UWYO.EDU - More than 350 geoscience students from across the nation met with representatives from 24 petroleum companies during last year’s Rocky Mountain Rendezvous (RMR) Job Fair. Similar numbers are expected at this year’s 12th annual event scheduled Sept. 27-30 at the University of Wyoming Conference Center and Hilton Garden Inn.

One of five regional job fairs nationwide, the RMR is sponsored by the American Association of Geologists (AAPG) and the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG). The UW Department of Geology & Geophysics and the School of Energy Resources (SER) co-host the event.

“Companies often hire their top recruits from this event,” says Randi Martinsen, a senior lecturer in geology and geophysics and the event’s founder and coordinator. “Companies have select schools they really like. They regularly come back to me to get the top candidates from UW.”

Many of the recruiters are UW alumni or those who got their jobs through the RMR, Martinsen adds.

The four-day event includes a vendor expo; on-site job interviews; receptions; short courses; student poster presentations that include cash prizes; and field trips, including an Anadarko oil rig tour and a visit to the Niobrara Formation, a major shale oil area in northern Colorado.

Online registration for students, available at http://rmr.uwyo.edu/ , will close Friday, Sept. 13. Students are encouraged to register early, as space is limited. Participating companies will be given access to student registration information and resumes, and will contact students to schedule on-site interviews.

Last year, 45 UW students attended the event, Martinsen says.

Geoscience students at UW typically major in petroleum engineering, geoanalytics, geochemistry, geohydrology or geophysics.

To date, 20 companies have registered to attend. Participating companies include Anadarko, BP Oil, Chesapeake Energy, ConocoPhillips, Encana Oil & Gas, Hess, Marathon Oil and Shell. For a complete list, go tohttp://rmr.uwyo.edu/participating-companies.

The job fair was developed to allow geoscience students from other colleges and universities -- who had no means to market themselves to recruiters -- an opportunity to do so, Martinsen says. Additionally, there are many smaller companies that do not have the recruiting budgets of their larger counterparts. Thus, such companies can’t visit every college or university where they’d like to recruit students, says Martinsen, the AAPG’s president-elect.

“This allows recruiters to get the most bang for their buck,” she says of the event that draws students from schools such as MIT and Stanford.  “So many former (UW) students come to me at meetings and thank me. They said they got their first job here (at the RMR).”

For more information about the RMR, go to http://rmr.uwyo.edu.

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