To double down in December, I thought I would give an easy read on my experience of graduate school so far and what I didn't know going into it. It feels like in order to move forward, we must ask ourselves what’s next. Often, when people don’t have an answer, they resort to graduate studies. Hopefully this article will shed light on whether it’s worth it.
1) You get paid: I honestly can’t believe I didn’t know this leaving undergrad. While this may not be true for every program, in my experience as a research-based graduate student pursuing a science degree, you receive a monthly stipend. On the plus side, this makes you feel like you’re actually working rather than just going to school. On the downside, you most likely will still have to pay tuition and you will not make a huge amount of money, especially when you account for the very long hours that you work.
2) You work, a lot: This isn’t news to anyone who has pursued any form of education. But instead of studying for exams and writing lab reports, you focus your time on running experiments and writing papers. However, research-based grad studies are extremely independent. You may think you had great time management and independence before, but this is on a new level. You probably won’t have a professor assigning you deadlines and holding you to them. You will have to set and keep these yourself if you want to graduate in less than 7 years.
3) They will want you to drink the Academic Kool-Aid: Once you start down an academic path, your supervisor and every academic you meet will try to convince you to stay on it. They love their jobs and usually it is all that they know, so naturally they are huge advocates for pursuing an academic career. If you know that is not what you want, you will have to actively seek professional development opportunities and mentorships elsewhere. Luckily, a lot of institutions have gotten better at creating professional development programs to help students transition into alternate career paths.
4) Everyone is married: Okay, this is definitely a less serious tidbit, but it was quite shocking to go from undergraduate studies, where everyone seems to be non-committal, to grad school, where everyone is getting hitched and buying condos (with their parents’ help). This to me is a testament to the more serious and independent nature of grad school. It represents the transition that comes with age and professional development.
While my experience in a thesis-based science degree may be completely different than someone in a course-based business degree, the take home is this: make sure that you are passionate about what you are doing. Grad school is expensive and exhausting, while also informative and fulfilling. You have lots of room to learn and grow as an early-career professional, but if it is just a time-filler, it is a resource-killer. Think about the career opportunities your degree will give you, and whether those careers suit your professional and lifestyle goals. You have time to figure out what’s next, don’t rush a decision to avoid uncertainty.
Written by Jess
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