A degree in Geology?

[Linflas]

Originally posted by: Zysoclaplem
Also Linflas, how were the courses? I can imagine there was some math involved, but I hate math. It's not that I cannot do it, I just hate it.
Was there lots of hands on, or just lots of homework. I guess that tends to vary from school to school and teacher to teacher.

Depends on where you want to specialize I guess. The math required for general geology was not all that tough, I never took any courses past differential calculus. The 2 toughest classes for me were minerology and paleontology. Minerology went pretty in depth in crystal systems and required a lot of memorization to be able to recognize different minerals. That is also where quite a bit of math is used. Paleo was a lot of memorization as well. You wouldn't believe the number of different kinds of fossilized corals there are and how hard they are to tell apart as an example. Still from what you have said in your posts here I would suggest you give it a shot.

One other thing you need to be aware of is that typically you will be required to take a +/- 6 week field course before you graduate. Those start after school ends in May and you take it either your junior or senior year. In mine we spent the first week mapping a cow pasture with a plane table and alidade. Then the next week we spent roaming over a huge area below the Skyline Drive to do a geology map of the area. While doing that during the day the evenings were spent working on the map we gathered data for the previous week. It was a pretty intense 6 weeks as it was pretty much all similar to that, do the field work on the new project during the day and spend the evenings working on the previous weeks assignment. We had a hell of a party at the end and I still have great memories of the experience.

 

[mercanucaribe]

Do it. I wish I had majored in Geology. I'd still be able to take classes in geography like landscape ecology, biogeography, vegetation ecology, GIS, etc etc, but would have more job opportunities.

 

[Zysoclaplem]

Originally posted by: mercanucaribe
Do it. I wish I had majored in Geology. I'd still be able to take classes in geography like landscape ecology, biogeography, vegetation ecology, GIS, etc etc, but would have more job opportunities.

I chose Graphic Arts instead. The Geology degree required way too much math. I hate math.

 

[mercanucaribe]

Originally posted by: Zysoclaplem

Originally posted by: mercanucaribe
Do it. I wish I had majored in Geology. I'd still be able to take classes in geography like landscape ecology, biogeography, vegetation ecology, GIS, etc etc, but would have more job opportunities.

I chose Graphic Arts instead. The Geology degree required way too much math. I hate math.

Here at UT they require engineering physics. I was in that the first on and dropped after a week. Talk about impossible!

 

[IronWing]

I have a B.S. and M.S. in Geology. Groundwater/soil cleanup is still the biggest employer though it doesn't pay as well as oil/gas. With a B.S. it is generally last hired/first fired and you're first job will likely be as field tech or with a state agency; you should plan on getting an M.S. As far as math goes, for a BS, basic college math will usually be sufficient unless you lean toward geophysics or hydrogeology where calc is a must and differential equations is very handy to have had. Most grad schools want to see at least two semesters of calculus upon entry.