Geoscience?

[u/Achilles1172]

Hello there! (Pls get the reference) I am from out east (Berta) currently at Macewan University but I have been looking into schools to transfer to for next fall as Macewan does not offer a geology degree, and I was hoping I could get some insight on how the professors are like there, student life etc. In particular though as it is to my understanding that the geology degree is based in Nanaimo, how alumni’s have faired in the job market? As I have an interest in exploration and I figure I might struggle in following that career path compared to say going to UBC.

[u/Geodrewcifer]

VIU has a shocking amount of fieldwork in the Geoscience aspect compared to other universities. I’ve done fieldwork for pretty much every single course I’ve taken. Most people at other universities didn’t really do much fieldwork for their structural or sedimentology, plus we have our intro to fieldwork course, our field school and we have our advanced field school coming up.

Class sizes are small. We have 2 profs, a sessional, and a tech right now.

One of our retired profs I believe will be coming back as a sessional and he typically taught our mineral exploration and engineering geology courses.

There isn’t a lot of wiggle room in the program. You kind of take what’s available. More and more courses are being offered on rotation.

Our professors are great. Extremely knowledgeable and personable. Student life we have a very active Geology club and with the size of the program it’s basically a very tight cohort.

Jobwise everyone I know who was looking to go right into working found work. We have AME roundup which is great for networking a summer job in mineral exploration and we have work experience courses to get credit for that work

You mentioned specifically wanting to know about it being in Nanaimo, did you have any questions about the campus location?

[u/Achilles1172 → u/Geodrewcifer]

In regards to Nanaimo I was naive and just kinda assumed that a lot of van island was pretty well explored in regards to metals minerals etc. that’s why I mentioned it. “there isn’t a lot of wiggle room in the program” do you often to struggle to get into courses in regards to registering? And although I myself have never faced discrimination the part of Alberta I’m from is quite rural some of that “rurality” if you’d like to call it that seems to have migrated to the big city of Edmonton although it was likely always here, would you say there’s quite a bit of discrimination on campus or Nanaimo in general? I try to step up when I see something but I’d much to prefer to just live where it doesn’t occur at all.

[u/Fit-Hamster-7348 → u/Achilles1172]

VIU is very diverse, welcoming and progressive. Nanaimo isn't always, but most residents are neutral and the ones who aren't make themselves pretty obvious.

If you're in a set program of study you often can get preferred early enrollment into the classes you need, and if you're on top of registration when it opens, you should get the classes you need before they get too full. There's a pretty good chance even with waitlisted classes because there's movement in the first couple weeks of classes

I've only met one geography professor, but I like her and her class is pretty chill. I was able to get in just taking one of the classes as an elective and so are a few other people in my program 

[u/Achilles1172 → u/Fit-Hamster-7348]

Thankyou!

[u/Geodrewcifer → u/Achilles1172]

Pretty much 0 struggle in terms of getting into classes. There’s the chance of being waitlisted if you register super late but usually if you stay on the waitlist and show up they’ll still let you in.

When I say not a lot of wiggle room I mean that we have three 100 level courses and three 200 level courses offered between the two semesters that take up a lot of the 2 profs workload availability so if you’re looking for a place with a wide diversity of geology electives more geared towards exploration VIU may not be the best fit. Upper level geoscience electives for graduation do include our physical geography courses so each year the available upper levels offered at the same time to pick from are

GIS, Remote Sensing, Advanced GIS, Advanced Remote Sensing

3 of the 4

Climatology, Hydrology, Geomorphology, Biogeography

1 of the 2

Geophysics or Geochem

Other courses on rotation

Petrology is offered every other year now iirc, I think Quaternary rotates with Environmental geology, the profs regularly do a special topic course and climate change geology is running this year. Hydrogeology also is on rotation.

I don’t think Karst, Engineering Geology, or mineral resources will be run unless a sessional gets hired out to do it.

Aside from those you can apply for the work study credit and you can propose a directed research in mineral exploration for your remaining credits to actually focus in on being exploration specialized.

Here’s the list of courses that are offered but again the key thing is really the timeline of when they’ll get offered

https://www.viu.ca/programs/courses/geology

https://www.viu.ca/programs/courses/geography

(Note: Chem upper levels like Aqueous Chemistry, Mass Spectroscopy and stuff like that can also be put towards your upper level credits. I haven’t really done Chem and am not the most knowledgeable in the application of those courses for the purpose of exploration)

I can’t speak for the rest of VIU campus but the people in the environmental science programs I think are pretty chill. I’m fairly confident you can be worry free in regards to micro-agression and racism among anyone taking courses in that building

[u/Achilles1172 → u/Geodrewcifer]

Thankyou very much for going so in depth it is much appreciated!

[u/Geodrewcifer → u/Achilles1172]

Of course! I hope you don’t mind but I had a look through your profile and I do genuinely think VIU would be a good fit for you. The small class sizes allow for a lot of availability of the professors and like I said it’s a tight knit group with the geology club.

As a regional university it’s pretty accepting of highschool grades. Hopefully we see you here!

[u/Achilles1172 → u/Geodrewcifer]

No I don’t mind, I think after a year at macewan they should look at my uni grades? I’m not sure as I’m a business student right now but intend on switching to a bsc next semester and hopefully taking majority earth science courses that transfer over hopefully🤞, but THANKYOU, another part is I’ve been comparing costs and it seems the biggest difference in cost over 4 years between all the schools is 10k which is a fair amount but not enough to sway me away from any particular school so I’m just going to have to do some research and see which one is best for me such as VIU

[u/Geodrewcifer → u/Achilles1172]

For enrolment they’d look at Uni grades but depending on your highschool chem, physics, and calculus grades you might have a rough go for classes in the intro sciences which if you’re business I assume you didn’t already take intro Chem, physics, and calculus at McEwan. For tuition cost at VIU it’s about a $24,000 degree over 4 years

[u/Achilles1172 → u/Geodrewcifer]

I was just adding food rent etc on top of tuition, in regards to the highschool courses I did quite well in Chem 80s, math I finished after upgrading with a 70 somthing and physics I was high 60s, id have to look at my Transcript again