Ask Slashdot: Worth Going For a Graduate Degree In the Middle of Your Career? 260
spiffmastercow writes "After nearly a decade of professional software development, my desire to work on something more interesting than business applications has pushed me toward looking into going back to school. I'd like to go into a graduate program for Computer Science, but I need to weigh my options very carefully. Is a Ph.D. a near-guarantee of a spot in a skunkworks type of job (Microsoft Research and the like)? Is a M.S. just as good for this? How does the 'letter of recommendation' requirement work if you haven't kept in touch with your professors?"
Guarantees (Score:5, Informative)
Really unless you plan to go into academia or hard core research I'd steer clear.
Re:You should never stop learning (Score:5, Informative)
If that comes in the form of a graduate degree, so be it.
Exactly. But make sure your boss is on-side before trying to convert learning into academic letters while working.
My learning on the job (at the R end of R&D) was producing so much in academic results (I've published quite a lot of it also) that I was easily able to regurgitate some of my personal work as a MSc thesis. Later, a bigger chunk in another area became a PhD thesis. Doing this on-the-job, however, required support from my boss, as I also had to do a load of courses and sit exams to get the required credits. Scheduling your work around class timetables can be tricky, even if you keep the work hours balanced.
PhD gets you freedom and more money (Score:5, Informative)
I have a PhD in CS from a top-20 US university and now work in an industry research lab. Like most PhD recipients, I started grad school right after college and finished before starting my professional career. I would say getting the PhD is the single best decision I ever made, and looking back at my high school and college trajectory, it now seems like it was an inevitability. I always wanted to work in technology research, hack on software prototypes, work on R&D projects for a large influential company, and make more money. I've gotten all those, and I'm grateful for the opportunities. I make about 25% to 50% more in base salary than my friends who went to the same grad school but graduated with a MS degree. I also have more technical freedom at work because I have the publications and track record to back up what I'm saying. In the couple of times I sent my resume out for a new job (e.g. Google, MSFT, Facebook), I've gotten callbacks within 48 hours.
I do agree with some of the other unwashed heathens here who have only MS degrees that you can indeed get a great job with just a MS degree. But why limit yourself? Also, I agree that not all PhD programs are the same. I've seen some PhDs from 3rd tier universities work as test engineers. So in the end, I would say that you should get a PhD only if you can land at a CS grad school top-20 university [rankingsandreviews.com]. It is not worth your time getting a PhD from a university outside of this group. If you do get in, establish your area of expertise by publishing a lot of papers at top-tier conferences in order to strengthen your case for getting an interview at a lab like MSR. I recommend you do your dissertation in a field that has high value to companies, like machine learning or IR.
By the way, never take out a loan for grad school. If you work as a TA or research assistant, you will get paid while you attend school. The national average seems to be about $25k/year according to all my PhD colleagues.
It used to be. Now it gets you this. (Score:5, Informative)
Here's a cool job: Whole-Body Motion Planning and Locomotion in Rough Terrains. This is to develop control software for the DARPA Humanoid Challenge. University of Texas at Austin (but really on site at NASA Houston)
The ideal candidate should have a PhD in Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science or related fields. Record of implementation and testing experiments on real robotic systems is required. She/he should be highly familiar with robotics theory, including motion planning, kinematics, dynamics, control, and linear dynamical systems. She/he should be proficient in software development including, algorithms, dynamic simulations, object oriented programming, and realtime Linux applications. High expertise in C++ is required. Proficiency in Python and Matlab is also desired. Experience developing software using GIT revision control or a similar tool is required.
Pays $55K.
Re:Several things (Score:5, Informative)
You don't go into a PhD program expecting to be better off financially because of it, you go for the PhD if you want to do research.
As an aside though, 20k USD? The entry salary for a PhD student at my university in Sweden is the equivalent of about 45k USD and it gradually climbs to about 54k USD for the last year of the PhD. Not private sector salaries, but certainly enough to live a good life without resorting to ramen noodles.
Never ever stop learning ! (Score:3, Informative)
I never stop my career while I learn, and I never stop learning in the middle of climbing the corporate ladder
I first entered the work force when I was in my primary school, working part time, during the evening hours, earned money to help my family, which was dirt poor
But I did not drop out of school
All my "holidays" became working fulltime - while my classmates went for vacations, I worked and worked
From primary school to secondary, to university, I worked while study.
Even after I obtained my first university degree, and landed a relatively comfortably paying job, I never stopped studying - I enrolled in graduate schools, as part time student
I obtained my graduate degrees that way
Now that I'm running my own businesses, and have a lot of people working with me, I still cannot stop learning - I guess the minute I stop learning is the minute I die
Re:You should never stop learning (Score:4, Informative)
I would unhesitatingly say "yes", however, make sure you understand what you are getting into. Talk to past students in a similar field. When you get close to choosing an institution and supervisor for the work, make sure you talk to that supervisor's students, etc. Always find a good supervisor and project first. If you are motivated and want to do well, a graduate project is a worthwhile challenge, but if you get a poor supervisor, it can be misery no matter how good you are. Make sure all the elements necessary for a good project are in place.
Someone else has commented on the importance of support of your boss at work. That's essential if your plan is to do it in parallel with working. Someone also mentioned that many MSc and PhD are granted these days based on a bundle of published papers. That's the approach I would recommend. The peer-review process can be an extra challenge to get through, but in the end it means you have something more than an unpublished thesis to put on your CV. It ensures your work gets distributed and used by people in the field.
If you think having an MSc or PhD guarantees a particular job, no, it doesn't. It will somewhat broaden the scope of positions you can consider, but it may simultaneously narrow some of them too (potential employers may be bound by standard agreements to pay more to people with MSc and PhDs, and they may not have that much money). If you're going to do it, do it mainly because you want to learn.
The "letter of recommendation" part is tricky if you have been outside the academic realm for a while. Presumably you've changed in 10 years. The most important person to contact would be whoever supervised you for the biggest project you did as an undergraduate in a relevant field, and then try to find someone in your current line of work along similar lines. Ideally you need people who would be positive about your work :-) Some indication of whether you are a good writer will be important. It also helps if you talk directly to a potential supervisor and ask them how to handle it. Talk to supervisor first, then apply, is probably the best route.
Don't worry that you've been out of the academic realm for a while and working in industry. Most graduate programs see that all the time. It's not regarded as an impediment if a student is actually any good and can show they are ready (e.g., a major project they've written up in undergraduate work or during their employment).
Re:You should never stop learning (Score:5, Informative)
I'd be hesitant to seek a PhD for career betterment. Oh, sure, some career betterment is likely to come, but it's a lot of work at fairly lousy pay and I think one needs the motivation of actulaly loving the work.
Oh, and regarding letters of recommendation - having spent a while working in a research environment before I applied to grad school, my LoRs were part of how I documented my research background. In the programs I applied to - mostly on the biomed side of things - they're pretty darned important.
Re:You should never stop learning (Score:4, Informative)
But I'm a simple woman with simple tastes. There's an awful lot of cool and interesting work to do, and so far people keep being willing to let me do it. I'm riding this as far as I can ;-)
* "Principle investigator" - god-boss of a lab.
Re:It used to be. Now it gets you this. (Score:4, Informative)
Sorry, but that example doesn't work because it's a postdoc position, not a permanent job.
The whole "postdoc" thing is mostly a scam. [wordpress.com] Especially in this case. Someone with a PhD in computer science or aerospace is already more than qualified for a real job. If that "postdoc" position meant entry to the tenure track for a professorship, it might be worthwhile. But it doesn't. It's a staff position for a DARPA competition for which real companies are also competing.
Re:You should never stop learning (Score:4, Informative)
What are you going to do, go be a 45 or 50 year old entering a new path? Right. That'll be taken seriously.
Bull. Shit. Granted, it's not a large dataset, but I know more than a half-dozen people in their late 40's that successfully switched careers, and started by taking a graduate degree related to their new profession.
They are taken seriously enough, my friend.
I know a woman that earned a law degree and changed professions when she was 60, and has been having a great second career working for a NGO. I went back to school in my late 40's to earn a MS in Biomedical Informatics, and have been having a blast ever since.
To a 20- or 30 - something it may look like you're professionally dead at 50, but if you bust your ass, you can still do anything you want for at least a couple more decades past 50.