Chris Houser

Chris Houser is the Dean of Science at the University of Waterloo and the tenth dean since the Faculty was founded in 1957. Prior to joining the University of Waterloo, he was Dean of Science at the University of Windsor (2016-2022) and Interim Vice President Research and Innovation (2022-2023). Houser joined the University of Windsor from Texas A&M University where he was the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs in the College of Geosciences (2014-2016), and the inaugural Global Faculty Ambassador in the Office of the Provost (2011 to 2016).

• Coastal and aeolian process geomorphology
• Coastal erosion and evolution
• Barrier island resiliency
• Coastal framework geology
• Rip currents
• Physical and social dimensions of beach safety
• Bluff retreat
• Advanced Geospatial Analysis of landscapes
• Geoeducation

Chris Houser is a coastal and aeolian geomorphologist. His research focuses on the response and recovery of coastal barriers to extreme storms, coastal erosion in the Great Lakes, the physical and social dimensions of beach safety, and the use of analytical reasoning, semantic modelling, and graph theory for landscape interpretation. His Coastal Research Group ([https://www.windsorcoastalgroup.ca/](https://www.windsorcoastalgroup.ca/)) also manages the COASTIE ([https://coastiecanada.ca/](https://coastiecanada.ca/)) citizen science science program in partnership with Parks Canada to monitor shoreline change in park managed areas across Canada.

• 2004 Doctorate Geography, University of Toronto
• 1999 Master of Science, University of Guelph
• 1997 Bachelor of Science, University of Guelph

• Dean of Science (2023-present)

• Editor-in-Chief, Physical Geography

• EARTH 491 - Special Topics in Earth and Environmental Sciences
  • Taught in 2024

* Only courses taught in the past 5 years are displayed.

• Lunardi, B., Smith, A., George, E., Lehner, J., and Houser, C. (2023). Intra- and Inter-site variability of the beach dune profile and vegetation line: Is there a scale-invariant profile? Geomorphology, 427, 108618.
• Houser, C., Lehner, J., and Smith, A. (2022). The Field Geomorphologist in a time of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 112, 1260-1277.
• Houser, C., Smith, A., Lehner, J., Lunardi, B., and George, L. (2022). Is there a representative and scale-invariant beach-dune profile? Canadian Geographer, 66, 783-796.
• Gharib, J., Smith, A., and Houser, C., (2021) Barrier Beaches and Breaches: Historical Changes on the Point Pelee Foreland. Journal of Great Lakes Research, 47, 1554-1564.
• Smith, A., Houser, C., Lunardi, B., Lehner, J., and George, E. (2021). Fuzzy Cognitive Modelling (FCM) in Coastal Geomorphology. In: John F. Schroder (ed.) Treatise on Geomorphology, In press. San Diego: Academic Press.
• Houser, C., Smith, A., Wernette, P., and Lehner, J. (2021). Spatial frequency analysis and information synthesis for understanding coastal barriers. In: John F. Shroder (ed.) Treatise on Geomorphology, In press. San Diego: Academic Press.