NOTICE - Due to COVID-19 concerns, some Western Michigan University offices are open limited days or hours. 

Fall semester (9/1/21 - 12/17/21) Rood Hall building hours are Monday to Thursday, 7:30 am - 9 pm and Friday, 7:30 am - 5 pm. The building is accessible by swipe card on weekends and holidays.  

The Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences is open in person, Monday to Friday from 8 am - 5 pm.

The physical address of Rood Hall is 2235 Wilbur Ave. In case of an emergency please dial 911.

IN THE NEWS

  • Save the date! Our fall Advisory Council and Alumni and Friends Gathering will be on October 15 and 16. At the event, we will honor our 2021 Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences Distinguished Alumni, Lisa Phillips. Details will be posted on the Alumni page as they become available.
  • Congratulations to doctoral student Mohammed Hashim, who received the “Best Student Talk Award” at the recent Midwest Geobiology Conference, held at IUPUI in Indianapolis. The title of his talk was “An Experimental Investigation of Iodine Incorporation into Dolomite: Implications for the Iodine Redox Proxy.” 
  • Congratulations to Dr. Steve Kaczmarek on his recent award from the National Science Foundation. This $420,830 collaborative study with colleagues from the University of Michigan and Grand Valley State University will experimentally investigate oxygen isotope fractionation during dolomitization. The results of the study will allow geoscientists to improve both their understanding of the natural environments where dolomite forms and the utility of dolomite as a geochemical archive of Earth history. 
  • The Dinosaur Park has welcomed a lot of visitors this summer since we were featured in a story on the KzooKids website. Read the full WMU News piece on the park and our plans for the future! If you plan to visit the park, please use the metered parking at Sindecuse or Sangren to avoid getting ticketed in the staff/student lot adjacent to Rood.
  • The department has suspended the GRE requirement for admission to our MS and PhD programs for students applying for entry in Fall 2021 through Summer 2022. Beginning in Fall 2022, the GRE will no longer be required for graduate program admission, however, prospective students are strongly encouraged to contact potential faculty advisors to find out if submitting optional scores is recommended. For more information, please see our Graduate Programs page or contact Dr. Peter Voice, Director of Graduate Studies.