In 2018, the first Uruguayan Student Chapter of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) was created, with the support and encouragement of the Exploration and Production team of ANCAP. Currently, the chapter is constituted by 47 students of the Undergraduate Geology career of the Faculty of Sciences (Universidad de la República).
The chapter allows students to directly interact with the AAPG organization and receive its benefits such as online courses and conferences, participation in international events, in-house visits of professors to give conferences, scholarships, grants and to generate a direct relationship and networking with AAPG students chapters of Latin America and the Caribbean. Also, the Uruguayan chapter organizes other activities such as presentations in schools and high schools, and online posts in social networks to divulge the geosciences in our country.
At the beginning of the year, the student chapter applied for the AAPG’s L. Austin Weeks Award Undergraduate Grant Program 2020. Finally, on June 26th, it was announced that, among all the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean that participated, the Uruguayan chapter was selected as the grant recipient of the L. Austin Weeks Award. The grant consisted of an economical support of 500 U$S to the student chapter. This fund must be assigned exclusively to the acquisition of materials and tools that contribute to the training of the chapter members in geosciences, including books, equipment, software and trip fields, among others.
