHEM 1013.5CHEM 1024.5COOP 101 or 101*1.0VACATION
ENGL 101 or 1113.0CIVC 101 or COOP 101*1.0ENGL 1033.0 
ENGR 1113.0ENGL 102 or 1123.0ENGR 1133.0 
MATH 1214.0ENGR 131 or 1323.0MATH 2004.0 
UNIV 1011.0MATH 1224.0PHYS 1024.0 
 PHYS 1014.0  
 14.5 19.5 15 0
Second Year
FallCreditsWinterCreditsSpringCreditsSummerCredits
CAEE 2023.0CAEE 2033.0COOP EXPERIENCECOOP EXPERIENCE
CIVE 2403.0ENGR 2103.0  
ENGR 2204.0ENGR 2323.0  
ENGR 2313.0ENVS 2303.0  
PHYS 2014.0PHIL 3153.0  
(UG) General Education Requirement3.0   
 20 15 0 0
Third Year
FallCreditsWinterCreditsSpringCreditsSummerCredits
CAEE 2124.0CHEM 2414.0COOP EXPERIENCECOOP EXPERIENCE
CAEE 3613.0CIVE 3304.0(GR) Graduate Elective3.0 
CHE 2114.0CIVE 4313.0  
CIVE 3203.0ENVE 3023.0  
ENVE 3003.0ENVE 7273.0  
(GR) Graduate Elective3.0(GR) Graduate Policy Course3.0  
 20 20 3 0
Fourth Year
FallCreditsWinterCreditsSpringCreditsSummerCredits
CHEM 2304.0ENVE 4103.0COOP EXPERIENCECOOP EXPERIENCE
CHEM 2312.0(UG) General Education Requirements**9.0(GR) Graduate Elective3.0 
CHEM 2424.0ENVE 6603.0  
CIVE 4303.0(GR) Graduate Elective3.0  
ENVE 5163.0   
ENVS 5013.0   
 19 18 3 0
Fifth Year
FallCreditsWinterCreditsSpringCredits 
BIO 2203.0ENVE 4213.0ENVE 4223.0 
ENVE 460 or 4653.0ENVE 4862.0ENVE 4353.0 
ENVE 4851.0ENVE 4923.0ENVE 4872.0 
ENVE 4913.0(UG) Technical Elective4.0ENVE 4933.0 
(UG) Technical Elective4.0(GR) Graduate Elective6.0(UG) General Education Requirement**3.0 
(GR) Graduate Elective6.0 (GR) Graduate Electives6.0 
 20 18 20 
Total Credits 225
*

Co-Op cycles may vary. Students are assigned a co-op cycle (fall/winter, spring/summer, summer-only) based on their co-op program (4-year, 5-year) and major. 

**

General Education Requirements

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty

Abieyuwa Aghayere, PhD (University of Alberta). Professor. Structural design - concrete, steel and wood; structural failure analysis; retrofitting of existing structures; new structural systems and materials; engineering education.
Ivan Bartoli, PhD (University of California, San Diego). Associate Professor. Non-destructive evaluation and structural health monitoring; dynamic identification, stress wave propagation modeling.
Shannon Capps, PhD (Georgia Institute of Technology). Associate Professor. Atmospheric chemistry; data assimilation; advanced sensitivity analysis; inverse modeling.
S.C. Jonathan Cheng, PhD (West Virginia University). Associate Professor. Soil mechanics; geosynthetics; geotechnical engineering; probabilistic design; landfill containments; engineering education.
Yaghoob (Amir) Farnam, PhD (Purdue University). Associate Professor. Advanced and sustainable infrastructure materials; multifunctional, self-responsive and bioinspired construction materials; advanced multiscale manufacturing; characterization, and evaluation of construction materials; durability of cement-based materials.
Patricia Gallagher, PhD (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University). Professor. Geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering; soil improvement; soil improvement; recycled materials in geotechnics.
Patrick Gurian, PhD (Carnegie-Mellon University). Professor. Risk analysis of environmental and infrastructure systems; novel adsorbent materials; environmental standard setting; Bayesian statistical modeling; community outreach and environmental health.
Charles N. Haas, PhD (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) Program Head for Environmental Engineering; L. D. Betz Professor of Environmental Engineering. Water treatment; risk assessment; bioterrorism; environmental modeling and statistics; microbiology; environmental health.
Simi Hoque, PhD (University of California - Berkeley) Program Head for Architectural Engineering. Professor. Computational methods to reduce building energy and environmental impacts, urban metabolism, thermal comfort, climate resilience.
Y. Grace Hsuan, PhD (Imperial College). Professor. Durability of polymeric construction materials; advanced construction materials; and performance of geosynthetics.
Joseph B. Hughes, PhD (University of Iowa). Distinguished University Professor. Biological processes and applications of nanotechnology in environmental systems.
L. James Lo, PhD (University of Texas at Austin). Associate Professor. Architectural fluid mechanics; building automation and autonomy; implementation of natural and hybrid ventilation in buildings; airflow distribution in buildings; large-scale air movement in an urban built environment; building and urban informatics; data-enhanced sensing and control for optimal building operation and management; novel data gathering methods for building/urban problem solving; interdisciplinary research on occupant behaviors in the built environment.
Franco Montalto, PhD (Cornell University). Professor. Effects of built infrastructure on societal water needs, ecohydrologic patterns and processes, ecological restoration, green design, and water interventions.
Mira S. Olson, PhD (University of Virginia). Associate Professor. Peace engineering; source water quality protection and management; contaminant and bacterial fate and transport; community engagement.
Miguel A. Pando, PhD (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University). Associate Professor. Laboratory testing of geomaterials; geotechnical aspects of natural hazards; soil-structure-interaction; geotechnical engineering.
Matthew Reichenbach, PhD (University of Austin at Texas). Assistant Teaching Professor. Design and behavior of steel structures, bridge engineering, structural stability
Michael Ryan, PhD (Drexel University) Associate Department Head of Graduate Studies. Associate Teaching Professor. Microbial Source Tracking (MST); Quantitative Microbial Risk Assessment (QMRA); dynamic engineering systems modeling; molecular microbial biology; phylogenetics; metagenomics; bioinformatics; environmental statistics; engineering economics; microbiology; potable and wastewater quality; environmental management systems.
Christopher Sales, PhD (University of California, Berkeley). Associate Professor. Environmental microbiology and biotechnology; biodegradation of environmental contaminants; microbial processes for energy and resource recovery from waste; application of molecular biology, analytical chemistry and bioinformatic techniques to study environmental biological systems.
Robert Swan Teaching Professor. Geotechnical and geosynthetic engineering; soil/geosynthetic interaction and performance; laboratory and field geotechnical/geosynthetic testing.
Sharon Walker, PhD (Yale University) Dean, College of Engineering. Distinguished Professor. Water quality systems engineering
Michael Waring, PhD (University of Texas at Austin) Department Head, Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering. Associate Professor. Indoor air quality and building sustainability; indoor particulate matter fate and transport; indoor chemistry and particle formation; secondary impacts of control technologies and strategies.
Jin Wen, PhD (University of Iowa). Professor. Architectural engineering; Building Energy Efficiency; Intelligent Building; Net-zero Building; and Indoor Air Quality.
Aspasia Zerva, PhD (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign). Professor. Earthquake engineering; mechanics; seismology; structural reliability; system identification; advanced computational methods in structural analysis.

Emeritus Faculty

A. Emin Aktan, PhD (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign). Professor Emeritus. Health monitoring and management of large infrastructures with emphasis on health monitoring.
Eugenia Ellis, PhD, AIA (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University). Professor Emerita. Natural and electrical light sources and effects on biological rhythms and health outcomes; ecological strategies for smart, sustainable buildings of the nexus of health, energy, and technology.
Ahmad Hamid, PhD (McMaster University). Professor Emeritus. Engineered masonry; seismic behavior, design and retrofit of masonry structures; development of new materials and building systems.
Harry G. Harris, PhD (Cornell University). Professor Emeritus. Structural models; dynamics of structures, plates and shells; industrialized building construction.
Joseph P. Martin, PhD (Colorado State University). Professor Emeritus. Geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering; hydrology; transportation; waste management.
James E. Mitchell, MArch (University of Pennsylvania). Professor Emeritus. Architectural engineering design; building systems; engineering education.
Joseph V. Mullin, PhD (Pennsylvania State University). Teaching Professor Emeritus. Structural engineering; failure analysis; experimental stress analysis; construction materials; marine structures.
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