Students

Hampshire College uses inquiry as the basis for the entire science curriculum. Students are encouraged to develop their own research questions and pursue their interests. Formal, pre-defined majors do not exist. All students, in their second year, must develop a proposal outlining the course of study they wish to pursue and choose two faculty members to oversee their Division II (concentration/major). In their fourth year, similarly, all students define a Division III research project and identify an advisory committee of two to three faculty members.

Selected Division III (Senior Thesis) Titles

The Co-dependent Relationship between Architectural Design and Structural Engineering

Modeling Leachate Plumes in Aquifers with Varying Hydraulic Conductivity

Algae Photobioreators: Applied Social Ecology

Mineral Grain to Tectonic Plate: A Geologic and Photographic Exploration of Orogeny

A Study of Dam Removal and the Ecological Consequences of Lower Flows

Selected Division II (Concentration/Major) Titles

Environmental Conflict: The Struggle over Resources

Investigating Science

Search for a Natural Balance

Ecology/Dendochronology and Wilderness Therapy

The Co-Dependent Relationship between Architecture and Structural Engineering

Sustainable Development and Social Ecology

Water Science and Policy

Ecology, Biology, and Birds

Water Crises: The Social, Political and Ecological Consequences of Human Water Use

Environmental Engineering and Systems Management

Ecology/Writing

Water, Agriculture and the Role of Economic Policy