Are most graduate students unhappy?

Graduate School
21

<p>I'm in graduate school now...I don't think most of the students are unhappy on a general level. Of course, we all get unhappy sometimes, like everyone else in the world, but most of the students here generally love what they are studying, have good rapport with their advisors, and are generally well-supported financially (at least while they are taking courses and exams). Besides that, we go to university in a very large U.S. city, so there is a lot to do here outside of graduate school. Most of the students here have also already taken some time off before they came and are sure that this is the next step for them -- very few of our students come straight from undergrad.</p>

<p>Of the things that make me unhappy as a graduate student, the things that make me unhappy most often are living so frugally (my stipend is generous to take care of me -- I live in a decent apartment, I can feed myself, I have enough left over on the weekends for fun -- but it's so much less than I could make if I were working full-time in the 'real world') and not being able to have as full a social life as I'd like. The workload is challenging but I expected it, and I love my supervisor and most of the staff here.</p>

22

<p>I can't imagine anything else I would rather be doing right now. If someone gave me $5 million, I would probably spend a week or two skiing at some resorts, but I would definitely be back continuing my time as a grad student. I get to work on cutting edge research as a grad student that I wouldn't be able to do anywhere else. Sure, it's always nice to have more money, but I have enough to live reasonably comfortable for now.</p>

23

<p>from what I've seen, grad school life is going to be miserable for engineers.
im not too fond of research, but what good job are you gonna get these days with just a BS? and who has the money to pay for an MS?
sometimes people wont admit it - but grad school is 5 yrs of free education, albeit you're doing most of it yourself.
but if you dont have a real passion for it, its not going to be fun.
yay 5 long years of misery .....</p>

24

<p>
[quote]
from what I've seen, grad school life is going to be miserable for engineers.
im not too fond of research, but what good job are you gonna get these days with just a BS? and who has the money to pay for an MS?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>It's not as bad as you think. There are many good engineering jobs with just a BS. But when interviewing, they always ask if you are interested in getting an MS. If they really believe you are grad school material and would make a good fit at the company, they will hire you and then pay for you to get your MS.</p>

<p>Also, when looking at job listings, don't just skip everything that says "MS preferred" or "MS required." I applied somewhere where they were looking for someone with an MS.... I got an interview, got hired with a sweet salary, and on top of that they are paying full tuition for grad school.</p>

<p>I do like research and stuff, but I am as happy as can be that I didn't try to get a PhD first. It'd take forever, and I might have ended up making even less money. No thanks.</p>

25

<p>A ton of people pay for an MS. They probably look for RA and TA positions along the way to get funding. Also, if you don't want to finish your PhD, you almost always can leave after the first two year's with the Master's. I have yet to meet someone in grad school who is bitter. I went to an UG that was notorious for the undergrads being bitter, though.</p>

26

<p>
[quote]
im not too fond of research, but what good job are you gonna get these days with just a BS?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I think this is one of the most common misconceptions not only on CC, but among people in general. The truth is, there are plenty of good jobs out there, not only for those with just a bachelor's, but often times even for those who don't (and even for some people who didn't even graduate from high school). What you really need are marketable skills. But you have to have an entrepreneurial attitude in terms of discovering and obtaining those skills on your own time. </p>

<p>I'll give you an example. I know a girl who graduated with a bachelor's in English. Unmarketable, right? Well, the summer after she graduated, she intensively studied software programming and Web development. She started by getting some of the basic books, i.e. 'Teach Yourself Java in 24 Hours', and then worked her way up from there, every day, learning and building her own projects. After a few months, she was hired as a developer, where she shortly became one of the top employees in the company (admittedly, a small company) due to her relentless work ethic of always wanting to learn more about software. Within a few years, she was making easily over 6 figures, and was then promoted to project manager - all without even having a degree in engineering or CS. </p>

<p>The fact is, it's not that hard to learn software development. Or how to set up Cisco routers. Or Oracle databases. Or Web programming. Or Linux servers. With these kinds of skills, you can get a decent job. You just have to want to do it. The problem that I see is twofold: universities don't really teach these skills (especially to those students not in CS programs), and students don't want to take the time to learn it themselves.</p>

27

<p>Sakky, before she was hired, how would they known that she's good at computers? I thought that CS companies would rather hire people with a CS degree because its cheaper for them to use the degree as a proxy for programming skills than actually testing them on the knowledge.</p>

28

<p>sakky's example is spot-on: having the right piece of paper with an impressive title will only get you so far. From my CS friend's job searches, it seems that in the field it's less important to be a "well-rounded thinker" as they stress in degree programs as it is to (a) know languages and (b) have experience. Almost everything my friend has needed to do professionally he learned independently as a side-product of masochistic curiosity, not as part of his formal education. I think smart CS company heads would know that a degree does not guarantee programming skills--the most interesting part of the resume is down at the bottom in the list of languages and skills.</p>

<p>Unfortunately, there's another bit of truth in this example: an English bachelors by itself really /is/ unmarketable, unless you want to teach. Both my parents were English majors. My father's now a lawyer and my mother an optician >.></p>

29

<p>To reiterate on the technology example, I know a guy who is a English major graduate of a small tier two liberal arts college. He is now currently employed as a technology director at a local high school. It's all about what marketable skills you have.</p>

30

<p>Well a PhD student cannot get a job and that can be frustrating for someone use to a lavish lifestyle. Also it is very long. Another thing I remember working alongside with a PhD student from India as I was a research assistance, is that he forgot his focus was to come to America and get a high salary tech job. He left his PhD and the pursued work and making over 150k a year. If he stayed he probably would have gotten a teaching or research job after 5 years later and made a lot less.</p>

31

<p>Grad school was depressing, but that doctorate degree made up for the countless hours of insanity.....priceless.</p>

32

<p>Well, if you feel you are miserable doing fully funded research in some of World's finest institutions, let me share my experience just to make you feel better .
I 'm a masters student in microbiology from a developing country. You will probably laugh reading this. In short, there is no funding for research at all, at any level, masters or PhD. You are totally on your own. So this was my life in the past 3 years, from 8am- 3pm work in a totally irrelevant job to get a very menial salary by your standards (approx 100$/month), from 3 pm- 10 pm do my research at a lab where i've to buy everything i work with from micropipette tips and culture media to DNA kits. Of course you can't complain about that because everybody thinks that since you are the one who will get the degree eventually, then you have to pay. After 10 pm, i return home carrying some equipments with me to wash and repack for autoclaving next day. Since i can't afford to buy a new set everyday and it is unsafe to return home after 10 pm, i've to do this at my own home. I've to work at weekends because sometimes i need a full day for my research and in order to get that day off my job, i've to work at weekend instead. My research supervisors on the other hand, are nice people who read papers done in fine labs like the ones who work at and ask me to do similar stuff. So for example, my supervisor tells me why not invistigate something by taking some electron microscope pictures. Of course, neither me nor my advisor know where to find an electron microscope in this country. So i started calling all universities in my country searching for one that is both functioning and has someone that knows how to operate it. I finally found one in a nearby city but i had to borrow travelling expenses and electron microscope fees from my parents. In other instances, i almost had to stalk people i don't know to ask them to help me in an experiment because they were the only ones who knew how to do it and because some material is so precious that i can't waste it in trial and error.
There were times when i felt everything worked against me, the careless and ignorant people, the lack of resources,... I've been so miserable that i spent long nights crying and i felt that i really can't take it anymore.
But you know, at the end i'm happy because research is the only thing that gives me the feeling of self-satisfaction and makes me feel i'm a worthy human being.
So please stop complaining or comparing yourself to other professionals. You are probably very bright people who can find better jobs but you are in graduate school because this is what you want to do. Just be grateful you are doing what you like at the best possible places.</p>

33

<p>A few professors and grad students have told me that grad school is really a grind. This is for PhD programs. It's really tough and the only way you survive is if you really love what you are studying. Even then, they said it's long periods of research, frustration with the occasional moments where you solve a problem and feel that level of excitement.</p>

<p>I think this is particularly why a lot of grad programs want to see research experience as an undergrad. Are they used to that grind? I worked on a paper with one of my professors for 3 semesters, and he made me do so much work and did not "baby" me. It was utter hell, but he did it because he said he would treat me like a grad student doing his thesis. </p>

<p>I remember spending hours pouring over his articles and hoping the answer would just magically appear. That's why I disagree with people who say research experience is not important. I think it is important from a mental point of view, not an intelligence point of view; does this kid know what he's getting himself into?</p>

<p>But now that I went through all that, I know how to begin working on really tough problems, I know how to write up a report in LaTeX, I know how to make graphics for papers, I know how to write a mathematical article, etc.</p>

34

<p>none of those concern me and if you thought you have a real passion than only will you go to a graduate school</p>

35

<p>Thank you microgirl, you have once again reminded us that we are whiny, overfed Americans and if we were to compare our plight to people in third world countries, we are in a fabulous spot. I think a lot of the criticisms of graduate life in this thread are valid, but without a context to appreciate them, I understand why you would be frustrated to hear our complaints.</p>

36

<p>
[quote]
Sakky, before she was hired, how would they known that she's good at computers?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Simple. She points them to her work. That is, she presented her portfolio of web applications that were live and fully functional and that hiring managers could actually try for themselves. For example, one of her website apps that she built was a fully functional and intuitive online photo management application - years before Flickr or Photobucket or any of the modern photo sharing sites had even been founded. Granted, her app obviously could not compare in terms of feature set or scalability to the sites we have today. But it worked. People could create user accounts, and then upload, manage, and share photos, all via an intuitive interface (at least, by the standards of Web applications during those times). Hence, anybody who doubted her ability to write software was free to try it out for themselves. </p>

<p>See below. </p>

<p>
[quote]
I thought that CS companies would rather hire people with a CS degree because its cheaper for them to use the degree as a proxy for programming skills than actually testing them on the knowledge.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>In her case, she didn't need a proxy. She could present an actual portfolio of software projects that she developed on her own time (as part of her learning process). You don't need a proxy when you can demonstrate actual results. </p>

<p>And in fact, she didn't even need to really look for an employer. They found her. That is, she had offered her web applications online to anybody who wanted to use them, and eventually some companies found her websites and were impressed enough to offer her interviews right out of the blue. She ended up with several job offers without even having to really look for them. She then chose to take a job at one of those companies, and that's how her career started. {Although, personally, I think she should have stayed independent and launched her own software startup firm and perhaps become Flickr.} </p>

<p>The fact of the matter is that software development is one of those skills that you can easily prove. You often times don't really need a degree as a proxy. Granted, a CS degree is still useful, as some software companies, especially the larger ones, will strongly prefer (and sometimes require) a degree. And, yes, a CS degree is still highly useful if you want to get a technical management job. </p>

<p>But there are lots of small software companies who have no requirement for a degree. They just want somebody who has strong knowledge with immediate applicability of the latest tools. For example, if you spend a few hard months learning something like Ruby on Rails, Wavemaker, ThinWire, or Groovy/Project-Zero, I am quite certain you will be able to find a decent job. Granted, those months will be hard (i.e. studying and coding for 12 hours a day, every day, including weekends). But if you do that, you will have developed a highly marketable skill. </p>

<p>But this is actually just a minor point anyway. I simply use software/web development as merely an example. The larger point is that people need to take active responsibility for managing their careers. You can't just sit back and rely on their schools to give them the skills they need for the workforce. You have to be willing to acquire these skills on your own time. They don't necessarily have to be software development skills. They can be business skills. (For example, people should be willing to take the time to diligently read the business sections of the newspapers daily). They can be public speaking skills via joining Toastmasters. They can be sales skills. {One highly successful startup founder that I know has recommended that all college students should spend one summer working part-time as user-car salesmen, as that will force you to develop valuable sales sales/schmoozing/self-marketing skills that will be useful for the rest of your life, as getting the job you want usually boils down to your ability to sell your own skillset.} These are the things you have to do if you want to build your career. </p>

<p>If you do these things, you will never find yourself in a position where you feel that you "have" to go to grad school because you can't get a decent job. If that's what happens, it just means that you haven't properly managed your career thus far, and it's high time that you start doing so.</p>