What are the best colleges and graduate schools in the US for marine biology, and specifically for cephalopod study? Has anyone attended or is anyone currently attending school to study cephs?

Texas A&M University in Galveston is a great place to major in Marine Biology. It is the only branch campus of Texas A&M where graduates recieve everything that main campus has (i.e. your diploma says just "Texas A&M", NOT Galveston)

There's also the National Resource Center for Cephalopods located in Galveston. They hire a lot of college interns to do such things as collect live food, and feed squid, cuttlefish, octopus and nautilus, and maintain the systems that support them.

There is often some research project going on there.

I've posted a few pictures I've taken while I worked there if you go looking through old posts.

TX is good, so is south Florida or south California...all have really fantastic programs... ( I am somewhat biased towards USC, but hey)
Good luck with your search!
greg

Anywhere in the northwest, or even northeast? (I can't take the heat) :(

BigSquid

Well, anywere around wood's hole is going to be good...or Chicago (the Shedd ). On the west coast, you could try Seattle. Too cold for this boy !

UW (in Seattle) is a great school for just a biology degree, but I have to say A&M Galveston would be a good choice.
Whoop!

Thanks a lot for the info!
Is the UW grad school any good for ceph studies?

BigSquid

Hey there,
I remember asking that same question years ago on this same site! I think that tx is a great place, I am considering it for my grad school prgm. Currently, though, I go to Eckerd College. It is a small Liberal Arts college with, what I consider, one of the best marine sciences progams in the country. It is small and there is plenty of opportunity for field work and your very own research projects. The interactions between student and professor is prob. the best in the country. It is located right on the water. It is important to know that grad schools really look at how much experience candidates have in the lab and in the field, the more the better actually. Because bigger schools are so competitive, it is harder to get any experience, that is an advantage of going to a smaller school. Also, the campus is BEAUTIFUL!!! Check it out!
www.eckerd.edu.

Nice to hear from you, Melissa and to know that you're working towards your goals. :) Are you in school this summer, too?

I've encountered many students and graduates in the marine biology program at Galveston and they've all seemed to like it. Plus, Galveston would be a nice place to live - I'd like to live there, too! But the nice thing about any marine biology program is that you get to be near the sea.

Nancy

Hi Nancy!
It is nice to have time to be on tonmo! I am not in school this summer, but I got into the Ford Scholar Program at Eckerd which allows me to do research next summer. So, next summer I will be in school. Eventually I want to be a professor, so I have many years of school left. I just want to congratulate everyone on how far this site has come since I first signed up, you all are doing an excellent job!