[Coral-List] For New Graduate Students Looking for Experience
Jim Hendee
jim.hendee at noaa.gov
Mon Oct 29 09:20:59 EDT 2007
Greetings,
I quite often get requests from newly beginning graduate students
who are looking for experience in the field, either along the lines of
their interests, or not sure what might be of interest to them
specifically, but interested in coral research nonetheless. Here are
some tips, and I'm sure other coral-listers will likely have additional
tips:
* Look at the former International Coral Reef Symposium papers and
topics at
http://www.reefbase.org/resource_center/publication/icrs.aspx and
see which ones interest you the most. See which authors wrote
those articles, find out which institutions they're from (it's on
the papers themselves), then write to them inquiring about study
or work at their school or institution. Be sure to write a
carefully crafted and thoughtful letter that shows you've given
the subject some research and thought; otherwise, your letter may
be counterproductive.
* View the Coral-List archives at
http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/pipermail/coral-list/ and again see
which topics and authors intrigue you most. (Not only will you
discover topics, but quite often you can get insight into the
instructor's personality, too!) Most often the authors'
affiliations are listed at the bottom of their messages. Also,
there are job opportunities posted all the time on Coral-List.
Another useful list is Carib-Coral-Reefs (see the Yahoo Groups at
http://groups.yahoo.com/).
* Visit the Web page of the Association of Marine Laboratories of
the Caribbean at http://www.amlc-carib.org/en/ and study the
different newsletters, job listings, and topics and develop some
contacts along your lines of interest. There are other similar
organizations as these.
* See the list of Caribbean Marine Protected Areas at
http://www.coral.noaa.gov/mpa/sites/ and determine (through
perseverance) if any of those might have opportunities for you.
If you're willing to volunteer, you'll have a fair chance of
getting some very interesting work at a beautiful place, as long
as you can afford to get and stay there. There is no doubt a
similar list for Pacific and Indian Ocean MPAs.
* There are a lot of universities with marine biology field programs
which are a ton of fun and full of experience at remote field
stations. Do the research and you'll be rewarded big time.
* And of course you should conduct a Google search for your
interests to see which schools might have something for you.
I hope this helps!
Cheers,
Jim
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