Opportunities for a Geoscience graduate?

[Flipmode22]

Hi everyone,

I recently graduated with a Geo-science degree and I am currently working towards a GIS certificate. I expected to be able to access lots of new jobs, but this has not been the case. I expected to work in the Oil and Gas industry after college, but that industry is enduring massive layoffs and I am now looking at a variety of industries. Overall, my job search has been very rough. What kinds of opportunities exist for Geo-science majors outside of the oil and gas industry? Are there any particular fields that are in demand?

 

[JakeBrodskyPE]

Hi everyone,

I recently graduated with a Geo-science degree and I am currently working towards a GIS certificate. I expected to be able to access lots of new jobs, but this has not been the case. I expected to work in the Oil and Gas industry after college, but that industry is enduring massive layoffs and I am now looking at a variety of industries. Overall, my job search has been very rough. What kinds of opportunities exist for Geo-science majors outside of the oil and gas industry? Are there any particular fields that are in demand?

Look no further than your local utilities. They're very busy trying to parse through old records and to get going on a GIS project to identify where power lines, pipelines, phone lines and the like are located. Those that do have this data in GIS form of one sort or another are also busy trying to model it and assess performance bottlenecks. There are also water resource management groups who are trying to figure out where the water comes from and how it gets into rivers and aquifers.

There are also many city planning groups who seek to improve on traffic problems. Again, geo-science can help.

I pulled this list from thin air. I'm sure others can make suggestions I have overlooked.

 

[Flipmode22]

Look no further than your local utilities. They're very busy trying to parse through old records and to get going on a GIS project to identify where power lines, pipelines, phone lines and the like are located. Those that do have this data in GIS form of one sort or another are also busy trying to model it and assess performance bottlenecks. There are also water resource management groups who are trying to figure out where the water comes from and how it gets into rivers and aquifers.

There are also many city planning groups who seek to improve on traffic problems. Again, geo-science can help.

I pulled this list from thin air. I'm sure others can make suggestions I have overlooked.

Thanks for the info!

 

[rxb949]

I am experienced GIS professional in this field since 2000. I have M.S. and a lot of training done by ESRI in their facilities. GIS and related fields always had been cyclical. We are entering an era, where GIS jobs have pretty much evaporated. I do not remember such bad job market in my field. Even in 2008 or 2010 I was changing jobs and had different offers within several weeks. This time I am looking for several months and I never experienced such bad job market. Nobody is hiring and I can barely get a phone interview. Several of my colleagues were already laid off and I may be losing a job next month. I have been applying daily, had submitted hundreds of resumes, and no luck. It is really bad. On top of it, I have a solid IT and programming skills, but it does not matter. There are just no jobs in GIS, Geointelligence, and Imagery science. My former colleagues from various GIS jobs had already abandoned this field and pursued different career options. If you do not get GIS job, or you are about to lose a job in GIS in 2016, this is the end of your GIS career.