MSc Pollution & Environmental Control

University of Manchester

Course description

Our course provides you with a strong grounding in the quantitative and qualitative skills required to address environmental questions in addition to subject-specific knowledge and understanding.

Following the taught element you have the opportunity to apply your skills and knowledge in a research project.

Aims

The aim of this programme is to

• provide interdisciplinary foundation training for students from a natural science or engineering background intending to pursue a career, with or without further postgraduate training, in pollution control, environmental management or resource conservation.
• provide an understanding of the nature of explanation in social science, natural science and engineering as applied to research or other investigative activity in pollution control and environmental management.
• provide generic and subject-specific training in research design and methods of data collection and analysis.
• provide subject-specific training in the social, economic, legal, planning and engineering dimensions of environmental protection and resource conservation tailored to the student's research interests and/or career needs.
• provide subject-specific training on how natural systems function and the perturbations to those systems arising from human activity, again tailored to the student's research interests and/or career needs.
• meet the needs of employers that require an ability to bring sound science and current thinking to environmental problems.
• foster interdisciplinary study within the School and within the University through provision of high quality students to carry out projects.
• enable the student systematically to research the area of environmental pollution via the literature and create an ordered structured report on a subject of relevance to the course and their own interests.

Career opportunities

Governments, industry and society, in all countries, are increasingly aware of the importance of securing sustainable development through cost-effective pollution controls and resource conservation. As a result, there is a growing need, internationally, for suitably qualified personnel in the environmental authorities of central and local government, industry and commerce, consultancy and research. Moreover, the resulting legal requirements on the part of governments and industry to conform to national and international agreements and regulations means that such demand will remain even during periods of economic austerity and retrenchment.

Employers are increasingly requiring environmental science graduates to have a strong grounding in the quantitative and qualitative skills required to address environmental questions in additional to subject-specific knowledge and understanding. Our programmes address these requirements through a core of skills-based modules with the emphasis on synthesis.