Academics

Schools and Departments 

THE SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE

The Rice School of Architecture (RSA) is an accredited design program offering that offers four degrees. Its small size enables the school to perform as a collaborative think tank that engages all four of these programs simultaneously. At the undergraduate level, students can earn a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture or the Bachelor of Architecture, which is a degree that prepares an architecture student for licensure. Graduate degrees include the Master of Architecture, an accredited degree for licensure, and the post-professional M.Arch. II.  

The School of Architecture is housed on the main academic quad in Anderson Hall, where -- in addition to generous studio, classroom and exhibition spaces -- students have access to an advanced computer visualization and research laboratory, a fully equipped model shop, and a state-of-the-art fabrication facility that includes a CNC milling machine, 3-D printer and laser cutter.   

Bachelor of Architecture students are able to refine their design skills through the RSA Preceptorship Program, an internship program that assigns qualified students to work for a year with leading architectural firms in the United States and abroad. Upper-level graduate and fifth-year Bachelor of Architecture students have the opportunity to study abroad through the Rice School of Architecture Paris program, which is offered in both fall and spring.   

Achievements of Rice architecture faculty include international awards for built and speculative projects, significant exhibits of work in venues around the world, and numerous scholarly published works in books and journals
 

 THE GEORGE R. BROWN SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING

 The School of Engineering has eight academic departments: Bioengineering, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Computational and Applied Mathematics, Computer Science, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, and Statistics. At the graduate level, there also are interdisciplinary degree programs in Applied Physics, Computational Science and Engineering, and Environmental Analysis and Decision Making, as well as a joint M.D./Ph.D. program with the Baylor College of Medicine. Undergraduates can choose from a number of engineering-related minors: Computational and Applied Mathematics, Energy and Water Sustainability, Financial Computation and Modeling, Global Health Technologies, and Statistics. 

All of the engineering departments are located in the five buildings that frame the Engineering Quadrangle except for bioengineering, which is housed in Rice’s BioScience Research Collaborative. Engineering undergraduates enjoy small class sizes (an average size of 20 students) and many opportunities for involvement in research; some 65 percent participate in research by the time they graduate. Crosscutting research programs in nanotechnology, information technology, biosciences, biotechnology, energy and environmental issues form the major focus areas within engineering, and local industry partners provide many opportunities for collaboration. Engineering faculty, undergraduates and graduate students benefit from partnerships with international leaders in the oil and gas industry; with NASA's space program; and with leading researchers at MD Anderson Cancer Center, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and Baylor College of Medicine, which are all part of the nearby Texas Medical Center.  

THE SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES

School of Humanities students at Rice choose from 12 academic departments: art history, classical studies, English, French studies, German studies, Hispanic studies, history, kinesiology, linguistics, philosophy, religious studies, and visual and dramatic arts. Several interdisciplinary majors and minors are also available, many of which include studies within the school’s programs: Jewish studies; ancient Mediterranean civilizations; medieval studies; theater; and poverty, justice and human capabilities.  

The School of Humanities houses the Center for the Study of Languages; the Humanities Research Center; and the Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality, all of which enrich Rice’s humanities education and research efforts. In addition, there is the Visual Resources Center, the primary location on campus for instruction and research using images of cultural objects; it contains approximately 350,000 35mm slides and 35,000 digital images of works of art, architecture and visual culture from prehistoric to contemporary times. The school is home to five national journals: Studies in English Literature 1500-1900, the Journal of Southern History, Feminist Economics, The Papers of Jefferson Davis and Religious Studies Review. Departments and centers are housed in the Humanities Building, Rayzor Hall, Herring Hall, Sewall Hall, Tudor Fieldhouse and the Rice Media Center.  

Hamman Hall -- a 500-seat proscenium theater facility -- and the film theater in the Rice Media Center -- which boasts the only silver screen of its type in Houston -- allow us to simultaneously train students and to extend our reach beyond the hedges with entertainment for the Houston community. Similarly, the Rice Gallery, located in Sewall Hall, is the only university gallery in the country dedicated to commissioning site-specific installation art, bringing a unique art experience to the university campus and Houston.   

Members of the Rice humanities faculty have been named a U.S. Professor of the Year and a Texas Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education. In addition, faculty members have been recognized through funding by the Guggenheim Foundation, the Mellon Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities.  

THE JESSE H. JONES GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS

The Jones Graduate School of Business offers the MBA degree through several programs: the full-time MBA program, which includes the joint MBA/M.E. (with the George R. Brown School of Engineering), MBA/M.S. (with the Wiess School of Natural Sciences) and MBA/M.D. (with Baylor College of Medicine); the evening and weekend MBA for Professionals program; and the weekend MBA for Executives program. The Jones Graduate School of Business Executive Education program offers a full schedule of noncredit and customized courses for business and industry. 

The school is housed in the 167,000-square-foot Janice and Robert McNair Hall, which includes the Gilbert and Ruth Whitaker Business Information Center, the El Paso Corporation Finance Center, a behavioral studies center and the 450-seat Shell Oil Foundation Auditorium. 

THE SHEPHERD SCHOOL OF MUSIC

The Shepherd School of Music offers preprofessional training for musicians, combining the intensity of a conservatory experience with the excellence of an education at a renowned private university. Degree programs in the Shepherd School include the four-year Bachelor of Music and the two-year Master of Music in performance, composition, conducting, music history and music theory. The Doctor of Musical Arts degree program is offered in composition and selected areas of performance.  

The Shepherd School is housed in Alice Pratt Brown Hall, home of four of the finest performance spaces in the city: Stude Concert Hall, Duncan Recital Hall, Wortham Opera Theatre and Edythe Bates Old Recital Hall and Grand Organ. This state-of-the-art facility also includes numerous practice rooms, classrooms and rehearsal halls, plus an electronic music studio and an administrative suite. The nearly 400 concerts, recitals and other events held at the venue annually reach an audience of more than 75,000.  

THE WIESS SCHOOL OF NATURAL SCIENCES

The Wiess School of Natural Sciences comprises six departments: Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Chemistry, Earth Science, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Mathematics, and Physics and Astronomy. Natural Sciences faculty participate in several Interdisciplinary institutes and centers including the Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering, Richard E. Smalley Institute for Nanoscale Science and Technology, Rice Quantum Institute, the W.M. Keck Center for Interdisciplinary Bioscience Training, Gulf Coast Consortia, and Rice Space Institute. Research partnerships encompass local institutions including Baylor College of Medicine, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, NASA, The University of Texas Health Science Center, the University of Texas Medical Branch, and University of Houston, plus foundations, museums, industries, and other universities and corporations worldwide.

The research of Nobel Laureates Robert Curl and Richard Smalley heralded the new discipline of nanoscience and technology that brings together many fields across science and engineering.  In addition to providing the foundation of nano-research, the School also recently recruited three renowned scientists, all members of the National Academy of Sciences.  Their research labs in cancer, physics, and chemistry will work in partnership with cancer specialists in the Texas Medical Center to apply new concepts from physics to cancer research and treatment.  Members of our faculty have received prestigious awards such as:  Packard Fellowships, Beckman Foundation Fellowships, NSF CAREER Awards for junior faculty, Feynman Prizes, Norman Hackerman awards in Chemistry, the Athelstan Spilhaus Award for Enhancement of the Public Understanding of Earth and Space Science, and the Public Welfare Medal from the National Academy of Science.

The School offers numerous research opportunities to its undergraduates, and many publish work in top journals.  A small sampling of research being conducted illustrates the broad range of possibilities: exotic plant and animal invasions into Texas ecosystems, evolutionary dynamics of genes and genomes in populations and species, effects of salt chemistry on freezing of saturated Martian soil, neurogenesis in Alzheimer’s Disease, and building lasers for cooling atoms to a millionth of a degree above absolute zero, to name a few.

The space that supports Natural Sciences is remarkably diverse in the state-of-the-art equipment provided to the undergraduate and graduate research programs.  The School also supports a professional science masters program in several areas. 

 THE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

The School of Social Sciences, housed in both Baker Hall and Sewall Hall, includes the departments of anthropology, economics, political science, psychology and sociology. Interdisciplinary programs associated with the school include cognitive sciences, managerial studies and policy studies. Students in cognitive sciences are engaged in the multidisciplinary study of the mind. Managerial studies provides an understanding of the environment in which business and other organizations exist and of the tools used by managers. Policy studies students learn to analyze and evaluate public policy and gain an understanding of the policymaking process.   

The School of Social Sciences also houses five institutes and centers: the Douglas S. Harlan Program in State Elections, Campaigns and Politics; the Hobby Center for the Study of Texas; the Kinder Institute for Urban Research; the Shell Center for Sustainability; and the Social Sciences Research Institute (SSRI). Each institute/center positively affects people’s lives in different ways. The Douglas S. Harlan Program in State Elections, Campaigns and Politics focuses on U.S. politics and policymaking. The Hobby Center for the Study of Texas seeks to advance the understanding of demographic, economic, geographic and social conditions in Texas and other states. The Kinder Institute for Urban Research is home to the Kinder Houston Area Survey, which tracks community residents’ experiences and perceptions of life in the Houston area. The Shell Center for Sustainability supports the efforts of Rice University's faculty, staff and students to better our planet's economy. The SSRI provides seed funds and other awards to promote cutting-edge research in the social sciences. 

The School of Social Sciences graduates more majors than any other school at Rice. The school also features high-quality graduate programs in anthropology, economics, political science, psychology and sociology. Social sciences faculty members garner more than $5 million in grants and consistently win between one-third and one-half of all university wide teaching awards. 

THE SUSANNE M. GLASSCOCK SCHOOL OF CONTINUING STUDIES

The mission of the Susanne M. Glasscock School of Continuing Studies (GSCS) is to further Rice University’s commitment to educational outreach by providing lifelong personal and professional development opportunities to the larger community. Established in 1967, the school now attracts nearly 13,000 enrollments each year to its noncredit and credit programs.   

Personal development opportunities are offered in arts, humanities, sciences, creative writing, studio art, photography, lifestyle and personal finance. Professional development programs include courses in human resources, paralegal studies, career development, communication and financial services, including a program to help prepare students for the Certified Financial Planner certification exam.  

Operating one of the largest language programs in the state, GSCS offers classes in eight foreign languages as well as in English as a Second Language. The ESL program has welcomed students from more than 100 countries since its inception.  

The Center for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Leadership offers a wide range of courses designed to improve the capacity of nonprofits in the community and to advance the practice and impact of philanthropy. The Center for College Readiness provides opportunities for teachers, administers and students to deepen their knowledge of academic content and increase their awareness of the importance of college-readiness skills.