Geologizer

I just read the title and little blurb at the top, but seriously... that's literally an oil exploration project. Salt deposits are natural oil and gas traps. *edit: and just to be perfectly clear, detecting and characterizing salt deposits is a huge research field in the oil industry I think it would behoove you to read up on the basics of the industry and science that you are saying you want to go into..I don't mean that in a rude way at all, but how can you know where you want to go or what you want to do without knowing the basics? A bit of reading would go a long way to helping you with your decision. The high pressure metamorphic stuff is probably less direct/not related, but the other one definitely is

Did you happen to notice where his graduated student is currently?

Structural geology and tectonics are excellent backgrounds to have for the oil industry too

No, a BA is not going to be viewed equally to a BS. The hard sciences and math that you're missing with the BA are probably going to be a liability for you. But I'm curious, if you're planning on taking the math classes anyway, why not just do the BS? Now, will you be able to accomplish what you want to with a BA? Perhaps, but you're going to have to compensate for what will be your lacking background in the fundamental science.

I don't know very much about any of those schools unfortunately, so I don't know that I could judge which schools would be best for internships. Geographically, they are all pretty well placed for oil and those schools will probably have recruiters you can talk to to get good information, but that's about all I can say. For course of study, internships are open to all disciplines (I.e. You don't have to be studying anything oil related to get an internship). That being said, studying tectonics seems far more transferable than igneous petrology to me. But I'd go with whatever seems more interesting because they take people from all different sub-fields. As far as jobs outside of petroleum, there are many jobs for each of the fields you listed. Government jobs (state and national), consulting firms, insurance companies, teaching, etc.

So are you interested in the petroleum industry specifically or geology? Specifically for the petroleum industry, the main qualification to get in the door for internships is being enrolled in at least a masters/graduate program (how picky they are in the official designation differs by company and mostly is case by case as far as I've heard). I should say internships are what matters, so if you're trying for petroleum you need to have internship experience. Therefore, if you're qualified to apply for the internships you want (check this beforehand) with a given program, then you're on the right track. However, I'd be dubious of geology programs that don't offer funding. Being offered some sort of funding is generally a given with geology programs - especially at well known schools, so if there isn't any, that should merit some inquiry as to its absence.

I think it's worth it to have the geology background. From my experience, geophysicists should be geologists who specialize in geophysics, and not the new emergence of "geo" physicists who know nothing about geology. I'm not saying you're in this category, just continuing my point. The view I just stated is one I've heard echoed from all of the geophysics professors I've learned from, so to be able to cast yourself as having a geology background immediately gives you a huge edge.

Having your own thoughts about how to organize things isn't what you did wrong. Having a committee member tell you to fix something, and the blowing it off, is. I mean, that's about as basic as it gets.

Your analytic writing score isn't going to kill your application. I'd focus on making your quant score better first - whether it's the 155 or 156. 160+ish is where you'll want to be for the middle of the pack (i.e. not have your GRE scores be a factor). If you want your GRE to be one of the strong points of your app, then you'll need to bump both by ~10pts. As long as your verbal isn't terrible - which it isn't - that adcom will probably look right passed that score and it'll be a non-factor. Basically, if you're stressing about the AW section..don't.

ASU has zero oil/mining presence, so they definitely aren't there by proxy to ASU. And ASU is between u of a and NAU, so I don't think geography plays much of a role. NAU is a good masters school, and good enough to pull those recruiters in its own right.

Ahh I assumed that it was going to be through the same department (geoscience). If that's not the case (through the engineering school?) I'm not sure how the two schools stack up. But funded is huge and because u of a is so well respected for earth science, I'm sure that'll open a lot of doors into mining. Not to mention all of the big mines right near there.

Looks like others beat me to the punch, but u of a is a top tier geoscience program. Now, fit and speciality of faculty is something rankings (which are totally bogus in my mind anyway) don't capture, but I don't think there's any risk of an"offset" in quality at Arizona in the way you think. If anything, you have it backwards. Plus u of a is funded...the decision is really one sided on paper, but I know that's only part of the story sometimes.

For light rail info, check the asu parking and transit site for up to date info. I think it's called a u-pass, if I remember correctly. You get a student discount rate on a semester long pass, but I don't remember the actual cost. It's probably changing every semester anyway.

This entire question boils down to what your ideal long term job prospect is. Especially true for engineering, if you decide to go into industry with a Masters, you had better make peace with probably never going back to grad school. An engineering PhD opens very few new doors that a Masters + Experience doesn't open for you - namely the academy, and that's about it really. The point being that you're going to go on the job market already exceptionally qualified, have a really good salary, and probably be in a very good position to advance your position in terms of job duties and salary (high upward mobility). Now once you have all of that, you're decision to go for a PhD is going to be to abandon all of that, take a massive pay cut, and toil away for years toward a degree that for all intents and purposes is doing nothing to improve your position - more likely even setting you back further once you hit the job market again. Now, if your goal is to become a professor at a university or have some other job where a PhD is necessary, then I would advise just jumping right in. Go for it now while you don't have to rip yourself away from the job market. I imagine it would be immediately difficult to jump back to grad school life, and exceedingly so as time passes. I guess just to hit on all points, I don't see any pros that you would necessarily gain from industry work beforehand. If you're hoping to cover a less than stellar Master's record, I doubt a short stint in industry will do it. If you don't want a life as a professor, then I'd say just jump into the job market.

I'm still struggling with the effect your talking to this professor is supposed to have. What is your goal in doing so?