River Environments and their Management MSc

Our River Environments and their Management MSc is taught by a team of internationally leading water scientists at the University of Birmingham and developed with input from the water industry. To link the theory to the outside world, excursions and fieldwork are a crucial part of many of our modules.

This course will examine the interactions between climate, hydrology, geomorphology, ecology, biogeochemical cycling, water and habitat quality and biodiversity.

Using a combination of lectures, fieldwork, tutorials, laboratory classes, group projects and an individual research-based thesis, you will be provided with the necessary training and skills for a career in the successful environmental management of rivers.

River systems are under ever increasing pressure through the growing demands of water abstraction and hydroelectric power generation, and suffer recurrent disturbance through diffuse and point source pollutants, drought, flooding and channel modification.

The environmental management of rivers is required to mitigate the effects of these pressures. This requires a holistic understanding of how river systems are structured and function, and of how these systems have been altered by anthropogenic activities. To this end, the course will examine the interactions between climate, hydrology, geomorphology, ecology, biogeochemical cycling, water and habitat quality and biodiversity.

An important aspect of the training will be an understanding of how these interactions act at different spatial and temporal scales to influence the structure and function of ecosystems in running waters. This scientific and technical corpus will allow you to understand and quantify the consequences of natural and anthropogenic disturbance on river systems.

Using a combination of lectures, fieldwork, tutorials, laboratory classes, group projects and an individual research-based thesis, you will be provided with the necessary training and skills for a career in the successful environmental management of rivers, including techniques on assessing their status and approaches to rehabilitate and restore the condition of these globally threatened environments.

This degree will provide direct postgraduate training for students interested in this career direction, as well as providing advanced-level training suitable for further PhD studies in water science.

Employability

The course is of considerable value if you wish to pursue a career in the river environmental management field or the water industry. It also provides advanced level training if you wish progress on to a PhD.

Currently, due to the large national demand for Water Managers, we have a 100% employment success rate for all our home/EU students, with graduates obtaining employment in the consultancy sector, typically with jobs secured before graduation. Additionally, Environmental Scientists who have spent some time in a branch of the water industry often feel the need for a postgraduate course to give them an overall understanding of their profession. The River Environments and their Management programme is so structured as to satisfy the requirements of both of these groups of potential students, the latter includes many International students who choose to retrain here in Birmingham.