DD wants to study Paleontology or Neurology

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, why is she against fieldwork? Agree she'd need to do some of it in undergrad/grad school at least if she goes the paleontology route.

Op here. She has expressed that in her reading and speaking to her current teachers on fieldwork, she’s learned about the experiences with rape and sexual assault that female Paleontologists have dealt with when working in the field and does not feel comfortable with the settings or how commonly this has occurred.

For the museum aspect, she had a reason that I do not recall.

Ok … that is a bit odd.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, why is she against fieldwork? Agree she'd need to do some of it in undergrad/grad school at least if she goes the paleontology route.

Op here. She has expressed that in her reading and speaking to her current teachers on fieldwork, she’s learned about the experiences with rape and sexual assault that female Paleontologists have dealt with when working in the field and does not feel comfortable with the settings or how commonly this has occurred.

For the museum aspect, she had a reason that I do not recall.

I'm a geologist with field experience in several coeducational environments. I'd not heard of encounters of this type.

[Anonymous]

My female cousin is an archeologist with extensive field work experience in the U.S. and abroad, and has never personally experienced anything like that and says her female colleagues are similar. It can happen, but very rarely.

If your DD really wants to be a paleontologist, I wouldn’t let fear of assault be a reason not to. Honestly, campus assaults of female students are probably at least as common if not more so, if only because it’s a much larger population. Get her some self-defense training and encourage her to pick her career aspirations based on what she actually enjoys doing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My female cousin is an archeologist with extensive field work experience in the U.S. and abroad, and has never personally experienced anything like that and says her female colleagues are similar. It can happen, but very rarely.

If your DD really wants to be a paleontologist, I wouldn’t let fear of assault be a reason not to. Honestly, campus assaults of female students are probably at least as common if not more so, if only because it’s a much larger population. Get her some self-defense training and encourage her to pick her career aspirations based on what she actually enjoys doing.

I am an archeologist and this has not been an issue on any projects I've worked on. There is one female archeologist I know who was sexually harassed at work...by her boss, indoors, not in the field. Not denying that assault happens, but it's definitely not so common that I'd steer a young woman away from fieldwork to avoid it.

Also consider that there's a difference between needing to get some field experience as a basic qualification or graduation requirement, and devoting your career to field research. I think all these people saying she will have to do fieldwork at some point are missing the point that doing a little isn't the same as doing it forever. I haven't done fieldwork in years myself with the direction my career has taken (although I'm not against it either).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:However, she’s expressed that for Paleontology she has no desire to work in the field nor at a museum.

She is completing Sophomore year as an average student solidly A’s and B’s. PSAT Test scores are median level, 50th percentile.

What would you encourage her to explore? Where?

We’re Virginia residents.

Go to the best Virginia school she can get into. She won’t get the top three with those scores or grades but might get JMU. CNU, Mary Washington, others. Major does not matter. She can look in the anthropology department for paleo classes or biology department for neurology courses.

Not every anthropology department will have paleo, and those that do will be focused on hominids. She should check the faculty profiles and course offerings in anthropology, geology, and biology to see if they actually offer courses in paleontology and neurology.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My female cousin is an archeologist with extensive field work experience in the U.S. and abroad, and has never personally experienced anything like that and says her female colleagues are similar. It can happen, but very rarely.

If your DD really wants to be a paleontologist, I wouldn’t let fear of assault be a reason not to. Honestly, campus assaults of female students are probably at least as common if not more so, if only because it’s a much larger population. Get her some self-defense training and encourage her to pick her career aspirations based on what she actually enjoys doing.

I am an archeologist and this has not been an issue on any projects I've worked on. There is one female archeologist I know who was sexually harassed at work...by her boss, indoors, not in the field. Not denying that assault happens, but it's definitely not so common that I'd steer a young woman away from fieldwork to avoid it.

Also consider that there's a difference between needing to get some field experience as a basic qualification or graduation requirement, and devoting your career to field research. I think all these people saying she will have to do fieldwork at some point are missing the point that doing a little isn't the same as doing it forever. I haven't done fieldwork in years myself with the direction my career has taken (although I'm not against it either).

Thank you for this comment!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My female cousin is an archeologist with extensive field work experience in the U.S. and abroad, and has never personally experienced anything like that and says her female colleagues are similar. It can happen, but very rarely.

If your DD really wants to be a paleontologist, I wouldn’t let fear of assault be a reason not to. Honestly, campus assaults of female students are probably at least as common if not more so, if only because it’s a much larger population. Get her some self-defense training and encourage her to pick her career aspirations based on what she actually enjoys doing.

To be clear, I’m suggesting the self-defense class to make *her* feel more confident, not because I think there’s an epidemic of fieldwork assaults happening.

It’s a good idea for any woman, honestly. I took them in college (a women’s college, at that).

[Anonymous]

Have her look into archaeology and anthropology if she's interested in the broader human/animal research side. If she wants to become a neurologist per se, be aware that might be full medical school.

[Anonymous]

It seems that paleontology has been conflated with archaeology in some replies. These represent different fields and even different general branches of academia. Nonetheless, some field techniques may overlap, particularly in the interdisciplinary major of geoarchaeology.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:VT has active paleontology research going on.
https://www.paleo.geos.vt.edu/

They also have a lot in neuroscience. As another thread noted, neuroscience is popular these days.

Yes! My Hokie is a biological sciences major, but VT has a very strong paleo program within the Geosciences major (also, last time I checked stats, Geosci had a fairly high acceptance rate as it's a smallish and not very high demand major). He was interested in the Paleo stuff but wasn't excited by all of the earth science classes that make up the breadth/intro coursework so decided against a geosci major. He's hoping to take some of the advanced level paleo classes as electives later that only require Biology prereqs.

[Anonymous]

Paleontology? Insert Dr. Ross Geller snark here: _______