YOUR FIRST STEP TO A CAREER AS ENVIRONMENTAL CONSULTANT

The most important basic knowledge for a career in environmental consultancy or as an environmental officer is the assessment of the environment and its resilience to changes. Work in this area has expanded greatly in recent decades, and when combined with a knowledge of plant or animal identification and ecology, this course develops an extremely valuable skill.

There are 8 lessons in this course:

1. Introduction to Environmental Assessment
2. Overview of Environmental Assessment
3. International Environmental Law 
4. Domestic Environmental Law
5. Types of Environmental Assessments
6. The Design and Process of Environmental Assessment
7. Writing Environmental Reports
8. Research Project

Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.

• To appreciate the range of employment available to scientists skilled in environmental assessment
• Develop an understanding of the basics of environmental study design, analysis and reporting within a legal framework.
• Be aware of the international legislation relevant to environmental assessment
• Research the legislation which dictates the environmental assessment requirements in the student's home country.
• Appreciate the range of environmental assessment techniques that have been developed to assess a range of situations around the globe.
• Understand the environmental assessment process in enough depth to manage a small environmental assessment.
• Write a professional environmental report.
• Prepare an environmental impact assessment including carrying out all research and writing up the actual report.

• Contact a laboratory (either by telephone, email, or in person) that carries out tests for environmental contaminants.
• Research the organisation in the local area that handles environmental complaints and the procedure for lodging such complaints.
• Identify developments that require an environmental assessment.
• Contact an Environmental Consulting Firm that carries out Environmental Assessments to determine the most common type of environment assessment in the local area.
• Contact the local government organisation to determine what sort of environmental assessments are required for the different classes of development.
• Research one treaty that influences environmental issues in the locality.
• Research the legislation in the student's home country that governs the preparation of environmental assessments. Research the legislation in one other country that governs the preparation of environmental assessments.
• Identify factors that influence developer's decisions on where to locate their developments.
• Read and review an Environmental Assessment Report
• Source the original data from an Environmental Assessment to determine how the data was analysed after collection.
• Write one hypothetical environmental assessment from beginning to end.
• Carry out a major research project in the form of an environmental assessment. This project will include research into data scoping, study design, data collection, data analysis, conclusions and a professionally presented final report.