Key Lessons Learned from the Masters Degree Program in Water Resources Planning and Management

Abstract

The need for practical inter-disciplinary approaches to water resource management has never been greater in the U.S. as it faces major challenges, ranging from an aging water infrastructure, to increased demands for water usage from competing sectors, to a greater incidence of coastal storm and inland flood events. As with flood damage reduction, navigation or environmental rehabilitation projects are no longer devised with a single objective in mind. Similarly, the stakeholder community has expanded appreciably in recent years, necessitating a professional staff not only technically skilled, but also able to effectively interact with diverse and often competing interests. However, as Kirshen et al., (2004) suggest, the design and execution of integrated, multidisciplinary curricula faces significant hurdles (see Russell in this issue). Planners from resource agencies such as the Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation traditionally receive their academic training within a single discipline, such as civil engineering or ecology, thus limiting their exposure to other critical areas that today’s projects entail. Recognizing the challenges they faced with multi-objective planning, combined with a loss of senior planners largely due to attrition, the Corps’ leadership established a task force (USACE 2001) to make recommendations for strengthening expertise throughout its planning community. The resulting Planning Excellence Program included the development of the Corps’ Master’s Degree Program in Water Resources Planning and Management (Masters Program). The Master’s Program, which was formed in partnership with the Universities Council on Water Resources (UCOWR), was unique in its emphasis on inter-departmental curricula. Seven “core” courses were identified to ensure that prospective students were exposed to the varied topics of economics, law, hydrology, engineering, ecology, and participatory planning (UCOWR 2001). A capstone seminar was envisioned to integrate the disciplines through practical test cases. After soliciting interest throughout the UCOWR network, it was determined that five separate universities were equipped and receptive to participating in the program. They were not only willing to promote an inter-disciplinary degree program, but also to waive some of the on-campus residency requirements. The universities eventually agreeing to participate were the University of Florida, the University of Arizona, Southern Illinois University, the Johns Hopkins University and Harvard University. At the time the program was devised, the Corps had ample training programs to which interested students within the Corps were encouraged to apply. Unfortunately, by the time the Master’s Program was launched in 2002, those targeted training budgets were either terminated or significantly curtailed. The resulting loss of centralized training opportunities meant that the individual Corps districts would, in large measure, have to fund their students within their own budgets. The end result was a much lower level of applicants than expected. Consequently, the training model that seemed to have all the right ingredients thus far appears to be unworkable, given the loss of application incentives. This meant that the universities that helped create the program were required to devise their own means to keep their respective programs viable. The University of Arizona, for example, has appealed to regional organizations outside the Corps as a means to attract students, while the 55