As the Tulane School of Science and Engineering’s newest department, River-Coastal Science and Engineering (RCSE) is at an early phase of development, but its upward trajectory is marked by a number of key milestones to date:
July 2017 – The Department of River-Coastal Science and Engineering is founded. Professor Mead Allison of the Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences is recruited to serve as the founding chair and organizer of the new department.
November 2017 – A blue-ribbon panel of 12 Tulane faculty and academicians, government, and corporate engineers and scientists from across the US meets for the first time to develop a strategic plan for RCSE.
January 2018 – A Cooperative Agreement is signed between Tulane (RCSE) with the US Army Corps of Engineers with the idea of developing joint educational initiatives. In Spring 2018 semester, the first class is taught of a joint RCSE-USACE Graduate Certificate in River Science and Engineering, stressing the “river” elements of the new department. This revolutionary “hybrid model” non-residence program is the first offered in the School of Science and Engineering.
June 2018 – The strategic plan for RCSE is submitted by the 12 member planning committee to Provost Forman.
November 2018 – The second full-time faculty member, Professor Ehab Meselhe, Ph.D., P.E., is hired. Professor Meselhe is a renowned numerical modeler of river-deltaic-coastal systems who has played a key role in the development of the Louisiana Master Plan for Coastal Restoration and Protection.
January 2019 – The first RCSE PhD student (Eric White) is accepted through the SSE Interdisciplinary Ph.D. program with the anticipation that he and future students will transition to an RCSE PhD degree program when it is stood up and accredited.
May 2019 – The joint RCSE-USACE Graduate Certificate in River Science and Engineering is officially accredited by Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS).
August 2020 – Professor Ehab Meselhe of RCSE is named the Nicholas J. Altiero Distinguished Professor of Engineering at Tulane.
December 2020 – First graduate certificate granted by RCSE in River Science and Engineering to Autumn Murray (M.S. 2021 and presently a civilian employee of the US Army Corps of Engineers).
August 2021 – Our third full-time faculty member, Professor John Sabo, join RCSE after a distinguished career at Arizona State University. Professor Sabo is a renowned river food web ecologist and has designed and implemented large scale field experiments to understand the role of aquatic-terrestrial energy flow on terrestrial food web dynamics as well as the dynamic effects of ground water on surface water food webs. Professor Sabo also serves as Director of the Bywater Institute at Tulane.
January 2022 – Two new tenure-track faculty members (our fourth and fifth) join RCSE. They are Associate Professor Annalisa Molini and Assistant Professor Soenke Dangendorf. Professor Molini joins us after a university career in the Middle East, is a water resources engineer specializing in hydroclimatology. Professor Dangendorf, who joins Tulane after previous university experience in Old Dominion University and in Germany, is a civil engineer who specializes in sea level analysis.
February 2022 – RCSE Professor Dangendorf receives a distinguished endowed position as David and Jane Flowerree Early Career Professor.
January 2023 – Total student enrollment in the RCSE Graduate Certificate in River Science and Engineering reaches a cumulative student enrollment of 323 individual class registrants, including 173 non-residential student/classes.
March 2023 – RCSE graduate programs (Ph.D., resident and non-resident M.S.) are officially accredited by Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS). Students will begin to pursue this program in the Fall 2023 semester. Existing graduate students in the department temporarily resident in other programs in SSE will transition into the RCSE degree programs by Summer 2023.
March 2023 – SSE and the Tulane Provost officially approve the RCSE Minor in Civil Engineering- Water Resources and Environmental (CEWR). Students will begin to pursue this program in the Fall 2023 semester.
