RE: paleonet AGI Report

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Title: AGI Report

Micropaleontology, forams and nannos, is still very much a part of oil and gas E&P in the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, with the demise of the bright spot play, I'd say that it's somewhat on the upswing, particularly at the wellste. Those of us who are working in the region continue to mature at an alarming rate. I'm not sure exactly what the future looks like, but I'd say that in the next decade or so there will be a nearly complete turnover of the practitioners. As I have stated in previous posts, biostratigraphy here is very much an oral tradition. In order to succeed some sort of apprenticeship is absolutely vital. Some of that is starting, but not enough in my opinion. Should be interesting to watch.

-----Original Message-----
From: N. MacLeod [mailto:N.MacLeod@nhm.ac.uk]
Sent: Friday, February 20, 2004 9:38 AM
To: PaleoNet@nhm.ac.uk
Subject: paleonet AGI Report

OK. The Kepkupaiui string has gone on way past long enough. Surely there's something else of interest to talk about. For instance, I recently came across an AGI report on the status of geosciences in US universities. The url where with a link to the full report is: http://www.earthscienceworld.org/careers/ The report seems to suggest paleontology/stratigraphy has been the big loser in terms of faculty positions between the 1980's and 2002. The histogram that compares the stats for the various specialty groups showed a larger drop for geochemists, but this was more than made up for by a net increase in environmental geology positions, many of which would be environmental geochemistry. Yet, I see lots of activity in terms of the paleo. job market. What's the real story? Are academic paleontologists and palaeo. programs being differentially singled out? Also, where do paleontologists who don't go into academics find jobs these days? Many leave the field. But are they any employment sectors where paleontologists can be paleontologists that are growing? Last, but not least, how many paleontology positions are there in the world right now?

Norm MacLeod
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Dr. Norman MacLeod
Keeper of Palaeontology
The Natural History Museum,
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