DEPARTMENT OF GEOGRAPHY
Undergraduate Department of Geography
COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND PUBLIC POLICY
Department of Geography Website
Chair: Anne Chin; Professors: Horner, Mesev, Uejio, Yang; Associate Professors: Billo, Fotheringham, McCreary; Assistant Professors: Chang, DeJohn, Li, Mathews, Velasquez; Affiliate and Adjunct Faculty: Cofield, Doel, Hart, Lewers, Miller, Molina, Quinton, Weisman
The Department of Geography offers two separate degrees reflecting the discipline's position straddling the social and natural sciences: one is the bachelor's in Geography and the second, a STEM bachelor's in Environment & Society. While these programs overlap to some extent, they differ in how society interacts with the natural environment: Geography examines how location and scale affect human behavior within urban, rural, and natural environments, while Environment & Society explores how humans both affect and are affected by changes in the natural environment. Students may double major in Geography and Environment & Society; with a maximum of six credit hours allowed to overlap. The Department also offers Pathways programs from both the Geography major and the Environment & Society major to the Applied Master's program in Geography Information Science.
Geographers are concerned with mapping how changes to the landscape, vegetation, animals, and climate impact where humans live, socialize, work, trade, and form cultural and nationalist identities. They examine industry, environmental health, boundary disputes, urban financialization and decay, political ecology, social movements, race and indigeneity, Black geographies, cultural identities, and how these relate to the protection, justice, and concern for the environment, including climate change and recycling/sustainability practices. On the other hand, Environmentalists work as policy analysts and natural resource conservationists, dealing with issues as wide-ranging as food production, marine exploitation, soil pollution, land use planning, coastal protection, severe storm mitigation, waste disposal, environmental health, and urban sustainability. Many of these are mapped and monitored using geographic information systems (GIS), including remote sensing and spatial statistics. Students are encouraged to use the College of Social Sciences and Public Policy's GIS laboratory, running the market-leader ArcGIS software. The two degrees provide access to jobs that help determine where public facilities, infrastructure, and environmental resources are located, counted, measured, and evaluated so that they provide benefit to as many people as possible within the best interests of the natural environment. Amongst the breadth of jobs, students are employed as planning and development surveyors, environmental consultants, real estate appraisers, land use analysts, park rangers, market researchers, cartographers, GIS analysts, foresters, demographers, natural resource managers, tour guides, soil scientists, and teachers.
For a complete education in Geography or Environment & Society, all students are given the opportunity to take courses that reflect the Department's research strengths in transportation optimization, land use/land cover change, urban growth, population mapping, regionalization and location theory, political ecology, race and identity, environmental conflict and policy, urban sustainability, environmental health, hurricane forecasting, tropical forests and grasslands, coastal and estuarine ecosystems, energy consumption and conservation, and biodiversity and resource management. Visit the Department of Geography Website or contact Undergraduate Program Director, Dr. Rachael Cofield (rcofield@fsu.edu) in Bellamy 313 or Academic Program Coordinator, Kristina Svec (k.svec@fsu.edu) in Bellamy 301.
Digital Literacy Requirement
Students must complete at least one course designated as meeting the Digital Literacy Requirement with a grade of “C–” or higher. Courses fulfilling the Digital Literacy Requirement must accomplish at least three of the following outcomes:
Evaluate and interpret the accuracy, credibility, and relevance of digital information
Evaluate and interpret digital data and their implications
Discuss the ways in which society and/or culture interact with digital technology
Discuss digital technology trends and their professional implications
Demonstrate the ability to use digital technology effectively
Demonstrate the knowledge to use digital technology safely and ethically
Each academic major has determined the courses that fulfill the Digital Literacy requirement for that major. Students should contact their major department(s) to determine which courses will fulfill their Digital Literacy requirement.
State of Florida Common Program Prerequisites for Geography
The Florida Virtual Campus (FLVC) houses the statewide, internet-based catalog of distance learning courses, degree programs, and resources offered by Florida's public colleges and universities, and they have developed operational procedures and technical guidelines for the catalog that all institutions must follow. The statute governing this policy can be reviewed by visiting the Florida Postsecondary Academic Library Network page.
FLVC has identified common program prerequisites for the degree program in Geography. To obtain the most up-to-date, state-approved prerequisites for this degree, visit the Geography General Requirements page.
Specific prerequisites are required for admission into the upper-division program and must be completed by the student at either a community college or a state university prior to being admitted to this program. Students may be admitted into the University without completing the prerequisites but may not be admitted into the program.
Geography Major
Geography bridges the social sciences and physical sciences in the pursuit of how humans affect, and are affected by, the surrounding environment. Geographers examine many social/physical issues at every scale, such as housing development and urbanization, habitat loss, insurance premiums and storm damage, commercial fishing and marine sustainability, transport flow and air pollution, energy needs and mineral exploitation, and intensive farming and deforestation. Geography is the study of place and space, in the same sense that history is the study of time. Geographers ask: Where are things located? Why are they located where they are? And how do we map them? Geographers are concerned with mapping how changes to the landscape, vegetation, animals, and climate impact where humans live, socialize, work, trade, and form cultural and nationalist identities. They examine agricultural practices, industry, boundary disputes, urban decay, political ideologies, religious principles, and how these relate to perceptions of the environment, concern for global warming, and recycling/sustainability practices. All of these can be mapped using computer-based GIS, GPS, and satellite surveillance techniques with ever-improving geographic accuracy and precision.
Major Requirements
A major in Geography consists of 33 credit hours. All courses must be completed with a grade of “C–” or better.
Introductory Courses (6 Hours)
Select two courses from this list:
GEA 1000 World Geography (3) (Exploring the Human Experience)
GEO 1330 Environmental Science (Gen Ed)
GEO 1400 Human Geography (3) (Exploring the Human Experience)
GEO 2200C Our Planet Earth (3)
Methods Courses (6 Hours)
GEO 2xxx Geographic Research Methods (3)
GIS 2040 Essentials of GIS
Geography Tracks (9 Hours)
Human and Nature-Society Geographies Track
IDS 2180 Future Cities (3) (Gen Ed)
IDS 2492 Sports: Place, Competition & Fairness (3)
IDS 3336 “Great” Britain: Geography, Imperialism, Industry & Culture (3)
IDH 3404 Environmental Justice (3) (Honors Only)
GEA 2210 United States & Canada (3)
GEA 3563 The Mediterranean (3)
GEA 4405 Latin America (3)
GEA 4500 Europe (3)
GEA 4520 Britain and Ireland (3)
GEA 4554 Russia and Southern Eurasia (3)
GEA 4635 Geography of the Middle East (3)
GEO 2477 Political Ecology (3)
GEO 3502 Economic Geography (3)
GEO 3613 Geography of the US South (3)
GEO 4xxx Disaster, Risk, Vulnerability, & Resilience (3)
GEO 4340 Living in a Hazardous Environment (3)
GEO 4344 Environmental Disasters & Apocalypse (3)
GEO 4357 Environmental Conflict & Economic Development (3)
GEO 4355 Geography of Food & Environment (3)
GEO 4403 Global Change, Local Places (3)
GEO 4404 Black Geographies (3)
GEO 4412 Environment and Gender (3)
GEO 4421 Cultural Geography (3)
GEO 4450 Medical Geography (3)
GEO 4471 Political Geography (3)
GEO 4503 Globalization (3)
GEO 4505 Fossil Fuels and Environmental Conflict (3)
GEO 4602 Urban Geography (3)
GEO 4700 Transport Geography (3)
GEO 4703 Communications Geography (3)
GEO 4804 Geography of Wine (3)
GEO 4930 Special Topics in Geography (3)*
GEO 4xxx Qualitative Methods (3)
Physical Geography Track
IDS 2471w Glaciers, Geysers, and Glades: Exploring U.S. National Parks (3) (Gen Ed)
GEO 2200C Our Planet Earth (3) (if not taken before)
GEO 4283 & GEO 4283L Hydrology & Environment & Lab (4)
GEO 4210 Landforms and Landscapes (3)
GEO 4251 Geography of Climate Change & Storms (3)
GEO 4280 Geography of Water Resources (3)
GEO 4300 Biogeography (3)
GEO 4376 Landscape Ecology (3)
GEO 4930 Special Topics in Geography (3)*
Geographic Information Systems & Technology Track
GIS 3015 Cartography (3)
GIS 4006 Computer Cartography (3)
GIS 4035 & GIS4035L Intro to Remote Sensing & Lab (4)
GIS 4043 & GIS4043L Geographic Information Systems & Lab (4)
GIS 4330 Florida GIS Applications (3)
GIS 4421 GIS & Health (3)
GEO 4162C Spatial Data Analysis (3)
GEO 4930 Special Topics in Geography (3)*
*May count as any of the tracks, at Undergraduate Director discretion
Geography Capstone (3 Hours)
GEO 4xxx Geography Capstone (3)
General Geography (9 Hours)
Students must select additional geography courses (GEA/GEO/GIS) at the 3000/4000 level to bring the total credits in the major to thirty-four; coursework may include a maximum of nine credit hours of GEO 4930 (Special Topics) classes. A maximum of three credit hours may be used from GEO 4905 DIS or GEO 4941 Internship.
No credit for geography courses with a grade below “C–” will be applied towards completion of the major.
Minor Coursework
Geography majors are required to complete a minor in any departmental or interdisciplinary area of interest. Minors must be at least 12 hours but can range up to 18 hours.
Bachelor's/Master's Pathways
Students in either the Geography major or the Environment & Society major can apply for a pathway to the MS degree in Geographic Information Science by sharing or ‘double counting' up to 12 graduate credit hours with their undergraduate program. This means 12 graduate credit hours can count towards your undergraduate degree AND count towards the 30 graduate credit hours for the master's degree in GIS, leaving you 18 graduate credit hours to complete the master's program after you complete your major. The following course must be completed with a C- or higher (note: this course does NOT double count with the GIScience Master's Degree):
GIS 4043/L Geographic Information Systems & Lab (4)
You must have a desire to improve your skill levels in using computer software, statistics, mapping, and geographic relevance for resource monitoring. You must also maintain a GPA of 3.0. For more information visit the Bachelors-Masters Pathways webpage or contact the MIS GIS Pathways Program Director, Dr. Xiaojun Yang (xyang@fsu.edu), the Undergraduate Program Director, Dr. Rachael Cofield (rcofield@fsu.edu) in Bellamy 313 or Kristina Svec (k.svec@fsu.edu) in Bellamy 301.
Graduate Programs
Graduate programs are available leading to the Master of Arts (MA), the Master of Science (MS), the MS in GIScience, and the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Geography. The graduate programs in the Department of Geography lead to an applied or a research-oriented degree centered on geographic information science (GIScience), environmental management, or human-environmental interactions.
Undergraduates contemplating a graduate degree in geography should take the Graduate Record Examination prior to submitting an application. Interested students should contact the Graduate Program Director, Dr. Tyler McCreary (tmccreary@fsu.edu), Bellamy 309.
Definition of Prefixes
GEA—Geography: Regional Areas
GEO—Geography: Systematic
GIS—Geography: Information Science
IDH—Interdisciplinary Honors
IDS—Interdisciplinary Studies