The Marine Biology Minor | Minor Requirements | Integrative Experience & FISH/BIOL/OCEAN 479 Contract | Declaring the Marine Biology Minor | Planning | Graduating | Finding Research and Funding

The Marine Biology Minor

UW undergraduates can earn an interdisciplinary minor in marine biology and learn about marine organisms, ecosystems, and conservation from the perspectives of three different fields:

Coursework in the minor includes exciting hands-on learning opportunities, such as field trips, internships, research with faculty, courses at the Friday Harbor Laboratories, and research in tandem with study abroad programs. Students are encouraged to declare the marine biology minor during their freshman or sophomore year and immediately join a small community of researchers and students interested in organisms, ecosystems, and conservation.

Minor Requirements

Overview

Core Coursework (18 credits)

Students must take each of the following courses: 

Approved Electives (14 credits)

Students must take at least one course from each of the following lists. Additional marine biology courses may be petitioned to count for the minor. Please contact marbiol@u.washington.edu with questions:

Oceanography (OCEAN)

Aquatic & Fishery Sciences (FISH)

Biology (BIOL)

Integrative Experience

Integrative experience credits cannot count toward the student‘s major. Students may take one of the following courses for their integrative experience requirements. Students only should consider pursuing FISH/BIOL/OCEAN 479 Research in Marine Biology if they already have worked for at least one quarter on independent research in faculty labs or affiliated internships and have taken FISH/BIOL/OCEAN 250 and Q Sci 381. Research credits must included a paper and a presentation to be eligible. In addition, coursework including Friday Harbor Lab Research Apprenticeships, and Independent Research 499 in FISH, OCEAN, or Biology may be petitioned to count for the Integrative Experience. Please contact marbiol@u.washington.edu for complete petition guidelines.

Declaring the Marine Biology Minor

Students can declare the minor at any time during their degrees, even if they have fewer than 90 credits. Students are encouraged to declare the minor with the marine biology minor advisor, marbiol@u.washington.edu, but they can declare the minor with the help of any academic advisor or without an advisor by signing a “Change of Major/Minor Form” and turning it into the registrar in Schmitz 225.

Students who are interested in the minor or have declared the minor are encouraged to contact the marine biology minor advisor, marbiol@u.washington.edu, and set up an advising appointment.

Planning

Students who have declared the marine biology minor are strongly encouraged to set up an appointment with the marine biology minor advisor through marbiol@u.washington.edu to create an academic plan that works for them. We also encourage new minors to print out the two forms below and use them in their academic planning process.

Graduating

Marine biology minors must have the marine biology minor advisor sign their graduation applications to verify that they have completed the minor requirements. Once students have completed graduation applications with their major advisors, they should set up a minor advising appointment through marbiol@u.washington.edu.

Finding Research and Funding

We strongly encourage marine biology minors to pursue research in faculty labs and research experiences and internships in the community early-on in their degrees. 

To find research and internship opportunities, we recommend that students make it a habit to talk to faculty and TAs in their office hours about class topics and research opportunities in faculty labs. Many undergraduate research opportunities arise from classes. We also encourage students to familiarize themselves with what UW marine biology faculty are researching by visiting their lab webpages.  In addition, students should visit these sites when seeking research opportunities:

Students involved in research are eligible for a wide range of awards and grants.  Students seeking funding for research should start by looking at the scholarship listings on our FAQ page.