Colleges and majors help

[teknitroxdiver]

After learning I made a 30 on the ACT, I started thinking that maybe I COULD do this college thing. :11doh: Basically 4 things interest me: Marine Science, Oceanography, Marine Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering.

I've found a few colleges that offer Marine Science, namely Texas A&M Galveston. I'm now looking for good colleges that offer one or more of these courses as a bachelor's degree. The college needs to be in the south or southeast, i.e. Texas, Florida, South Carolina, anything like that. I'm sure some of you guys or ladies here have done one of these degrees, so where did you do it and how did you like the program? :06:

thanks!

 

[cinder4320]

Look at the job market and make sure you have a career goal in mind not just a degree. I have a B.S. in Wildlife Sciences from Purdue. I planned to work in a zoo(which i actually had an internship in) or do conservation work. The current government has limited such park services positions and zoos can take years to get into. In the meantime I and three of my fellow classmates all work at Petsmart. Sad but true. Make sure you can get a job bfore you decide on some specific degree!

Miranda

 

[teknitroxdiver]

Sorry, I should have mentioned the job part.

Basically right now my plans are to get a 4-year degree mainly as a backup. I plan to go to work in the smallish family business, which btw does not require a degree, and if I decide I don't like that, I'll use the degree to either get a job in that field or cover the requirement all airlines and most corporations have that require pilots to have a 4-year.

Deep inside I have this itch to do commercial diving, but my mom hates the idea, and the life expectancy isn't too good, so that's kinda on the back burner (okay, more like off the stove and in the dishwasher...but I digress...).

 

[ScubaTexan]

Texas A&M (College Station) has an excellent Oceanography department, in addition to TAMU-Corpus Christi. I didn't get to attend either of these colleges, and my degree is in Communications, but I would contact the schools to send you some literature on their Oceanography programs. Best of luck!

http://www.tamu.edu
http://www.tamucc.edu

 

[surfbummer]

Gotta agree with ScubaTexan: you cant beat Texas A&M at Galveston. I know alot of their grads; this is an EXCELLENT marine sciences program (and this coming from a UT grad!).

 

[Warthaug]

Basically 4 things interest me: Marine Science, Oceanography, Marine Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering.

I work as a scientist (medical sciences, not oceanography). Assuming that you're planning on going the oceanography route you'll probably have to go right through to your PhD if you want to do anything interesting. This is true of most scientific fields. Not that there is anything wrong with that - my PhD years have been the best ones in my life.

The engineering field is more open, and good work can be found without a masters or PhD. I cannot speak for the demand for engineers in the US, but if push comes to shove you can get a job up here (Canada). In the city where I live they cannot get enough engineers - they've gone so far in some cases as to fly people in, house them, and give them buckets of $$$, just to get the workforce they need. With the large amount of off-shore oil I imagine that texas probably has good demand for engineers as well.

Bryan

 

[chip104]

Hi TnD,

All the best in your college years. Here's a thread about marine bio careers:
http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=105149 and I posted my thoughts there.

I agree with Warthaug, to have an edge in the science field you have to continue to study beyond your undergrad so be prepared for that. As for marine, I can't help you with the Southern state unverisities, however, FWIW I currently read a lot of work published by researchers from Florida Universities (more on marine biotech stuff though).

hope that helps.

 

[teknitroxdiver]

Thanks for the great input guys. I've been doing some research about jobs with a bachelors or masters, and you're right: basically to get a good oceanography job you need a PhD.

So that got me to thinking about something that's interested me for a while, mechanical engineering. I'd like to go to school somewhere where I can dive at least some, and it would be awesome to either be in cave country or near the coast.

More ideas?

 

[ScubaTexan]

It's the same answer, tek....Texas A&M. They have the nation's No. 1 engineering school, in most all disciplines.

 

[archman]

TAMU-Galveston's mission is centered specifically on maritime and marine science programs. Their marine biology program is in the Top 5 from a curriculum standpoint, but something like #10,000 in terms of location. It's hard to stay focused academically when your local study site is icky Galveston Bay and the upper Texas coast, and your campus is a near-treeless plot of dredge spoil overlooking the Galveston ship channel.

Their marine science program is well regarded, but not designed as a terminal degree per se. It's more of a prep course for budding oceanographers and technical type (GIS scientists, marine techs, facility managers). You have the option to learn a little marine biology with this major, or a moderate amount. It's far less involved in fieldwork than the marine bio program.

TAMU-Galveston's marine engineering and maritime systems engineering programs are top-rated... graduates have no trouble finding jobs. If you enroll as a merchant marine cadet, you'll spend a lot of time working aboard the training ship (currently the Sirius), and go on at least one 10-week summer cruise.

Neither TAMU, TAMU-Corpus Christi, or TAMU-Galveston offer undergraduate oceanography degrees. It's a graduate degree at TAMU only, although you can take undergraduate oceanography courses at TAMU-Galveston. If you're a marine science major, you're actually required to take introductory oceanography or its equivalent.

If you like nature study, you'll get far less exposure in oceanography than you would in marine biology. Oceanography places much more emphasis on chemistry, geology, and technical knowledge. Only the sub-discipline of biological oceanography focuses much on critters, and not too much, at that. But the oceanographers get first dibs on all the fancy research cruises!

Plenty of oceanographers with Master's degrees get jobs. State and federal govt. actually prefer Master's degrees. A heap of consulting and monitoring firms snag Master's grads. PhD's are primarily confined to academic institutions.

TAMU-Corpus Christi is the only TAMU school with a decent diving program (excepting the nautical archaeology dept). But really, if scuba is something you really want to integrate into your college degree, stay out of Texas! Florida is the place to go for this in the South.