Career in meteorology?

Question

I'm interested in majoring in meteorology. I am currently at a community college but will go to a 4 year college in the fall. What classes would be good to take? What jobs could I get? What's the salary like?

Answer 1

I am also going to school for meteorology. I've needed to take Calculus 1-3 and Differential Equations for math and two semesters of physics in my program. My guess is the program at the school you are transferring to will have some requirements, so you could check those out.
Aside from the requirements, I highly recommend taking advantage of all the elective meteorology classes your school offers. This is the best way to find your "niche," or which part of meteorology you will wish to have your career in. It's a very diverse field so there are a lot of opportunities for whatever you are interested in.
Public speaking may help since you will be making presentations through school most likely, and quite possibly through your career. I am taking technical writing in the fall, which I hope will help me write consisely in case I ever try to publish anything. Since I haven't taken it yet, I can't comment on it, but it sounds like a good idea.
If you're interested in a broadcast job (TV or radio meteorologist) then I would recommend getting a B.S. in meteorology and a communications minor. You are more qualified for a job and more likely to get it if you have those credentials rather than a degree in just Broadcast meteorology.
There are a ton of opportunities in meteorology. I would suggest an internship in a place that interests you to help you figure out what career you'd like. I recommend the National Weather Service, they take summer volunteers. I've done it for two years and I love it . There is also media, research, and private sector forecasting. You can also do things with air quality and meteorological instruments. There are a lot of opportunities, but once you decide your niche they will start to limit to a managable number.
From what I know, meteorologists can make anywhere from 35,000-100,000+ a year depending on what you are doing. Once you find some interesting jobs, this is something you could look up online most likely.

Answer 2

I saw in a book while I was in 8th grade the salary for your job of choice was at 300K/y. the salary should've gone up since then, and I think the book was out-dated as well, so my info my be a bit out-of-date a of now, but that's what I saw

Answer 3

check out these links they might help ya

http://careerservices.rutgers.edu/meteorology.html

http://weather.about.com/od/currentjobopenings/Current_Job_Openings_in_the_Weather_and_Atmospheric_Sciences.htm

http://sky-fire.tv/index.cgi/careers.html

http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2004/AneeAsma.shtml