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Geography Program

The Geography program at Ohio State University is a comprehensive study of distributions, patterns, and movements across space, encompassing both physical and social aspects. Human geographers focus on the geographic patterns of various human activities, including economic, political, and cultural aspects. In contrast, physical geographers concentrate on the geography of physical processes and their effects, such as the geography of weather and climate.

Specializations

The program offers two specializations:

• Physical Geography (BS): This specialization explores the structures and processes controlling the dynamics of the natural world and how the natural world shapes and is shaped by human action. It includes understanding the impact of natural hazards like hurricanes, tornadoes, droughts, and earthquakes on humans and the built environment. Students receive technical training in areas such as biogeography, geoscience, hydrology, glaciology, geomorphology, land cover change, and global climate change.
• Social and Environmental Geography (BA): This specialization integrates social and environmental issues, preparing students to become global citizens working towards a socially just and sustainable future. Students tackle existential threats such as social inequality, climate change, globalization, dilemmas around public health, and tensions associated with difference regarding race, gender, class, and sexuality. The SEG major embraces and examines the connectedness of the world, providing students with perspectives from the physical sciences, social sciences, and humanities, and offering transferable skills for the ever-changing job market.

Curriculum

The geography program requires students to complete all courses in their major track with a grade of C- or higher, with an average GPA of C. All specializations require at least 10 courses. Students in the urban, regional, and global studies or the environment and society specializations earn a Bachelor of Arts, while those in the climatic studies, physical geography, geographic information studies, or spatial analysis specializations earn a Bachelor of Science. The latter Bachelor of Science tracks require the completion of the calculus series (Mathematics 1151 and 1152), and the physical geography and climatic studies specializations also require additional mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computer programming courses.

Internship

The department offers an intern program to its undergraduate majors, providing work experience, valuable contacts for the future, and the opportunity to accumulate college credit. Students can apply to a variety of agencies after completing 12 hours toward their major in geography.

Honors and Scholars

There are five Honors courses in geography that reflect the diversity of the field, including:

• Geography 1900H: Introduction to Weather and Climate
• Geography 2750H: World Regional Geography
• Geography 2400H: Economic and Social Geography
• Geography 3901H: Global Climate and Environmental Change
• Geography 3600H: Space, Power and Political Geography Honors students are exposed to research in various ways, with about one-third choosing to complete a senior honors thesis. Faculty members also incorporate research opportunities into their course structures, and laboratories in technique courses add to these opportunities.

Research

Numerous faculty members actively incorporate research opportunities into their course structures. Laboratories in the various technique courses that undergraduate majors take, such as Introductory Geographical Information Systems, Cartography, and Introductory Geographical Analysis, provide additional research opportunities.

Possible Careers

Graduates from the urban, regional, and global studies specialization are attractive candidates for positions with planning and development agencies at the federal, state, and local levels. They can also be employed by retail chains, financial institutions, insurance companies, real estate, and industrial firms to collect and analyze data related to the firm's production and distribution of goods and services or to identify appropriate locations for new or expanded facilities.

Graduates from the environment and society specialization have career options including working for environmental and protection agencies, state Departments of Natural Resources and Conservation, and a range of nonprofit agencies working in environmental protection, development, and the protection of indigenous ways of life.

Students with training in computer-based cartography and the use of geographic information systems can find numerous high-paying jobs with private companies and governmental agencies. The physical geography and climatic studies specializations offer job opportunities in the National Weather Service, private forecasting firms, or in television.