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Ideas for getting environmental science/geography experience?

I'm planning to go to uni to study either geography or environmental science and am looking for some work experience to, as my mum would say, "get your foot in the door". Does anyone have any ideas of places to look at? eg parks, water treatment plants, wildlife trusts etc.

Reply 1

taelarc96

I'm currently applying for an environmental science summer school at the University of East Anglia- I'm not interested in going there, but this is a good opportunity to get some experience that can make you stand out when applying for other things, and it also looks fun and interesting in my opinion :smile:

If you apply quickly you may get a free place! There are more details here:

http://www.uea.ac.uk/study/info-for/young-people/post-16/university-tasters-enrichment/environmental-sciences-summer-school

Also try the environment agency or the forestry commission, according to my geology tutor they are really nice and love taking on students for work experience.

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 2

Tabers

It depends what sort of work you are looking to go into. I think that wildlife trusts are a good place to go to if you are after more practical conservation experience. Maybe even get in touch with your local government to see if you can do some work experience in their environment department. The environment agency would also be a good one to get in touch with to do some more of the environmental sciencey things such as water monitoring surveying. Or maybe even your local water board. I did my first ever work experience working with the rangers on a local reservoir doing practical conservation work but you could see if there was any opportunities in the water treatment side of things. Its worth just sending out loads of emails to different places and seeing what happens. I had to get a month long work placement for one of my uni modules in practical conservation and it took a lot of emails to eventually get a reply and get anything sorted.

Good luck!

Reply 3

RobertsClan

I'm starting an Environmental Science degree at Bangor in September. As a mature student I wanted to make sure I had some relevant experience as my work background was in a completely different field.

I arranged two placements one with Welsh Water, our water supplier, and another with Natural Resources Wales(NRW) . I'm not sure where you are from but NRW is the equivalent of the Environment Agency in the rest of the UK. I have to say that the week I spent with them was well worth it. I got to see so much it including visiting water treatment works that had previously polluted a local river, soil sampling and meeting local farmers to discuss nutrient management. I also visited a scrapyard to see them de-polluting a vehicle and a disused mine that had the potential to pollute the nearby watercourse with metals. They even let me see some of their surveillance footage gathered by their crime team and talked to me about how they investigate and prosecute offenders.

With both of the placements I had to fill out an application form which actually worked out really well as I mentioned my research project for the Access Course I'm working on was about eutrophication and the affect of agricultural runoff on water pollution. NRW then arranged as much of the placement to be relevant to my research and experiment. The most useful part if my placement though was being able to ask staff that had been there a long time and recent graduates about choice of degree and job prospects after graduating. At the time I was torn between two different courses and they all really helped me with making a decision.

Not sure about any other places offering placements but I'd definitely recommend NRW of the Environment Agency if you're not in Wales. Also in Wales NRW incorporates The Forestry Commission and The Countryside Council for Wales so they may be worth a try as well.

Good Luck!

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