The American Geosciences Institute’s (AGI) Status of Recent Geoscience Graduates 2021 provides an overview of the demographics, activities, and experiences of geoscience degree recipients during the 2020-2021 academic year. This research draws attention to student preparation in the geosciences, their education and career path decisions, as well as examines some of the questions raised about student transitions into the workforce.

This report examines the changes in the number of NSF Graduate Fellowships and the amount of funding awarded between 2000 and 2009, with comparisons between geoscience and other STEM fellowship awards. The report also analyzes the academic backgrounds of geoscience NSF graduate fellows, research fields and institutional affiliations.

A growing portion of decision makers in academia, private industry, and government are concerned about shortages in the science, engineering, and technology (SET) workforce. This heightened awareness is in part to several reports released in the last year looking at that nation’s competitiveness in the global market. For years, the geosciences have been aware of the need to increase the number of students entering the pipeline, but the recent upswing in the world’s commodities market and impending retirement of a generation of geoscientists has increased this pressure.

Field camp has traditionally served as a central part of undergraduate geoscience curricula, but this tradition appears to be disappearing. There are several reasons for the decline in the number of departments offering traditional summer field camp experiences, including the rising costs of liability insurance for colleges and universities to run such programs and the changing face of geoscience departments in smaller schools that are combining forces with geography and environmental science programs.

The Status of the Geoscience Workforce 2016 report is based on original data collected by AGI as well as from federal data sources, professional membership organizations, and industry. The report integrates all of these various data sources into a comprehensive view of the human and economic parameters of the geosciences, including supply and training of new students, workforce demographics and employment projections, to trends in geosciences research funding and economic indicators.

The Status of the Geoscience Workforce 2014 report is based on original data collected by AGI as well as from federal data sources, professional membership organizations, and industry. The report integrates all of these various data sources into a comprehensive view of the human and economic parameters of the geosciences, including supply and training of new students, workforce demographics and employment projections, to trends in geosciences research funding and economic indicators.

The "Status of the Geoscience Workforce" report provides a comprehensive benchmark of the geoscience profession. The report is based on original data collected by the American Geological Institute as well as from existing data from federal data sources, professional membership organizations, and industry data sources. The report synthesizes all available data for the geosciences, from the supply and training of new students, to workforce demographics and employment projections, to trends in geoscience research funding and economic indicators.

According to the federal government, science and technology has been responsible for more than 50% of the economic growth in the U.S. since the end of World War II. This growth was driven by increased investment in science and technology fields undertaken in the post‐war, space‐race, and cold war years, building not only the human capital but also the institutional frameworks to sustain the technical capacity of the U.S. economy in the face of ever‐changing threats.