The CV

You need a basic CV as you progress through your career as a scientist: to apply for fellowships and grants, graduate school, internships, etc. Read through this thorough description of a basic science CV by Richard Reis in The Chronicle of Higher Education and see several resources on How to Craft a Winning Résumé on the Science Careers (AAAS) web site. Once you have all your basic info down, you should take particular care to 1) proofread your CV for typos, 2) make sure it is formatted simply so that it is easy to find critical information (e.g., year(s) of your degree(s)), 3) avoid excessive wordiness (less is more - don't use complete sentences to describe your skills, instead use bullets), and 4) keep it to a maximum of 1 or 2 pages unless you already have a PhD and can justify a longer CV (i.e., have you used an 11 pt. font, played with the page margins and spacing? Have you already removed all items related to your high school record? hobbies? and anything else that isn't DIRECTLY related to your career as a scientist?). In early versions of your CV, err on the side of INCLUDING small awards or presentations (a scholarship from the local gem and mineral society, a poster competition in your College of Science, etc.). Include other languages you speak, specialized lab techniques you have experience with, specialized software you use (no, we don't want to see that you've mastered MS Word).

Things that SHOULD NOT be included in your CV: a photo of yourself, your birth date or age, your marital status, an exhaustive list of your college courses, your hobbies (unless you happen to have an Olympic medal or some other very notable "hobby" that will make your CV stand out but perhaps work that into your Honors and Awards section).

Finally, look at CVs of other academics for formatting ideas and ideas for what to include in your CV. I happen to like the way my CV is formatted (I don't overuse bullets, but instead use more bold type, italics, underlining, and creative spacing to make the information easy to find. You should include the dollar amounts of any awards/scholarships in your CV). Then have someone (an advisor or graduate student) look at your draft CV before you send it off. Send your CV as a .pdf file and not an MS Word file to avoid software problems.

Research grants, Fellowships, and Scholarships

I've compiled a list of research grants, fellowships, and scholarships for both graduate students and undergraduates in the Department of Earth & Climate Sciences at SF State (with a focus on students in my research group). If you see something you want to apply for, put the deadline on your calendar now so that you can start your application, request letters of recommendation, and order transcripts well in advance of the deadline. Deadlines generally hover around the same time of year if not the same date each year:

Graduate Student Research & Travel Grant Opportunities and Fellowships

• AAPG Foundation Grants-in-Aid program, $500-$3,000 - deadline January 15
• AAAS Pacific Division Student Research Award, up to $750 - deadline May 1
• AAAS Pacific Division Student Travel Grants, up to $150 - deadline 5pm on May 1
• AEG Foundation Funds, variable - deadline February 1
• AIPG William J. Siok Graduate Scholarship Program, $1,000 - deadline February 1
• AGeS2 Program, GSA, for geochronology student research - deadline 3pm on February 1 annually
• AGU travel grants (specific international meetings only) - variable
• College of Science and Engineering, SF State - deadlines vary
• Department of Geosciences research grants, up to $800 - deadlines in the 5th week of Fall semester and the 10th week of Spring semester (usually announced by e-mail)
• EDMAP, US Geological Survey, up to $17,500 - deadline in November
• GSA Graduate Student Research Grants (~50% success rate!), with an average award of ~2,000 - deadline February 1
• GSA Travel Grants to Cordilleran Section meetings - deadline in late Winter/early Spring
• MSA Grant for Student Research in Mineralogy & Petrology, up to $5,000 - deadline March 1
• MSA Grant for Research in Crystallography, up to $5,000 - deadline March 1
• National Defense Science & Engineering Graduate Fellowship program, must be U.S. Citizen, generous stipend + tuition - deadline November 2
• National Geographic Society Early Career Grants, $5,000-$10,000 - deadline October 21
• NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program, generous stipend + tuition - deadline October 22 annually
• SEG scholarships, $500-$10,000 - deadline March 1
• Society of Economic Geologists Graduate Student Fellowship Program, $2,500-$15,000 - deadline February 1
• Sigma Xi Grants-in-Aid of Research program, up to $1,000 - deadlines March 15 & October 1
• Zeiss-GSA Research Grant, $10,000 - deadline February 3

Undergraduate Student Research & Travel Grant Opportunities, and Scholarships

• AEG Foundation Funds, variable - deadline February 1
• AIPG National Undergraduate Scholarships, $1,000-$3,000 - February 1
• Association of Independent Professional Earth Scientists National Undergraduate Scholarship, $1,000-$3,000  - deadline February 1
• College of Science and Engineering, SF State - deadlines vary
• Department of Defense SMART Scholarship Program, generous stipend + tuition - deadline 5pm on December 1
• Department of Geosciences research grants, up to $400 - deadlines vary (announced by email)
• The Desk and Derrick Educational Trust scholarships, U.S. & Canadian citizens only (Min. 3.2 GPA) - deadline April 1
• EDMAP, US Geological Survey, up to $10,000 - deadline in November
• Expanding Representation in Geosciences, GSA, diversity program, $1,500 - deadline May 15
• The Gladys Carol Scholarship Program, $2,500 (renewable, Min. 3.75 GPA) - deadline March 31
• The Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Foundation (apply in Sophomore year), tuition + $7,500 - Fall deadline
• GSA Travel Grants to Cordilleran Section meetings - deadline in late Winter/early Spring
• Microscopy Society of America, Undergraduate Research Scholarship Program, up to $3,000 - deadline 11:59pm on December 1 
• MSA Grant for Student Research in Mineralogy & Petrology, up to $5,000 - deadline March 1
• MSA Grant for Research in Crystallography, up to $5,000 - deadline March 1
• National Geographic Society Early Career Grants, $5,000-$10,000 - deadline October 21
• On To The Future, GSA, diversity travel grant to attend the Annual Meeting of the GSA
• SEG scholarships, $500-$10,000 - deadline March 1
• Sigma Xi Grants-in-Aid of Research program, up to $1,000 - deadlines March 15 & October 1

Underrepresented Students and/or Womxn Only

• AAPG L. Austin Weeks Undergraduate Grants - deadline March 31
• AGI Scholarship Programs, Harriet Evelyn Wallace Scholarship for Female Graduate Geoscience Students, $5,000 (can apply twice) - deadline February 7
• AWG awards (scholarships, travel awards, field-based or paleontology research) - award amounts and deadlines are variable
• Collabera STEM Scholarship (women only), $2,500 - deadline May 29
• Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellowship (U.S. Citizens only, URM award) - deadline December 17

Field Camp Scholarships (in addition to above scholarships)

• AEG Foundation Beardsley-Kuper Field Camp Scholarship Fund - deadline February 1
• AISES Exxon Mobil scholarships (indigenous students only), $3,000 - deadline May 31
• AWG Maria Crawford Field Camp scholarship, $750 - deadline February 14
• GSA Field Camp Awards, $2,000-$10,000 - deadline March 27 
• NAGT scholarships for field study, $750 - deadline February 14
• SEG Field Camp program, $1,000-$20,000 - deadline February 1
• Scholarships for the Indiana University Judson Mead Geologic Field Station, $40-$180 per credit hour (~80% of students receive a scholarship)
• TravelingGeologist Fieldwork Scholarship (800CAD [or equivalent foreign currency]) - deadline March 31

Good luck!

Letters of recommendation

Sooner or later, you're going to need a letter of recommendation from professors/employers who know you and are able to write positive things about you. These kinds of letters are necessary for scholarship/grant applications, applications to graduate school, etc. I often get requests at the last minute, with minimal information about the program for which I'm writing the letter, and without copies of any of the other information the student will submit alongside my letter. I suspect the main reason for the lack of information is procrastination...waiting too long to get around to putting the application together.

If the professor agrees to write the letter, all of this means that they won't have enough information about you to write a thoughtful letter that points to your strengths nor time to think about what they might write. The result? A generic letter of recommendation: "John X. took my Petrology class in Spring 2008 and received a final grade of B+, scoring in the top third of students in that class...He is a hard-worker, turned in all assignments, and asks lots of questions in class....I recommend him for XYZ scholarship." Trust me - that's not the kind of letter you want.

It's best if professors are able to talk about improvement of your grades over time and point to the 3.6 GPA in your geology courses (versus the 3.3 overall GPA) - information contained in your transcript. A resume that includes previous relevant work or research experience, published abstracts, scholarships awarded, community service experience, teaching experience, etc. would provide additional details that might significantly improve a letter of recommendation. Finally, having final (or semi-final) copies of the essay(s), budget, and/or statement of purpose can make all the difference; those documents discuss your qualifications for the grant or what you plan do as part of your graduate research, your motivation for pursuing graduate school, whether they feel you're a good fit for the program/advisor to which you're applying....key elements to a letter of recommendation. If you've chosen faculty who know you well academically, they can discuss whether you're a capable researcher and prepared for graduate school, include details of the kind of research you did, discuss how involved intellectually you were with the project, etc. It is also very important to give your letter-writers copies of any details of the grant/scholarship that you're applying for: who is the funder? what sorts of research do they support? what are the eligibility requirements? do they have a preference to support a particular group (women, minorities, petroleum geologists)? what is the typical grant size? For example, here is some of the text describing GSA's Graduate Student Research Grant program:

"The primary role of the GSA research grants program is to provide partial support of master's and doctoral thesis research in the geological sciences for graduate students enrolled in universities in the United States, Canada, Mexico and Central America. In 2008, 53% of the applicants received funding. GSA strongly encourages women, minorities, and persons with disabilities to participate fully in this grants program."

From this, I can see that they want to partially fund thesis research. That's an important thing to know from the letter-writer's (and the applicant's) standpoint: in a letter, I can emphasize other funding that's available to support a student's research or point to other aspects of the thesis project for which no funding from GSA is requested.

Here is another example from AAPG's Grants-in-Aid program describing how AAPG will choose grant awardees: "Factors weighed in selecting successful applicants include: the qualifications of an applicant as indicated by past performance; originality and imagination of the proposed project; support of the department in which the work is being done; and perceived significance of the project to petroleum, energy minerals and related environmental geology."

Grant proposals often have word/character/page limits that mean you can't necessarily say everything you want in your proposal. Armed with the above information from AAPG's web site, a letter-writer can again better justify funding your proposal by highlighting those specific points about you or your project.

Giving your letter writers all that information with plenty of time (at least 2 weeks before the deadline) gives us good fodder for the letter and puts us in a good frame of mind while we're writing those letters. There is perhaps less need to ask for a letter so formally (see the link above) after the first request, and particularly from your main advisor who has written (multiple) letters for you in the past, but the need for copies of the meat of your application (the essays and budget, the statement of purpose, and program requirements) still stands. Always.

Final tip: academics tend to write more glowing letters than employers/supervisors outside academia (think: the geotechnical firm you worked for right after college) because we know what the competition is like and what stands out (the good and bad) when evaluating a grad school or grant application.