June 29, 2026
Joshua Frank '26 came to the University of Chicago’s MS in Environmental Science with the intention of finishing his one-year degree, finding a job, and putting his analytical training to work on problems he cared about. Three quarters in, while he's still applying for jobs, he's also looking into PhD programs. Not because the original plan was wrong, but because the program kept opening doors he didn't know existed.
"It feels like I'm not ready yet to be done with it just because of how much I've been exposed to," he says.
A Quantitative Student Looking for the Right Problem to Solve
Before UChicago, Joshua studied actuarial science at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. He was active in his school's actuary societies and on track for a stable career. Halfway through, something stopped fitting.
"I realized maybe halfway through, a little farther, that it just wasn't going to be a satisfying thing to do full-time. I didn't feel like I was using my knowledge that I was gaining for the pursuit of bettering the world."
Sustainability already shaped his daily life. He started taking environmental science courses to test his interest. By graduation, he knew he wanted to pivot, but that he didn't yet have the depth to do it well.
The challenge was finding the right program. Most environmental science master's programs lean heavily on fieldwork. Joshua's strengths were analytical, and he wanted to build on them, not set them aside.
"There's a lot of programs out there for environmental science. [UChicago's] felt really unique with its specific focus on analytical work and working with environmental data sets, as opposed to maybe a more fieldwork-heavy program."
UChicago became his first choice.
Coursework That Goes Deeper Than Expected
The first surprise was how far the courses pushed him. Joshua's program of study has included rigorous work in atmospheric and ocean physics, which are fields he hadn't expected to care about. He says they’re taught at a level that builds genuine intuition rather than surface familiarity.
"I think there's a couple classes I've taken here that have really pushed me into very high-level conceptual understandings of topics that I did not think were really possible before this. And that's really made me excited to continue my education," says Joshua, adding that the faculty are central to that.
His professor in fluid dynamics stood out for "being able to pace his lectures and answer questions and help build intuition on what would otherwise be a very challenging concept." His program head and his data science professor have both been consistently available, receptive to feedback, and genuinely engaged with how students are doing. That faculty access matters more than some might think.
Joshua also works alongside PhD students in many of his classes, and he's leveraged those connections to learn what doctoral research actually looks like.
"They're really awesome people. I've discovered that doing a PhD could be really fulfilling — getting some additional research in and really contributing to the field."
A Capstone That Becomes Published Research
Now, Joshua is working on a capstone project using computer vision and data analytics on satellite imagery to study cloud seeding — the practice of inducing precipitation by introducing particles into clouds. He chose the project after a structured process of meeting potential mentors and reading about the available research. His advisor wants him to develop the work into a published paper.
"I anticipate that this one is going to take as much time as we are willing to give it just because of the scope of the project."
The capstone is also where the program's flexibility pays off. Across three quarters and nine classes, students choose much of their own path. For Joshua, that meant going deep on fluid dynamics and now using his capstone to bring those tools to a real research question. He's grown especially curious about ocean circulation and atmospheric interactions, which bring up questions that don't resolve in nine months.
Faculty depth in the Geophysical Sciences Department gives him room to keep going if he wants to. "We have some really notable faculty here who I've really enjoyed working with,” he says.
What Made Joshua Want to Continue His Journey
What ultimately changed Joshua's plans wasn't any single class or conversation. It was the cumulative effect of being in a program where the work goes deep, the faculty care about your success, the cohort teaches each other, and your research is insightful enough to publish.
That's what made one year feel like the start of something rather than the end.
"It being one year, feeling like I can get as much out of it as I can in such a short time frame, means I'm getting a lot out of it."
For students considering the program, his advice is straightforward:
"Indulge your curiosity. It's worth a dig. I have discovered a lot of things here that I did not even know I could learn about. If you can get past the initial hurdle of deciding to come here and engage with this higher-level education, you're going to get everything you want out of it and more."
Explore University of Chicago’s MS in Environmental Science.