Program Overview

River-Coastal Science and Engineering, PhD

The River-Coastal Science and Engineering program is an effort by faculty and students to understand a key component of the Earth system—the linked environments of river basins, deltaic river mouths, and coastal ocean systems. Much of our focus surrounds the nexus issue of water: water exerts a strong control over landform evolution and ecosystem health, and is a priority human need for agriculture, industry, and health.

Program Requirements

Tulane requires 48 credit hours of graduate coursework (typically comprised of 16 courses each carrying 3 credit hours) as part of the Ph.D. requirements. For students entering with a Master’s degree, the RCSE graduate advisor may approve up to 24 credits of graduate coursework toward the Ph.D. total—this classwork can be earned in SSE or externally.

Coursework

• PhD students can transfer up to 24 credit hours from previous graduate-level coursework to the degree. The RCSE Graduate Advisor must approve all transfer credits.
• Students hoping to transfer graduate credits should prepare and submit the paperwork at the start of their second semester at Tulane. SSE will only transfer credits when the student has completed one semester (it is at that point that a Tulane transcript is available).
• RCSE Ph.D. students will be anticipated to be supported through fellowship, scholarship, or other of the various kinds of assistantships. Hence, they will be required under SSE rules to be registered for at least nine hours of graduate credit until admitted to candidacy to maintain full-time residence status. These nine hours of graduate credit, following SSE standards, may be a combination of course work and research or solely research credit.
• Approved academic graduate electives from other departments can be applied to the degree up to a limit of 12 credit hours. All other courses must originate from RCSE. If a class is not on the approved list, a student may petition the Graduate Advisor for it to be accepted as an elective.
• Note that Ph.D. students must register for credits during the summer due to health insurance reasons
• Unless students have been exposed previously to the material offered, thesis committees will strongly urge students to take two introductory technical course offered by RCSE—the existing RCSE 6800 Intro to River Science & Eng (3 c.h.), and RCSE 6802 Introduction to Coastal Science and Engineering (3 c.h.).

Course List

• RCSE 6010: Water Resources Engineering I (offered Summer session), 3 credits
• RCSE 6020: Water Resources Engineering II (offered Fall semester), 3 credits
• RCSE 6030: Water Resources Engineering III (offered Spring semester), 3 credits
• RCSE/EENS 6040: Coastal Marine Geology (offered Spring semester, even years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6660: Special Topics (offered periodically), 1-3 credits
• RCSE 6710: Open Channel Flow (offered Spring semester, odd years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6800: Intro to River Science & Eng (offered every Spring semester), 3 credits
• RCSE 6802: Introduction to Coastal Science and Engineering (offered every Fall semester), 3 credits
• RCSE 6810: River and Stream Restoration (offered Spring semester, even years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6820: Introduction to River-Coastal Hydrologic and Hydraulic Modeling (offered Spring semester, even years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6830: River Mechanics & Management (offered Fall semester, even years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6840: Methods in River Sampling (offered Spring semester, odd years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6850: Estuarine Processes (offered Spring semester, odd years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6860: Environmental Data Analysis in the Anthropocene (offered Spring semester, even years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6865: Sea-Level Change (offered Spring semester, odd years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6870: Hydroclimatology (offered Fall, odd years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6875: Ecohydrology (offered Fall, even years), 3 credits
• RCSE 6900: Independent Study (Every semester), 1-3 credits
• RCSE 7020: Research Skills, Information Literacy and Scientific Writing (offered every Fall semester), 3 credits
• RCSE 7100: Seminar in River Coastal Science and Engineering (Every semester), 1 credit
• RCSE 7940: Transfer Credit- Graduate, 1-12 credits
• RCSE 9990: Dissertation Research, 3 credits

Additional Requirements

• Ph.D. students must enroll in three semesters of the 1 credit Seminar course (RCSE 7100 Seminar in River Coastal Science and Engineering (1 c.h.)).
• They must also enroll in RCSE 7020 Research Skills, Information Literacy and Scientific Writing (3 c.h.), a course that is offered each Fall.
• Generally, students take this class in their third semester.
• Additionally, students must enroll in 3 credits of Dissertation Research (RCSE 9990 Dissertation Research (0 to 3 c.h.)) over two semesters (6 credits total). This is a requirement to advance to candidacy.

Examination and Candidacy

• PhD students must undertake a general (preliminary or qualifying) examination by the beginning of the third academic year of study (5th semester).
• Following SSE guidelines, a student who fails to take the test within a reasonable length of time will be judged not to be making adequate progress towards the degree and will be advised by RCSE not to continue graduate study.
• Prior to scheduling the examination, the student will give an in-person preliminary dissertation prospectus presentation to their committee where they outline the proposed topic of original research, a background of the state of knowledge of the topic, and the progress to date in their work.
• Following successful completion of the oral qualifying examination, the student will prepare a dissertation prospectus that focuses on the individual novel research projects that will result in dissertation chapters and eventual peer-reviewed publications.
• This document will be approved by the dissertation committee for submission to SSE, at which point the student will be advanced to candidacy.
• Preliminary drafts of this prospectus will be produced in the required RCSE 7020 Technical Writing course.
• At the time of submission of dissertation for approval by the committee, a Ph.D. student will be required to have submitted at least one, and preferably two manuscripts for peer-reviewed publication as supervised by their dissertation committee.