Master of Plant Protection and Pest Management (MPPPM)

The Master of Plant Protection and Pest Management is an interdisciplinary, non-thesis professional degree program jointly offered by the departments of Entomology, Crop and Soil Sciences, and Plant Pathology. This program equips students with a comprehensive knowledge base and technical skills to develop integrated pest management systems for urban and rural environments. The MPPPM degree emphasizes practical, hands-on learning, preparing graduates for immediate impact in the field of plant protection and pest management.

For more information on this program, including admission requirements and core curriculum, please see: https://ent.uga.edu/graduate/programs-of-study/mpppm.html.

What are the goals of the MPPPM program?

To produce graduates with comprehensive, multidisciplinary training in Integrated Pest Management (IPM) of insect, plant disease, and weed pests of agricultural, commercial, and home commodities.
To train students to be proficient in solving the types of pest management problems routinely encountered by growers and other agricultural professionals, as well as urban pest control.
To teach IPM using a blend of pest control strategies including pesticides, transgenic crops, cultural operations, and biological control.

What are career opportunities with an MPPPM degree?

MPPPM graduates are trained for employment as IPM professionals in the pest control industry, pesticide and fertilizer services, Cooperative Extension, and regulatory agencies.

The MPPPM degree can also be completed as part of the Double Dawgs 4+1 accelerated Masters degree program at the University of Georgia. This opportunity currently exists for undergraduate students in Horticulture or Agriscience and Environmental Systems. Please see the Double Dawgs web page or the MPPPM Coordinator for more information.

Admission

Specific requirements

To be admitted to the MPPPM program:

applicants must have an undergraduate degree from an accredited institution;
a minimum combined GRE score of 289 in the new grading scale;
a 3.0 grade point average (out of 4.0); and
three letters of reference.

Any deviation from these minimum requirements, e.g. allowing significant job skills to compensate for slightly lower than minimum GRE or GPA scores, etc., must be approved by majority vote of the MPPPM Coordinating Committee. Students must include a statement concerning the area of pest management they are interested in. Final decisions on admittance will be made by the MPPPM Coordinating Committee. Each student will have a home department (Crop and Soil Sciences [CRSS], Entomology [ENTO], or Plant Pathology [PATH]) designated at the time of admittance or assignment of the internship home department.

How to apply

In order to begin the admission process, you must go to the UGA Graduate School website and look under the “Future Students” tab. Follow the instructions for your particular category, e.g., “Domestic application information.”

MPPPM Core Curriculum

Area	Credits
Area I All are required courses: CRSS 6340/L Weed Science (4)* ENTO 6000/L General Entomology (4)* ENTO/CRSS/PATH 6740 Integrated Pest Management (3) ENTO/CRSS/PATH 6250 Pesticides and Transgenic Crops (3) PATH 6280/L Diagnosis and Management of Plant Diseases (4)* CRSS/ENTO/PATH 6130 Internship (1)	19
Area II Select at least one 2- to 4-credit course from each of the three MPPPM departments.	6-12
Area III Electives: Select any UGA graduate course related to pest management in the student's area of interest. Please check with the Graduate Coordinator for acceptability of courses not in the three departments, CRSS, ENTO, PATH early in the program to avoid the possibility of electives not counting toward the 33 minimum credits	6-8
Total	33

* If a student has had the 4000-level equivalent of CRSS 6340 or ENTO 6000, then a substituted course must be selected from the same MPPPM department.

Internships

Since the MPPPM program is a professional degree, an internship is required instead of research for a thesis. The internship is designed to strengthen a student's background in integrated pest management and to provide practical experience, such as with a research scientist, the agrichemical industry, or the Cooperative Extension Service.

Prior to the internship, the student will meet with the major professor and discuss aspects such as the general mission of the employer, nature of anticipated work, and goals of the institution related to integrated pest management. These and other types of information will need to be collected during the internship for inclusion in a written report. If possible, the student and major professor should meet 4 to 6 weeks after initiation of employment and evaluate the student's progress. It may be desirable to alter the original goals and to be observant for different integrated pest management principles during the remainder of the internship. Internships should be completed by the first week of the last term in the student’s program of study.

Internship report

An internship report is required and should be reasonably concise, substantial in character, and reflective of biological principles related to integrated pest management. The report should demonstrate to the MPPPM coordinating committee that the student understands basic and practical implications of integrated pest management and has the ability to: (a) organize information in a clear manner, (b) produce a professionally useful and technically acceptable report (supervisor can verify that privileged information is being used properly), and (c) present material in a well-structured form, written in acceptable English. Details and formatting requirements are outlined in the MPPPM Handbook .

Exit Exams

The MPPPM has a final examination requirement of all students. The purpose of the examination is to measure education capabilities that encompass the entire program of the student.

The examination consists of a written or oral exam for each of the program disciplines (Plant Pathology, Entomology, and Weed Science) that is taken after all coursework has been completed and will be administered by members of the MPPPM Coordinating Committee. The exams will cover specific information and general concepts learned during the overall graduate program, including prerequisites, and core courses in Area I. The student must have the internship report approved before scheduling the final exams to complete requirements for graduation.

Advisory Committee

The MPPPM Coordinating Committee is advisory to students. Each student is assigned a major advisor whose academic credentials conform to Graduate School requirements for faculty advisors, and may be faculty outside of the MPPPM Coordinating Committee members. The major advisor and student will develop a program of study and internship. An internship report by the student needs to be approved by the MPPPM Coordinating Committee prior to taking the final comprehensive exams over the program of study.

2019 MPPPM Coordinating Committee

Tifton Campus	Athens Campus	Griffin Campus
Alton Sparks, Jr. (ENTO) asparks@uga.edu 229-386-3424	Will Hudson (ENTO) wghudson@uga.edu 706-542-9856	David Buntin (ENTO) gbuntin@uga.edu 770-412-4713
Bhabesh Dutta (PATH) bhabesh@uga.edu 229-386-7495	Jean Williams-Woodward (PATH) jwoodwar@uga.edu 706-542-9140	James Buck (PATH) jwbuck@uga.edu 770-412-4098
Glen Harris (CRSS) gharris@uga.edu 229-386-3006	Bill Vencill (CRSS) wvencill@uga.edu 706-542-2461	Paul Raymer (CRSS) praymer@uga.edu 770-228-7324