One of the largest and most well-known meteorology schools in the world has its home in Tallahassee. Our own Ray Hawthorne profiles Florida State University's Meteorology Department, including its ongoing efforts to reach out to our community.

How hard can it really be to predict a 50 percent chance of rain? It's a lot harder than some are led to believe. Those considering a career in meteorology should be prepared for a rigorous education.

Bill Cottrill, FSU Weather Station Manager, says, "The difficulty in the coursework in even undergraduate meteorology at FSU and other universities that have major programs in the science give a student a firm background in the physical sciences."

This means that you need to be good at physics and unfortunately for some, mathematics. Even if we just discouraged you from pursuing a meteorology degree, the department is doing a lot to educate our community about the weather.

Associated Professor Dr. Jon Ahlquist says, "We are seen in various ways to the broader community through our weathercasting efforts, through the outreach to public schools that Dr. Ruscher does, to the outreach of the agricultural community that Dr. O'Brien does, to the hurricane forecasting that Dr. Krishnamurti does."

FSU is probably the best place in the world for tropical meteorology. That bodes well for us if a hurricane ever threatens our area, but don't be surprised if your child sees someone from FSU's Meteorology Department in the near future.

"We're teaching kids about hurricanes and tornadoes and lightning, so we try to do as much as we can with the community as a whole."

All of these efforts will prevent a wrong forecast, maybe some day.

The groundbreaking research that emanates from FSU's Meteorology Department is also used by the National Weather Service Office conveniently located in the same building.