Advising Information

Getting Advice

Many faculty members in the 20 cooperating departments and schools serve as advisors in the Environmental Sciences and Policy majors. Every effort is made to assign an advisor from a discipline compatible with your interests. You should schedule meetings with your advisor at a minimum of twice each year to discuss your academic progress and to obtain his/her signature for registration. Your advisor must approve your course selections each semester.

You may also wish to seek out your advisor at other times during the year. Your advisor is a tremendous resource, someone who can help you plan a coherent and satisfying individual curriculum and keep you on track toward graduation requirements. He or she may also have useful information about graduate and professional schools or specific career paths related to your field of study. Do not expect him or her to serve as a career counselor, however; this type of guidance is best obtained from the university's Career Development Center.

Because of the interdepartmental nature of the EN major, the Director of Undergraduate Studies plays a significant role in the advising process. The EN Program Office maintains lists of approved courses in all departments and schools participating in the major, and can determine the appropriateness of other courses that may not be listed.

In all instances, it is a courtesy to visit your advisor or the Director of Undergraduate Studies by appointment or during specified office hours, which generally are posted on their office doors or listed with the departmental secretary. Typically, your faculty advisor will post sign-up sheets with specific appointment times during the registration advising period.

Planning Your Program of Study

Of the myriad courses available to undergraduates at Duke, you will be able to take only a few dozen. If you know where you are headed in a chosen career, you should apply that knowledge to your course selection. If you do not, do not worry. A selection of courses based on nothing more than a subject of interest to you or an interesting teacher may eventually have some bearing on your academic direction.

There are a number of sources of information about course offerings beyond the bulletin listings. Most departments keep on file the syllabi of the courses offered by their faculty. In addition, the EN Program Office maintains a file of syllabi for courses approved for the upper-level requirements. The instructors themselves should be willing to talk with you briefly about your interest in a specific course. As you may already know, other students may share with you their impressions about a particular course or instructor.

Within the EN major, a wide variety of options exists for specialization according to intellectual interests or career goals. The focused study can be designed to emphasize particular themes such as waste management, global environmental change, marine conservation and policy, environmental health sciences, or conservation and development in the Third World, for example. Careful selection of courses will make this major especially interesting, appropriate, and challenging for you. You should file your focus study plans and focus study essay during your junior year. A draft essay is due during the fall registration of the junior year; and a final approved essay is due during the spring registration of junior year. Juniors are not given PIN registration codes until they meet these requirements.

Second Majors

A second major in addition to the EN major is possible. You should be aware, however, that a double major is not a casual undertaking. A second major will eliminate or reduce the number of courses that you may choose as electives. It may also cause problems in scheduling required courses. If you choose to double major, one major is considered the "first" major and the other the "second" major. Advising is usually done mainly by the department of the first major. If your second major is Environmental Sciences and Policy, you will still be assigned an EN advisor. You are strongly urged to meet with this advisor to ensure that you develop a coherent program and meet all requirements for the major.