Program Overview

Graduate School of Oceanography Master of Science (M.S.)

The Graduate School of Oceanography Master of Science (M.S.) program is a comprehensive graduate degree that typically takes 2-2.5 years to complete. The program involves coursework, research credits, thesis proposal defense, research cruise (minimum 5 days at sea), and final thesis defense. Students receive an annual stipend (approximately $40,000, depending on student level), health benefits, and tuition coverage.

Program Requirements

The M.S. program requires students to focus on a specific area of oceanography, including biological, chemical, geological, and physical oceanography, as well as interdisciplinary and related areas such as atmospheric chemistry.

M.S. Track

Students typically concentrate in one of the four tracks, and the courses and requirements differ among them:

• Biological Oceanography: Students study the relationship between living organisms in the ocean and their environment, with courses specializing in specific organism groups, ecology of organism groups or ecosystems, and more.
• Marine and Atmospheric Chemistry: Students study the chemical composition of seawater and its interactions with the atmosphere, biosphere, and sediments, with courses in chemical oceanography, organic chemistry of seawater and sediments, and more.
• Marine Geology and Geophysics: Students study the composition, structure, and processes associated with sedimentation and rock-forming processes in the ocean basins and within the Earth's interior, with research opportunities in marine geophysics, geodynamics, volcanology, and more.
• Physical Oceanography: Students seek to understand the physical processes that govern the circulation of the ocean and the coupled atmosphere-ocean system, with research opportunities in satellite remote sensing, computer modeling, laboratory modeling, and observational studies.

Research Areas

Research opportunities exist in various areas, including:

• Biological oceanography: microbes, phytoplankton, zooplankton, fish, and ecology of organism groups or ecosystems
• Marine and atmospheric chemistry: chemical oceanography, organic chemistry of seawater and sediments, physical chemistry of seawater, and more
• Marine geology and geophysics: marine geophysics, geodynamics, volcanology, geochemistry, paleoceanography, and more
• Physical oceanography: satellite remote sensing, computer modeling, laboratory modeling, and observational studies in air-sea interaction, mixing processes, or large-scale circulation