What is ocean engineering? Learn about the Department of Ocean Engineering at Texas A&M University and hear directly from a student in the program.
Sebastiao Figueira:
So personally, my career within ocean engineering started with Harvey hitting Houston. So my personal focus within ocean engineering is coastal resilience. And so that's going to be how we can prepare communities for sea level rise. About 40% of the world population currently lives within 100 kilometers of the coastline. I want to be one of the people that's in the front lines trying to define how we can ensure that people can stay on the coast, how we can adapt life to it, and what ways we can protect it through hopefully natural methods where we can coexist with the water. Howdy, my name is Sebastiao Appleton Figueira, or "Sebas", and I'm a member of the ocean engineering department at Texas A&M.
Laura Simmons:
Nearly a third of the population in the US was in coastal regions so career opportunities for ocean engineers abound. From new energy sources to marine robotics protecting homes from storm surge and sea level rise to expanding ports and harbors to accommodate ever larger ships, our students often graduate with multiple job offers in their area of choice. A Bankrate study of over 150 degrees ranked naval architecture and marine engineering, subsets of ocean engineering, among the top college majors for several years in a row with a median salary of$100,000. With a unique dual campus setup, students have the opportunity to earn their undergraduate or graduate degree at either of our two campuses in College Station or Galveston, while benefiting from the expertise of every faculty member through remote communication technology.
Sebastiao Figueira:
So for me, ocean engineering is one of the coolest fields you can find within engineering. First of all, we have naval architecture, we have new routes being developed in the north due to ice caps melting. However, we can take advantage of that through naval architecture by creating better transportation methods. Boats are currently the least polluting transportation method we have. So investment into the area, I believe is really important. We also have huge funds going into offshore renewables. And we as ocean engineers are at the frontline of trying to design those structures and trying to perfect them to be able to withstand storm surge, hurricanes, tornadoes, whatever else can occur to those structures. And then finally, it's my field of coastal engineering. Like I mentioned, sea level rise is going to continue to occur. There's huge investment in every state for projects dealing with coastal resiliency. There's a huge project here in Texas, the Texas coastal resiliency master plan and the Ike Dike. All of th t is within the ocean engine ring field. We have a great pr gram here at A&M that's he vily involved with those efforts And I think it's great for peop e to ho
Laura Simmons:
Learn more about the ocean engineering department by visiting engineering.tamu.edu/ocean