Sam
30 Aug 2025
Neil Caddy from Radio Cornwall wanted to chat about how to become a geologist as part of their “When I Grow Up” feature!
I was really pleased to get contacted by BBC Radio Cornwall this week! I was invited to come on to the Saturday morning show with Neil Caddy to talk all about how I became a geologist and all the amazing reasons why geology is a great career.
I love it when people ask what I do. I love that it is a bit unusual and interesting. I find it is always a conversation starter. I am usually met with "ah, my brother's wife's second cousin's third born is a geologist, do you know them?". It can be a small world, so sometimes I do! But what usually follows is a lot of interest and questions about this fascinating subject.
During the interview, Neil asked me if I knew I wanted to be a geologist from an early age. Honestly, I didn’t know it at the time, but looking back to when I was a kid collecting shiny rocks and minerals it does kind of make sense now!
But to be honest, it wasn’t until choosing my A-Levels when I picked geology as a fourth subject when things fell in to place. A few weeks into the course and I had completely fallen in love!
Neil also asked me about what being a geologist entails and where it can take you. Personally, I am not as well travelled as some geologists, but have been around quite a few amazing places in the world during my career. Rocks are everywhere, and they all need to be studied! So being a geologist can take you all over the world and experience some amazing things.
I love Cornwall, and Cornwall has been my main focus of study and research in my career. Neil went on to ask why Cornwall is so varied in its landscape and appearance. Cornwall has such a diverse and complex geological history, which has led to lots of amazing rock types under our feet that influences our landscape today and how we interact with that.
Finally, I explained how becoming a geologist can offer a fantastic career. It is extremely varied in what you can do, can take you anywhere around the world, and can also pay quite well! For me, it is such an enjoyable job that it isn’t really work!
If any kids out there have a passion for collecting rocks and minerals, or have interest in Earth science subjects being studied in things like science and geography, then remember that geology is a really good career path to follow up through further and higher education.
You can listen to the show now on BBC Sounds - https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002hn4g. If you wanted to fast forward to the interview it was on at 09:15 (3 hours 14 minutes in to the show).