SBSE Course Schedule and Major Requirements

Admission to the Sustainable Bioresource Systems Engineering (SBSE) major

SBSE is a Minimum Requirements major, which means all students who complete the Minimum Requirements for Admission are admitted to the major.  All details regarding SBSE Admission are available under SBSE Admissions.

When to start the SBSE Major – Timing is Important

All prospective SBSE students should be aware that while students can join the major at any time, the SBSE-prefixed courses begin in Autumn Quarter of Junior Year (year 3).  Students admitted prior to this need to be completing all of the courses included in years 1 and 2 of the SBSE academic plan so they are ready to start the SBSE-prefixed courses in Autumn of year 3.  There are two years (6 quarters, Autumn-Spring) of required SBSE-prefixed courses.

Students admitted after Autumn quarter of Junior year (year 3) will need to be working on other courses required for the major and begin the SBSE courses in the following Autumn quarter.  SBSE course content builds from quarter to quarter, with completion of previous courses a prerequisite for enrolling in courses in the following quarter, so beginning the first quarter of SBSE-prefixed courses in Autumn quarter of year 3 is required.

Graduation in the Sustainable Bioresource Systems Engineering major

To earn a B.S in Sustainable Bioresource Systems Engineering, undergraduate students complete a minimum of 180 credits.

• For a full listing of all requirements, please see the SBSE Major in the UW Catalog.
• Both prospective transfer student applicants and current UW students can download this SBSE 4-year course plan document and use it to plan your required courses.
• Current UW students who want to download some or all of the 4-year course plan directly into MyPlan can do so by going to the SBSE sample 4-year course plan for importing into MyPlan (UW NetID required for access).  Here are additional access instructions for current UW students:

1. Click on SBSE Courses and Sample 4-year Course Plan.  Review all 4 years of the plan.
2. Click on Import Plan (on right side of screen)
   1. You will have the option of downloading the courses required for the current quarter, or you can download multiple quarters or the whole Plan.   If you have other courses in your plan for the quarters in question, those classes will not be deleted.  Review the download instructions for more information.

Once the classes are in your Plan, you will be able to register for the classes as normal

Sustainable Bioresource Systems Engineering (SBSE) Major Elective Lists

One course is required from each of the following two SBSE Elective Lists:

• Computation and Data Science
• Business, Policy, and Economics

Currently, the courses on each list are as follows.  More courses are expected to be added.

Computation and Data Science Elective list (1 course required)

• AMATH 301: Beginning Scientific Computing (4 credits)
• CSE 121/122/123/142/143: Introduction to Computer Programming (various versions) (4 credits)
• CSE 160: Data Programming (4 credits)
• INFO 180/CSE 180/STAT 180: Introduction to Data Science (4 credits)
• Q SCI 256: Introduction to Data Science Methods for Environmental Science (4 credits)

Business, Policy, and Economics (1 course required)

• ECON 200:  Introduction to Microeconomics (5 credits)
• ECON 201: Introduction to Macroeconomics (5 Credits)
• ESRM 235/ECON 235/ENVIR 235: Introduction to Environmental Economics (5 credits)
• ESRM 320: Marketing and Management from a Sustainability Perspective (5 credits)
• ESRM 321: Finance and Accounting from a Sustainability Perspective (5 credits)
• ESRM 400: Natural Resource Conflict Management (3 credits)
• ESRM 423: International Trade, Marketing, and the Environment (3 credits)
• ESRM 465: Economics of Conservation (3 credits)