Master in Agronomical Engineering

Completion requirements:

Compulsory: 60
Optional: 18
External internships 10
Master’s Final Project: 12
Total: 100

The Master's Degree in Agronomic Engineering offers the following specializations:

-Agroengineering
-Milk production engineering
-Vitiviniculture

In order to obtain the specialization, the student must take the 6 optional subjects of 3 ECTS each (18 ECTS in total) that make up the corresponding specialization module, as well as carry out the External Internships (EP) and the Master's Thesis (TFM) in subjects related to the chosen specialization. Students may also obtain the degree without any specialization; in this case, they may freely choose the 6 optional subjects they wish, without being obliged to take them from the same module, as well as carry out the External Internships and the Master's Thesis in any subject related to the proposed title.

Its aim is to train senior technicians so that they are capable of planning, projecting, organizing, controlling and managing the systems and production processes developed in the agrifood sector, providing them with powers to exercise the regulated profession of Agronomic Engineer and manage natural renewable resources in a rational manner.

• Admission profile

  It is recommended that the student has studied the Science and Technology modality during the Bachillerato (RD 1467/2007). It is also recommended that the student has the following personal and academic characteristics:

  - Intellectual curiosity
  - Reading habits
  - Analytic and synthetic capacity
  - Critical capacity
  - Ability to apply fundamentals for problem solving
  - Consistency and responsibility at work
  - Capacity to work in teams.
  - Ability to manage time effectively.
  - Linguistic competence in English (B1 level), as well as in Spanish and Galician.
  - Competence in basic computer tools.

• Minimum number of ECTS enrollment credits per student and school period

  Completion requirements:

  Compulsory: 60
  Optional: 18
  External internships 10
  Master’s Final Project: 12
  Total: 100

• Tutorial action and reception

  La Escuela cuenta con la colaboración de varios profesores/as que actúan como coordinadores académicos, y cuya función es tutorar y asistir en sus decisiones académicas a los estudiantes propios y de acogida.

  Para la realización de las prácticas externas la Comisión del Título asignará al alumno un tutor académico entre el Personal Docente e Investigador del Centro, que hará un seguimiento al trabajo realizado por el alumno y velará por la calidad de la estancia realizada, y un tutor externo en la empresa, encargado de garantizar las condiciones apropiadas para la realización de la práctica.

• Access

  Access

  Para acceder aos ensinos oficiais de Máster será necesario estar en posesión de:
  A.1. Un título universitario oficial español.
  A.2. Un título expedido por unha institución de educación superior pertencente a outro Estado integrante do Espazo Europeo de Educación Superior que faculte no mesmo para o acceso a ensinos de Máster.
  A.3. Un título pertencente a un sistema educativo alleo ao Espazo Europeo de Educación, previa comprobación pola Universidade de que o citado título acredita un nivel de formación equivalente aos correspondentes títulos universitarios oficiais españois e faculta no país expedidor do título para o acceso a ensinos de posgrao.
  A.4. Un título superior das Ensinanzas Artísticas Superiores do sistema educativo español.

  Admission

  Modality: with limited vacancies and general criteria

  Degree in Agricultural Engineering and Rural Environment, and Degree in Engineering of Agro-food Industries by the USC (as well as the degrees of other Spanish universities that grant the competences established in the Ministerial Order CIN /325/2009; e.g.: Degree in Agricultural Engineering by the UVIGO).

  Technical Agricultural Engineering (with complements, which must be taken before or simultaneously with the 1st year of the master's degree).

  Information is updated in each enrolment call

Modality: with limited vacancies and general criteria

Degree in Agricultural Engineering and Rural Environment, and Degree in Engineering of Agro-food Industries by the USC (as well as the degrees of other Spanish universities that grant the competences established in the Ministerial Order CIN /325/2009; e.g.: Degree in Agricultural Engineering by the UVIGO).

Technical Agricultural Engineering (with complements, which must be taken before or simultaneously with the 1st year of the master's degree).

Information is updated in each enrolment call

• Basic skills

  - Possess and understand knowledge that provides a basis or opportunity for being original in the development and/or application of ideas —usually in a research context.

  - Students must know how to apply their acquired knowledge and their capacity of problem solving in new or uncommon surroundings. All of this, inside broader —or multidisciplinary— contexts associated with their study area.

  - Students must be able to integrate knowledge and confront the complexity of making judgements from information which could be incomplete and limited. This information must include reflections about social and ethical responsibilities associated with the application of their study areas’ knowledge and judgements.

  - Students must know how to clearly and unambiguously communicate their conclusions —and the knowledge and ultimate reasons that sustain them— to specialized and non-specialized public.

  - Students must possess learning abilities that will allow them to continue studying, in a way which would be largely self-directed and autonomous.

• Generic skills

  In accordance with section 3 of the Annex to Order CIN/325/2009, of 9 February, which establishes the requirements for the verification of official university degrees
  that qualify for the exercise of the profession of Agricultural Engineer, graduates of this Master's must acquire the following general skills:

  1: The capacity to plan, organise, direct and control productive systems and processes developed in the agrarian sector and the agro-alimentary industry, within a framework that guarantees the competitiveness of companies without neglecting the protection and conservation of the environment and the improvement and sustainable development of the rural environment.
  2: The capacity to design, forecast and execute infrastructure projects, buildings, facilities and the plant necessary for the efficient execution of productive activities carried out by agro-alimentary companies.
  3: The capacity to propose, direct and execute research, development and innovation projects in products, processes and methods used by companies and organisations associated with the agro-alimentary sector.
  4: The capacity to apply the knowledge acquired to solve problems arising from novel situations, analysing the information from the setting and synthesising it efficiently to facilitate the decision-making process in companies and professional organisations in the agro-alimentary sector.
  5: The capacity to transmit their knowledge and the conclusions of their studies and reports, using the means that communication technology allows and taking into account the knowledge of the audience.
  6: The capacity to direct or supervise multidisciplinary and multicultural teams, to integrate knowledge in complex decision-making processes with limited information, assuming the social, ethical and environmental responsibility of their professional activity in harmony with the socioeconomic and natural setting where they work.
  7: The aptitude to develop the necessary skills to continue their learning autonomously or tutored, incorporating new concepts, processes or methods deriving from research, development and innovation into their professional activity.

• Specific skills

  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology in the management of water resources: hydrology, hydrodynamics, hydrodynamics, hydrometry, hydraulic works and installations.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to irrigation and drainage systems.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to the management of equipment and installations that are integrated into agro-food production processes and systems.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to agro-industrial constructions, infrastructures and rural roads.
  -Adequate knowledge and ability to develop their own technology for planning and managing agricultural land and landscape integration.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology on agricultural and rural development policies.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to the study, intervention and management.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology on systems of vegetable production.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to integrated crop protection systems.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to the management of research and development projects on new technologies applied to plant production processes: biotechnology and plant breeding.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to systems related to animal production technology.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to nutrition and hygiene in animal production.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to production systems of the agro-food industries.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to equipment and systems destined to the automatization and control of agro-food processes.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to the management of the food quality and security, food analysis and traceability.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to language and techniques of the administration and management of the agro-food company.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to marketing and commercialization systems of agro-food products.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to market research.
  - Adequate knowledge and ability to develop and apply their own technology to logistics management in the agri-food sector.
  - Completion, presentation and defense, once all the credits of the study plan have been obtained, of an original exercise carried out individually in front of a university tribunal consisting of an integral project of Agronomic Engineering of a professional nature in which the competences acquired in the courses are synthesized.
  - Ability of completion of external internships in the professional field of Agronomic Engineering and of completion of a record of the realized activities during the external stay, acquiring knowledge about the reality of the job opportunities of the degree and having a first professional experience in a work center.

• Transversal skills

  - Capacity for analysis and synthesis..
  - capacity for reasoning and argumentation.
  - Capacity for individual work with an self-critical attitude.
  - Ability to work in groups and deal with problem situations collectively.
  - Ability to obtain adequate, diverse and updated information.
  - Ability to elaborate and present an organized and understandable text.
  - Ability to do a public exposition in a clear, concise and coherent way.
  - Commitment to the veracity of the information offered to others.
  - Skills in the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs)
  - Use of bibliographical information and the Internet.
  - Use of information in a foreign language.
  - Ability to solve problems through the integrated application of their knowledge.

Mobility

Student mobility is regulated through the “Regulation of inter-university exchange.” Exchange programs are managed through the International Relations Office, such as national exchange programs (SICUE) as well as Europeans (ERASMUS) and from outside the European Union (exchanges with Latin American countries or English-speaking countries):

Portal Internacional

Internships

Internships will consist in the realization, by the student, of an internship in a company or organization for 240 hours (6 weeks) plus the elaboration of the corresponding report, in order to obtain 10 equivalent credits.
The Higher Polytechnic School counts with approximately 400 agreements with companies and institutions so that students of the different degrees taught there can carry out external internships.

The teaching methodology to be used will be the personalized interactive teaching with the aim to meet the specific needs of each Master’s Thesis which, in compliance with the requirements that affect the regulated profession of agronomist engineer, must be an original and individual exercise.

The contents of the Master’s Thesis will be within the professional field of Agronomic Engineering. To determine the appropriateness of a topic, the student must submit a proposal following a standardized form to the monitoring committee. Once the proposal has been approved, the Master's thesis may be prepared and presented for defense.

The teaching staff for the Master's Degree in Agricultural Engineering consists of professors from the USC.