Mining Education in Great Britain
In Great Britain students get mining education at special colleges and mining departments of Universities. They are often situated close to coal mines where students can have practical training and learn the new achievements in technology and engineering.
These institutions provide full-time and part-time education.
At the Mining Department students may take such courses as geology, mining engineering, mine surveying, quarrying, management studies and others.
The courses are based on lectures, an intensive tutorial system, laboratory work, design classes and practical training. The term of study lasts 3 or 4 years. The academic year consists of 3 terms running from the beginning of October to the end of June.
Students course is designed on a modular bases (self-contained “units” of study). When a student passes a module, he gets a credit. Each module is regularly assessed by end-of-term examinations. Practical work in the field and laboratory forms an important part of the course.
On completion of the course of study college graduates are conferred diplomas and the University graduates are awarded the degree of Bachelor of Arts or Science.
British education is fee-paying. Admission to the Universities is by examination and selection.
Departments usually interview all the candidates to select better ones. Students usually live in the University halls of residence, lodgings and privately rented accommodation.
Mining education in the usa
In the USA students can get mining education at special colleges and at the mining departments of Universities.
The field of study includes earth sciences (geology, geochemistry, geophysics, etc.) and engineering.
The students may specialize in petrology, mineral deposits, mining engineering and other disciplines.
Field work is an important part of training. All students take part in a summer field course during their undergraduate programme. At the Department of Geology there are well-equipped laboratories for study and research.
The mining engineering students study the basic sciences, principles and technologies of mineral exploration, underground and surface operations, rock mechanics, mine ventilation, surveying, mine safety and operating research. The Mining Department has an experimental mine which is a large, well-equipped laboratory for teaching and research in mining operations.
The education is fee-paying. During the course of training students may visit surface and underground mines, oil fields, dressing plants and regions of geological interest.
As a rule, mining engineering programmes include:
Liberal arts –20%
Basic sciences-25%
General engineering-20%
Geology-10%
Mining-25%.
Famous geologists a.Y. Fersman
Academician A.Y. Fersman was born in St. Petersburg on November 8th 1882.
He studied at the Moscow University under the leadership of V.I. Vernadsky. Graduating from the University in1907 A.Y. Fersman first worked in the laboratory of professor Vernadsky.
Ultimately he became the Director of the Lomonosov Institute of Mineralogy, Crystallography and Geohemistry in Moscow.
Fersman’s early researches were essentially crystallographic and mineralogical. He worked in Paris and Heidelberg and travelled in Switzerland and Italy, eventually writing a paper on mineralogy of Elba.
Later he produced an authoritative treatise on the precious stones. In 1912 A.Y. Fersman was appointed to a professorship in mineralogy and to a curatorship of the Museum of mineralogy attached to the Academy of Sciences. From this time his interests were devoted to the field of geochemistry. The results of the next 25 years of scientific research were his monumental works on geochemistry. Between the two world wars his contributions included investigations on the geochemistry of pegmatites, researches on the geochemical migrations of elements within sedimentary terrains, remote from magmatic centres and other studies in regional mineralogy.
Academician A.Y. Fersman was one of the leading mineralogists who converted mineralogy from a descriptive science into a science based on the fundamental chemical investigations.
He laid the foundation for the chemical surveying and prospecting for useful minerals.
Of A.Y. Fersman’s many achievements, his research on great alkali igneous complexes of Khibin and Lovozevo in the Kola region rank among the most outstanding. His scientific study of Russian mineral resources (1935) provides a succinct account of the development of the mineralogical researches in which he played a prominent part.
Academician Fersman led the expeditions to the Central Asia, the Urals, the Altai, the Caucasus and the Crimea.
He is especially known for his investigations in the Kara-Kum Desert resulting in the discovery of big sulphur deposits. His investigations of the Kola Peninsula lead to the discovery of enormous apatite deposits and the development of a mining-industrial region in the Khibiny Mountains.
Academician A.Y. Fersman was the organizer of the Geochemical Institute in Moscow.
He was one time Chief editor of the scientific publications of the Academy of Sciences.
In addition to his scientific work A.Y. Fersman was the author of some 5 hundred scientific books and papers.
A.Y. Fersman was also a foreign member of the American and British Mineralogical Societies and got the Wollaston medal of the Geological Society in London in 1943. His popular book “Interesting Mineralogy” passed several editions in Russian and German. A.Y. Fersman named 19 minerals, many of them from Kola Peninsula and Fersmanite from the same region was named after him.
A.Y. Fersman died in 1943 at the age of 61 in Sochi on the Black Sea.