Choosing an advisor

Your major advisor serves as an academic mentor and will help guide you to completion of your degree. Having a major advisor is a requirement of acceptance to the MNR program, whether you apply directly or are transferring from a certificate program. Here are our recommendations for choosing a major advisor:

Identify potential faculty advisors

We recommend that you identify two to three faculty members who could potentially serve as your advisor.

Review our list of graduate faculty by college to help you find faculty members whose area of research aligns with your academic interests.

Depending on your career and academic goals, you may want to find a faculty member outside this list. The program welcomes additional Oregon State faculty to advise our students. You can find additional faculty through these OSU links:

• College of Forestry faculty directory
• Fisheries and wildlife faculty directory
• CEOAS faculty directory
• Water conflict management faculty directory

Request faculty members to serve as your advisor

Once you have compiled a list of potential faculty, contact each faculty member separately and ask them to serve as your MNR advisor. Faculty will want to know background information about your academic experience before they agree to be your advisor.

Use this email letter template to draft a message to each faculty member to introduce yourself and attach the following pertinent information:

• CV
• Transcripts
• Writing sample (term paper, short essay, research proposal)
• The MNR faculty advisor guide to ensure they understand the program's requirements, expectations and compensation for working with you.

This information will allow advisors to decide whether or not to serve as your advisor. The number of students each faculty is willing to take on at one time is dependent on their availability. Please don’t be discouraged if faculty members respond with “no” or “not at this time.”

Still need help?

Download our MNR handbook for information about admissions, program requirements, academic policies and useful resources. It also contains suggested timelines, procedures and strategies to help you get the most out of your graduate experience.

If you have completed all of the above steps and are still in need of help identifying an advisor, please contact:

Juliet Sutton
Program coordinator
Forest Ecosystems and Society
juliet.sutton@oregonstate.edu
541-737-6088

Please provide a list of the faculty members you contacted along with a short summary of your interaction with them.