Interested in becoming a geology professor.?

Question

Don't want to be in oil company if I have to bail out and find a different job... Any advice?

Answer 1

The competition is pretty stiff.  Be really good and find an interesting niche to become expert in, one that a lot of people want you to teach about.  That is my advice. Oh, and publish a lot and get a lot of grant money.  Especially the grant money part.

Answer 2

I am a registered professional geologist (a PG after my name, a number, stamp, and everything) with over 30 years of experience.  I worked in the private sector for 10 years doing coal exploration, and some oil and gas exploration.  I also did some environmental work, cleaning up polluted water.  I am now with a government agency and still do environmental work, geologic mapping, and lots of GIS work.  I do teach on occasion, but do not have a PhD.

Private-sector and public sector opportunities abound.  But there is no magic bullet.  It takes hard work and lots of education.  Outside of academia, a Masters is your best ticket for a job.  To teach, go the extra miles and get a PhD.

Yes there are jobs in the exploitive industries, but you are not limited to oil or coal companies.  There are also jobs in the environmental and environmental clean-up areas.  Our most precious and underreported dwindling resource is clean water.  Become a hydrogeologist.  If you want to do geologic related research and mapping, the USGS or any of the state geological surveys are a good place.  Academia is the best place for self-generated research.

All in all, it’s what you make of it.  It takes hard work, perseverance, and patience.  But the rewards are worth it.

Being a geologist has served me well, both in the exploitive industries and in the environmental fields.  Although the day I fell in the drilling pit is not a fond memory.

Pursue your dreams.  There are more opportunities than you can imagine and they are increasing.

To Tgregory – I can see you are not a geologist, but work with some.  Exploitation of our natural resources is necessary and when done properly, environmentally sound.  Yes, we need to conserve what we have, but just remember, if you don’t grow it, it has to come from the ground.

Answer 3

Private practice geologists rip stuff out of the earth. People seem to really like oil, so that is where many private practice geologists end up. With the price of oil these days, they are starting to offer geologists (at least in Texas) salaries they can't really refuse.

However, there are also plenty of opportunities in the environmental field (ripping pollution out of the earth) and mining (ripping metals or coal out of the earth).

To be a professor you will need a PhD. You can teach at a community college with a Master's and you can teach high schol with a bachelors.

If you have a PhD, there are many things you can fall back on, including the previously mentioned metal and environmental industries, but also various interesting research projects including:

1) Climate change

2) Studies of Mars, or other bodies in the Solar System

3) Volcanism

4) Beach erosion

5) Earthquakes

6) Erosion

7) Soil science

Also, for every private-practice geologist, there is probably a government geologist checking up on him. Think of groups like the Environmental Protection Agency and the United States Geological Survey.

So you see that as a geologist you have a lot of options outside of the oil field. I know of three guys in my company off the top of my head with PhD's in geology. One is a geophysicist and the other two are environmental geologists. One of them actually teaches part time - but her subject is statistics at University of Phoenix.