Master of Arts in Geography - Business Location and Transportation Analytics

The Business Location & Transportation Analytics concentration aims to enhance students knowledge of theories, techniques, and models of business location analytics and transportation analytics used by practitioners in the public and private sectors of the economy. This concentration is focused on business location decisions and practices in urban, regional, and national contexts, including commercial and institutional site selection and evaluation, economic development, and the use of transportation and mobility systems in contemporary societies, including infrastructure development, socio-economic impacts, and the structuring effect of transportation systems on urban and regional geographies. The concentration offers coursework in retail and office location, real estate development, transportation, logistics, regional economic development, business intelligence and methods of geospatial, census, and network data analytics. This concentration prepares students for jobs in location research with retailer and service firms, real estate developers, consulting firms, jobs in transportation analysis with various groups of service providers (carriers, freight forwarders, logistics managers, transit agencies), jobs with economic development agencies, or for continued academic training in economic and transport geography. Overview: The Geographic Information Science & Technologies (GIS&T) track offers course work giving each student the opportunity to acquire and apply GIS&T tools and techniques, specifically digital image processing, environmental, transportation and urban applications of GIS, GPS, GIS programming and customization, geocomputation, geovisualization, location modeling, network analysis, planning applications of GIS, remote sensing, spatial database design, spatial decision support systems, spatial optimization spatial statistics and geostatistics.

In addition to the general requirements for admission to the UNC Charlotte Graduate School, the following are required for study to the M.A. in Geography:

Under most circumstances, students admitted to the program must have: a B.A. or B.S. degree in Geography or field related to the primary emphases of the program.
Grade Point Average (GPA): in general, the department would prefer an overall undergraduate GPA above 3.1 (or a 3.1 for the last 2 years) and a GPA of 3.2 in the major. However, averages less than these do not exclude applicants if the other elements of the application are strong.
Transcripts of College Coursework: transcripts are evaluated on the basis of types of courses attempted, range of geography, statistical, and computer coursework attempted. Not only is the applicant evaluated on the strength of the performance in these areas, but also on the range, depth and suitability of the applicant's preparation for graduate level coursework.
Graduate Record Examination (GRE) with minimum scores of 150 on both the verbal and quantitative sections and a 3.5 or above on the analytical portions. Applicants must have taken the GRE, no other test is accepted in its place. Scores less than these suggested minimums do not automatically exclude applicants if the remainder of the applicant's file is strong.
TOEFL exam scores of at least 84 on the Internet-based test for applicants whose native language is not English. The program expects a minimum score in the low to mid 20s on each of the components of the TOEFL. In addition, international students who are supported through a teaching assistantship (TA) are required to undergo evaluation by the English Language Training Institute (ELTI) at UNC Charlotte prior to beginning their assistantship.
Letters of Recommendation: Three letters of reference are required. Letters from college or university teachers who have worked with and/or taught applicants are preferred. These letters are evaluated on the basis of how well the applicant is suited in terms of intellect, motivation and temperament to do graduate coursework.
Personal Essay: Applicants must write a personal essay which directly addresses why they wish to do graduate work in geography and why they wish to participate in the M.A. program at UNC Charlotte. They should address directly how the program at UNC Charlotte fits their career and/or professional goals and how they would benefit from and contribute to the M.A. in Geography at UNC Charlotte. This essay is very important in determining the applicant's commitment to graduate education and to a professional career in geography or a related field. Careful consideration of what goes into this essay is time well spent.

For non-native English language speakers: official and satisfactory scores on the English language proficiency scores on the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) are required. A minimum score of 83 on the Internet-based TOEFL or a minimum overall band score of 6.5 on the IELTS is required for admissions consideration.