Environment

Kroon Hall, 203.432.5100
http://environment.yale.edu
M.S., M.Phil., Ph.D.

Dean
Ingrid Burke (Kroon, 203.432.5109)

Director of Doctoral Studies
Peter Raymond (Kroon 205, 203.432-0817, peter.raymond@yale.edu)

Professors Mark Ashton, Michelle Bell, Mark Bradford, Craig Brodersen, Marian Chertow, Liza Comita, Michael Dove, Daniel Esty, Justin Farrell, Eli Fenichel, Kenneth Gillingham, Matthew Kotchen, William Lauenroth, Xuhui Lee, Anthony Leiserowitz, Narasimha Rao, Peter Raymond, James Saiers, Oswald Schmitz, Karen Seto, David Skelly, Dorceta Taylor, Gerald Torres, John Wargo, Julie Zimmerman

Associate Professors Paulo Brando, Nyeema Harris, Yuan Yao

Assistant Professors Brianna Castro, Sparkle Malone, Arianna Salazar Miranda, Luke Sanford

Fields of Study

Fields include agroforestry; biodiversity conservation; biostatistics and biometry; community ecology; ecosystems ecology; ecosystems management; energy and the environment; environmental and resource policy; environmental anthropology and sociology; environmental biophysics and meteorology; environmental chemistry; environmental ethics; environmental governance; environmental health risk assessment; environmental history; environmental justice; environmental law and politics; environmental management and social ecology in developing countries; forest ecology; green chemistry and engineering; hydrology; industrial ecology; industrial environmental management; plant physiology and anatomy; pollution management; population ecology; resource economics; silviculture; social ecology; stand development, tropical ecology, and conservation; sustainable development; urban ecology; urban geography; urban land cover change; urban planning; and water resource management.

Students admitted in 2020 or earlier have the option of receiving a degree in either forestry and environmental studies or environment. Students admitted in 2021 and subsequent years will receive a degree in environment.

Special Requirements for the Ph.D. Degree

Students are required to take ENV 900, Doctoral Student Seminar and Responsible Conduct of Research, in the first year of their program. Courses of study are individually designated through consultation between degree candidates and their advisers and dissertation committees. The amount of coursework required will depend on the previous training of the student, but the normal requirement for a student with no previous graduate training is three or four courses per term for four terms. The program of each student will be evaluated at the end of the first year of residence. At least two term grades of Honors are required in the first two years of study; however, it is anticipated that grades of Honors or High Pass will be achieved in two-thirds of all courses taken. A written and oral qualifying examination is required upon completion of the course requirements. Students are expected to take the examination by the end of their second year, although this can be extended to the third year in cases with appropriate extenuating circumstances. At the time of the qualifying examination, the student must present a prospectus of the research work proposed for the dissertation. Successful completion of the qualifying examination and submission of the prospectus will result in admission to candidacy. Upon completion of the dissertation, the candidate must make unbound copies of the dissertation available to the faculty and appear for an oral examination at a time and place designated by the director of doctoral studies. Copies of the approved dissertation must be submitted to the graduate school. Depending upon the nature of the dissertation topic, completion of the Ph.D. degree normally requires five years.

Teaching and research experiences are regarded as integral parts of the doctoral training program in Environment. All students are required to serve as teaching fellows (ten hours per week) for four terms. The nature of the teaching assignment is determined in cooperation with the student’s major adviser and the director of doctoral studies. With the permission of the director of doctoral studies, the total teaching requirement may be reduced for students who are awarded fellowships supported by outside funding. Regardless of outside funding, all doctoral students must serve as teaching fellows for a minimum of two terms.

Combined Ph.D. Program

The School of the Environment offers a combined Ph.D. degree program with the Department of Anthropology.

Eligibility and Master’s Degrees

In general, eligibility for entry into the combined degree program is the same as for entering either the YSE or the anthropology doctoral program. Prior award of a master’s degree is generally preferred for entry into the YSE doctoral program but not the anthropology doctoral program. Therefore, the desirability of a prior master’s degree will be weighed on a case-by-case basis among applicants. Combined degree students will receive (upon petition) an M. Phil. degree from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) after passing their comprehensive exams.

Application

Prospective combined degree students must initially apply either to Anthropology or to YSE but not to both at the same time. They should, however, as per the current GSAS application process, indicate their interest in the combined degree on the application form. Once accepted in the initially chosen doctoral program, the student’s file will be considered in the second program and a recommendation made on the combined degree application that will be communicated by the graduate school. Admitted students will be allocated to the initially chosen program as their primary administrative home but will enter Yale as members of the combined degree program. Being turned down for entry into the combined degree program at this point does not preclude reapplication in the following semester.

Students previously accepted to YSE or the Department of Anthropology may submit a petition to enter the combined degree program. The first step is securing the support of their prospective principal adviser and the director of graduate studies (DGS) for either YSE or anthropology, as appropriate. In order to meet the demands of the combined degree in a timely manner, it is best if this second application is made as soon as possible in the student’s doctoral program, ideally no later than the last week in October during the first semester of graduate study at Yale and not later than the end of the first semester. To help make this possible, such applications will be reviewed on an ad hoc basis as they are submitted, without being held to the normal annual calendar for doctoral applications. However, applications to the combined program should in content and all other respects follow the norms of the regular doctoral application (the sole difference being that applicants should specifically address in the statement-of-purpose why they are interested in the combined program). The YSE doctoral admissions committee and the anthropology faculty would review the application. In the latter case, the departmental graduate registrar must receive the application at least one week before a regularly scheduled faculty meeting. If admitted, the applicant will then submit the proposal (countersigned by both DGSs) to the associate dean of the graduate school, who will make the final decision regarding admission. A positive decision by the dean will constitute formal admission into the combined degree program.

Requirements of the Combined Degree

The requirements of the combined doctoral degree are the same as those of the doctoral degrees of YSE and Anthropology (which are detailed in the bulletins of the respective institutions), with the following exceptions or clarifications.  

Coursework

Students are required, upon acceptance into the combined degree program, to draw up a program of coursework. Students are required to take twelve units/courses which will be apportioned among Anthropology, YSE, and other university departments as appropriate, based on consultations with the student’s committee. The twelve courses must include one exam-oriented independent study. During their first three semesters in the program, combined degree students must take (a) ENV 900 Doctoral Student Seminar and Responsible Conduct of Research (taken in year one), and (b) any additional required coursework in YSE and Anthropology as outlined by each subfield for combined degree students. 

Teaching Requirements

The teaching fellow requirements of the combined program vary depending upon whether the student first entered into Anthropology or YSE. Combined students entering from Anthropology are expected to serve as teaching fellows for four semesters, as required by the GSAS. The exact timing of teaching depends on the scheduling of Ph.D. research. Students are eligible to work as teaching fellows starting in year two of their program of study. The GSAS expectation is that they will teach mostly during years three and four, but students in the combined program who conduct field research during some of this time can defer their teaching requirement accordingly. If students receive a sixth year of support, then they will be expected to teach for an additional two semesters. The total teaching requirement is effectively reduced for those students who are awarded fellowships supported by non-Yale and non-GSAS Yale funding sources.

Students entering the program from YSE are also expected to serve as teaching fellows for four semesters during their first five years in the program, and they become eligible to do so during year two. If students take the available sixth year of support, they will be expected to teach for an additional two semesters (one of which must be at a level of twenty hours per week as opposed to the normal ten). With the permission of the director of doctoral studies (DDS), the total teaching requirement may be reduced for students who are awarded fellowships supported by outside funding.

Doctoral Committee

Combined degree students will be assigned an adviser in both YSE and Anthropology upon admission to the combined program. As soon as possible thereafter, but not later than the end of the second semester of their first year in the program, each student must constitute a formal doctoral committee. The student’s principal advisers in YSE and Anthropology will serve as cochairs of the committee. The committee should have one additional member drawn from tenure-track Yale faculty; one more member from Yale or even from outside Yale can be added if that is deemed necessary by the student and cochairs.

Exams, Prospectus, and Dissertation

Combined degree students will take their comprehensive exams during their fourth semester of study. This will be a written examination composed of two parts. The first part of the examination will be taken over four or five hours on a single day and will be based entirely on the required sequence of seminars taken in YSE and Anthropology. The second part of the examination will also be taken over four or five hours on the next day or within a week of the first part and will be based on elective courses and bibliographies of anthropological and inter-disciplinary environmental studies research pertaining to a world area and/or topic (for example sub-Saharan Africa or global climate change) that the student has chosen for conduct of dissertation field research. Both parts of the written examination will be taken starting in the last week of March and the examination will be written by the student’s committee. Both parts of the written examination will consist of six to eight questions, of which three to four will have to be answered. Both parts of the exam, if permitted by the student’s committee, may also be answered as a take home and submitted a week later. The entire committee will sit in an oral examination of the entire written exams within two weeks of the completion of all written examinations. Remote participation by telephone conference call is permitted where necessary. The exam will consist of a brief presentation/overview by the student, followed by questioning by the committee. There are only two possible exam outcomes: Pass, or Fail. If a student fails, he/she is dismissed from the graduate school.

All combined students must prepare a comprehensive dissertation prospectus and a field paper in close consultation with their committee, and following current Anthropology and YSE guidelines. The prospectus document is typically 1500 to 2000 words long, and the field paper is 8,000 to 10,000 words long. These documents also form the basis for dissertation research grant proposals for Yale sources and external competitions. The student must defend this prospectus in a formal oral defense before the entire committee (and other interested faculty members). The oral defense is held within the department that serves as the student’s administrative home. There are several possible outcomes to the defense: unconditional Pass, Pass conditional upon specified revisions to the prospectus, or Fail. If the student fails the examination, the committee and DGSs will together prescribe the remedy, which may include scheduling a second defense. If the student fails a second time, they will be dismissed from the graduate school. A successful defense of this prospectus/field paper satisfies the oral defense required by YSE and the Department of Anthropology and is required for admission to candidacy.

A final version of this prospectus must be filed with the DGS and the student’s advisory committee’s endorsement of this document must be brought before the entire Anthropology faculty for approval. Depending on their progress and readiness, combined degree students may complete these prospectus/field paper requirements in their fourth, fifth, or sixth semester of study. Passing qualifying examinations and approval of the prospectus and field paper by the home department after a successful defense before the committee complete requirements for the student to attain candidacy or All but Dissertation (ABD) status. At this point the student can petition for the M. Phil. degree from the GSAS.

The completed dissertation must be defended, following YSE guidelines, before a meeting of the entire committee (and other interested faculty members). The defense will consist of a brief presentation or overview by the student, followed by questioning by the committee. There are three possible outcomes to the defense: unconditional Pass, Pass conditional upon specified revisions to the dissertation, or Fail. In the event of failure, the committee and DGSs will together prescribe the remedy, which may include scheduling a second defense. If the student fails a second time, they will be dismissed from the graduate school. Following a successful defense, three formal reader’s reports must then be prepared for presentation to the DGSs of Anthropology and YSE. At least two of these must come from tenured Yale faculty, and at least one must come from the YSE faculty and at least one from the Anthropology faculty. The readers must be recommended by the appropriate DGS and approved by the GSAS.

For more information contact the program coordinators Michael Dove (Anthropology; michael.dove@yale.edu) or Kalyanakrishnan Sivaramakrishnan (YSE; kalyanakrishnan.sivaramakrishnan@yale.edu).

Master’s Degrees

M.Phil. (en route to the Ph.D.) Students may petition for this degree after they have passed the qualifying exam and advanced to candidacy. Applications for this master’s degree are not accepted.

M.S. (en route to the Ph.D.) This degree is normally granted only to students who are withdrawing from the Ph.D. program. Applications for this master’s degree are not accepted. Requirements that must be met for award of the M.S. are (1) successful completion of two years of course work in residence with two grades of Honors; (2) a written prospectus; (3) fulfillment of one term of the teaching requirement. Students who are eligible for or who have already received the M.Phil. will not be awarded the M.S.

For information on the terminal master’s degrees offered by the Yale School of the Environment (the Master of Forestry, Master of Forest Science, Master of Environmental Management, and Master of Environmental Science degrees), visit the school’s website, http://environment.yale.edu, or contact Admissions Director, Yale School of the Environment, 195 Prospect Street, New Haven CT 06511.

required Course

All Ph.D. students are required to take the following course in the fall term of their first year. For a complete list of ENV courses, see the School of the Environment bulletin, available online at https://catalog.yale.edu/environment, and Yale Course Search at https://courses.yale.edu.

ENV 900a, Doctoral Student Seminar and Responsible Conduct of Research

This course provides the foundation for doctoral study at the School of the Environment. Students learn what it means to do scholarly research as well as become adept with philosophy of science and research methodology and proposal writing, as a basis for exploring diverse approaches to formulating and addressing research questions. Students work with their advisers to put these concepts and principles into practice to develop the basis for their dissertation research (including building bibliography, identifying and crafting research questions, formulating research hypotheses, and drafting a research proposal). Students further learn about funding opportunities and procedures for submitting grants. The course also covers professional ethics and responsible conduct of research, including ethical approaches to inquiry and measurement, data acquisition and management, authorship and publication, peer review, conflicts of interest, mentoring, collaborative research, and animal and human subjects research. Finally, the course explores ethical ways to advocate for the application of scholarly knowledge in the interest of environmental problem solving. Weekly assigned readings support concepts and issues addressed in class. Students present their embryonic research ideas in class and use feedback from the group to further develop their ideas.  3 Course cr
W 1pm-3:50pm