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The 2021 Student expo will be held at the TGS Headquarters in Houston, TX on September 13th and 14th. TGS will be donating their facility and services to help in the successful planning and execution of the event.
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10451 Clay Rd, Houston, TX 77041
2021 Speakers
Allen Bertagne, BRT Energy Advisors
Expanding your 21st Century Career Toolkit through an Active Entrepreneurial Mindset
Allen Bertagne grew up in the oil business, spending his early years in Venezuela, Libya, and the UK. Upon completing a Bachelor’s in Geology at Imperial College, and a Master’s at UT Austin he embarked on an exciting career, working at Exxon, CGG, PGS and Shell and currently running BRT Energy Advisors while also being involved in several other projects.
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While in Shell’s Gulf of Mexico Commercial Team, he played a key role in closing more than $500 MM of transactions and later raised $20MM to drill prospects that he and his father generated in the Aquitaine Basin of France. This resulted in his being named France Country Manager, one of the more enjoyable assignments of his career.
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Allen has also had a parallel “SEG career” serving as Chair of The Leading Edge Editorial Board, then as First Vice-President on the 2000-2001 Executive Committee.
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In December 2017, Allen was asked to be Technical Coordinator of the SEG EVOLVE Program, allowing him to create a comprehensive 5-month virtual internship for students. Since then, more than 400 students from over 40 countries have participated in EVOLVE, resulting in his excellent personal rapport with the Fearless Explorers of the Future.
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He was recently elected Chair of SEG’s Council, the most diverse and representative governing body of SEG, and will serve a 3-year term while continuing with his various business activities.
Rob Schapiro, Microsoft
How a Geologist Ended Up at Microsoft: Career Opportunities in Tech
Rob is the Director of the Microsoft Azure Energy Acceleration Program. This program is housed at The Ion in Houston and is focused on Energy Innovation across oil & gas, power & utilities, and renewables. Working closely with oil & gas customers, startups, and partners, Rob and the team are advancing energy industry transformation.
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Prior to joining Microsoft in 2019, Rob spent 17 years at ExxonMobil as a geologist and manager. He held 15 different technical and management assignments in Exploration, Development, and Production. He worked with partners and governments in 10 different countries on 5 continents.
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Prior to this role, Rob was the Global Coordination Manager for Production Geoscience and the Global Opportunity Prioritization Manager for Exploration. In each of these roles subsurface data was front and center and he led the Exploration company’s vendor data coordination team.
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Rob earned a Bachelor of Science in Geology from Vanderbilt University and a Master of Science from the University of California Santa Cruz. He lives in the Woodlands, Texas with his wife and two sons (12 and 15 years old). Rob is a former Loaned Executive and Young Leaders Chair with United Way of Greater Houston. He enjoys snow skiing, traveling, and inspiring others to innovate.
Marianne Rauch, TGS
My International Career and Life as a Geoscientist
Marianne has more than 30 years of experience. After she finished her PhD, she decided that Austria was too small and immigrated to Australia. When that became too confined, she moved to Houston and has called this city home on and off for 22 years. She was able to divide her work life into 1/3 academia, 1/3 service companies and 1/3 operators which makes for an interesting mix. When she is not thinking of new and innovative ways to use seismic, she likes to travel, visit art centers, playing with her puppies and going out with friends. Currently she is the Principal Technical Advisor at TGS Houston.
Amanda Rico PhD, Rico Editorial Services
Networking and Transferrable Skills
Dr. Amanda Rico specializes in optimizing resumes, cover letters, and LinkedIn profiles for senior and executive-level professionals. With 14+ years of experience ranging from partnering with TEDx speakers to building profiles for Energy & Petroleum executives, she is passionate about helping forward-thinking leaders level up.
She is a Houston Business Journal and Oilwoman Magazine career columnist, clean energy career mentor, and highly-requested public speaker with a history of partnering with state officials and corporate executives such as former CEO of GE, Jeff Immelt, Houston Mayor, Sylvester Turner, President & CEO of Halliburton, Jeff Miller, and former Chevron E&P President, Jeff Shellebarger.
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80% of Dr. Rico's clients who hop on the job market with their rebuilt materials land new jobs in 6 months, and 98% report double the interviews in 4 weeks. Additionally, 95% of her clients are in oil, gas, and energy, and she is recognized as both an industry thought leader and resume expert for upstream, midstream, downstream, and clean energy sectors.
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A member of Career Director's International – a first-tier, internationally recognized resume writing certification organization – Dr. Rico is currently in the final stages of completing her Certified Advanced Resume Writer (CARW) certification. Dr. Rico earned her Ph.D. in English at Texas A&M University, and her M.A. and B.A. in English from the University of Oklahoma.
Matt Francsis, General Mills
Geology to Groceries: Data Science Career Opportunities
Matt Francsis is a former petroleum geologist turned data scientist. Laid off in 2018 after six years with ConocoPhillips, he successfully made the career pivot after completing an online data science boot camp. Matt now works as a data scientist for General Mills where his primary focus is optimizing grocery product promotions. Since switching careers, he has actively assisted oil and gas professionals find their way into the data field. Matt holds Geology degrees from the University of Wisconsin – Madison and Virginia Tech; and a data science certificate from Thinkful.
Laura Dafov, BP
Energy Resources, Carbon Storage, and Ice on Fire
Dr. Laura Dafov joined bp in January 2021 as a geologist supporting the offshore Gulf of Mexico exploration team. In 2019, she completed a successful internship at bp and was given the top award across disciplines in an annual technology competition for interns.
Laura earned her Ph.D. at Stanford in 2020 and completed a B.S. at the University of Texas at Austin in 2016. Her Ph.D. focus was on emerging relatively clean-burning offshore gas hydrates, including the stability zone that can be used for CO2 storage. Her thousands of models and a new method using code, automation, and modeling elucidate on marine gas hydrates and the understanding of offshore basins.
Laura also acquired a Harvard Business School Management Certificate and has received more than 30 awards, grants, and scholarships. She helped raise more than $600,000 for Stanford and EARTH AI which is accelerating sustainable development and planetary exploration.
Laura moderated and co-organized the largest student-run energy conference in Silicon Valley (Stanford Energy Week) while serving as a Vice President of the Stanford Energy Club. She has had dozens of speaking engagements including on Cleantech Open’s Energy Leadership Panel, podcasts, and global energy conferences.
During her free time, Laura enjoys fitness, global cuisine, volunteering, and spending time with the people she loves and her dog.