I have a major fascination for sharks and intend on studying them in college. i have some questions.

Question

ok so like it says i want to study sharks in college. can someone help me with the pros and cons of that career and if you know any good colleges that have good programs for the study of sharks what are they?

Answer 1

you probably wont find a program focusing mainly on sharks in college. you should study marine biology and then go on to get a career studying them. thats what I am doing. also you need to figure out what sharks you want to study, I am studying reef sharks because that works for me. if you study say the great white, that is a totally different job experience, depends on what suits you. pros and cons really just depend on you. its a job, if you love it, cool, do it. also any really really great marine programs will be by the coast. there is one in Florida that is really nice I hear. one way or another though you should do your first two years of college someplace cheap, because you will be knocking out you required classes like english and math for those first few years and won't really get into anything specialized till probably your third year, so there really isn't any reason to spend major cash at some expensive college for your basic classes. wait to go broke till you have to. then you can transfer to a college you want to be at. also take as many biology classes as you can, any biology really, it all helps towards what you want.  anyway I hope this helped. :)

Answer 2

I don't know of any scientists who study sharks exclusively.  A Marine Biologist studies all marine life but may specialize in one particular species or sub-species, such as sharks in general or specifically the Nurse Shark.  

You will definitely want to major in Marine Biology.  If you want to study sharks, then it will be a good idea to also study their prey, i.e. sea lions, mackerel fish, etc. and their habitats, such as coral reefs, river deltas, or the open ocean in the case of Great White sharks.  

A few universities that offer Marine Biology programs are Alabama State University, Auburn University, and San Diego State University.  I have heard that San Diego State University has a pretty good Marine Biology program, but it was several years ago.  Below is a link to a complete list of the best colleges of 2008 offering Marine Biology Programs.  They are in alphabetical order, not in order of best to worse.

Answer 3

I have no idea of the pros and cons of a shark career.... well, possibility of losing a body part might be a con. ;-p

Here's the answer I gave someone with a similar question.

See about becoming an Elasmobranch Biologist, or Ichthyologist (someone who study's fish), or just a Marine Biologist

Start off by volunteering or working at an aquarium, or if you can at a shark research. This will give you experience related to your future career and will look good on college and job applications.

Go to a school that a marine biology degree, or Ichthyology degree/classes, or Elasmobranch degree/classes.

Before, during, or at least after, see about doing an internship and getting more experience working with sharks.

Here are some links. I hope they'll help. Good Luck.

http://www.sharks.org/about.htm

http://www.mbayaq.org/cr/whiteshark.asp

http://www.elasmo.org/links.php

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/Sharks/sha...

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/links/link...

http://www.pelagic.org/education/index.h...

http://www.hawaii.edu/HIMB/sharklab/link...

http://cmbc.ucsd.edu/

http://www.csulb.edu/web/labs/sharklab/i...

http://www.csulb.edu/web/labs/sharklab/l...