BS Agricultural Engineering

agricultural engineers in the fieldUse the latest technology to protect and conserve our natural resources while uncovering new methods to increase food production to feed the world’s growing population. Even though we have newly revised the curriculum, Agricultural Engineering maintains its historical tradition of offering a core curriculum that provides one of the most broadly-based engineering science curriculums available. After completing most of the core, based on your interests, you can choose an emphasis area and focus on one of the following pathways:

  • Discover new ways to reduce soil erosion and improve irrigation techniques to ensure our food supply consistent with current crop production methods.
  • Learn mechanical design for handling and managing the environment for people, plants, and animals.
  • Learn structural design for storing and housing processing operations for biological materials.
  • Learn robotic technology and data collection using drones.
  • Become proficient with the latest techniques for scheduling and transporting food and other biological materials (biologistics).
  • Learn how to safely and effectively process food products for consumer satisfaction.

Depending on the emphasis area you choose, you will gain significant depth in civil, mechanical, or electrical engineering in addition to the broadly-based core. The new biologistics emphasis will expose you to industrial engineering, which is a new direction for UGA Engineering. Similarly, Food Engineering is also now available. Agricultural Engineers have historically been highly competitive with other discipline engineers in gaining entry-level employment in their respective areas. Redundancies in some of the emphasis areas will be consolidated as current students graduate.

Explore our areas of emphasis

Traditional Emphasis Areas

New and Revised Emphasis Areas

Agricultural Engineering at UGA is in a transition motivated by the development of a comprehensive engineering program at UGA. The historic emphasis areas have been retained but are likely to be phased out in the next few years. Emphasis areas have been redesigned such that they capitalize on the availability of other engineering disciplines. In addition, brand new Biologistics and Food Engineering emphasis areas have been added for students interested in these emerging fields.

What you’ll study

  • Calculus I, II, III, Differential Equations, Physics, and Chemistry
  • Machine Design and Machine Hydraulics
  • Fluid hydraulics in pipes and channels
  • Thermodynamics
  • Electrical Circuits, Sensors, and  Controls
  • Design Methodology
  • Systems Modeling
  • Statistics and decision making
  • Physical Unit Operations for handling fluids and granular materials

Careers

  • Design engineer based on your chosen emphasis area leads to careers such as:
    • Irrigation engineer
    • Stormwater engineer
    • Water resources engineer
    • Industrial engineer
    • Light structural engineer
    • Logistics engineering
    • Project engineer
    • Robotic applications engineer
    • Geospatial data collection and analysis
  • Movement into a management or leadership track is likely a few years out of graduation.

Additional career possibilities are suggested on the respective emphasis area web pages.

The Agricultural Engineering curriculum has been revisioned to address 21st century issues in Georgia. We anticipate transitioning to new and revised emphasis areas. We now show tradition as well as new/revised emphasis areas.

The new curriculum continues to provide a fundamental understanding of the natural, mathematical, and engineering sciences and how to apply this understanding to design devices and processes. Graduates are qualified for a wide range of careers in civil, mechanical, electrical, agricultural, environmental, and process engineering areas such as design, development, testing, process control, management, electronic communications, food processing, mechanical equipment, paper production, consultation, textiles, and government.

Program mission

The mission of the BSAE degree program is to create, adapt and disseminate engineering knowledge and technologies associated with the design and management of natural resources for feed, food and fiber production, food process engineering, biological materials transport, and robotics for production and manufacturing systems for the state of Georgia, the nation, and the world.

Program educational objectives

The following Program Educational Objectives relate to the knowledge, skills, and behaviors that UGA College of Engineering alumni with degrees in agricultural engineering should demonstrate within three to five years following graduation. Graduates should meet one or more of the following educational objectives:

  • Effectively lead and participate in teams of engineers and other professionals working to define and solve problems related to natural resources engineering, biologistics engineering, food engineering, or bio-automation engineering.
  • Be recognized as an effective project leader by peers.BSAE_Curr_FA23
  • Advance up the ranks of employment by State or Federal Governmental Agencies if employed in government service.
  • In career areas where licensure is common, be qualified to pursue licensure in their state or jurisdiction.
  • Complete an advanced degree in an engineering or related discipline.

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