<p>I am trying to make the difficult decision of whether grad school will be my next step after graduating. I am an undergrad Mechanical Engineering major at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.</p>
<p>My main question is whether or not Graduate school is worth it? </p>
<p>Keep in mind that I will be 75k in debt as it is coming out of my undergraduate degree (Wow, I know).
IF it is worth it, what are my options ? I have great LORs and a 3.4 GPA which will give me a good chance of getting a fellowship here at the UW (After speaking with my professors and grad students here). I also was curious of what other (high quality) universities I should apply to with a 3.4 GPA, great LORs (From Professors I am doing research under in the Solar Energy Lab here) , and research experience here at UW.</p>
<p>Forgot to mention: If I decided to attend grad school here at UW, I would be able to live and attend the University at almost no cost out of pocket. Consequently, for all intensive purposes the sole cost of grad school will be the interest on the on going loans from my undergrad.</p>
<p>I also wanted to ask of how going to multiple universities affect GPAs. I attended Southern Illinois University Carbondale my freshman year and took 39 credits and a 4.0 GPA. My aforementioned 3.4 GPA is my Wisconsin GPA as I am not sure how the combination of the two works when applying for grad school. If it is averaged then I will be upwards of a 3.7 GPA.</p>
<p>Depends on the university. Generally, the whole cumulative undergraduate GPA will be considered, with more weight placed on the last two years. Some schools only consider the last two years.</p>
<p>Grad schools won’t average your GPA. If you’re trying to compare yourself to other applicants (i.e. to their reported averages), just consider the GPA of the degree granting school (Wisconsin). They might also consider the GPA of the previous school, but probably won’t if they don’t know the quality of that school. You’re a 3.4 Wisconsin Engineering student, and that’s how they’ll view you.</p>
<p>You don’t specify PhD or MS. So I’m going to assume MS. </p>
<p>The value of a master’s degree in engineering? A master’s degree will generally open you up to the same jobs as a bachelor’s degree. Your salary will be about the equivalent of 1 year of experience more than a BS, but it takes 2 years to get the MS. That said, there are some fields where a master’s degree opens up new doors (structural engineering, biomedical engineering, and a thesis-based master’s degree opens up some R&D positions). An MS can also be valuable if you go from a school with not many recruiters (like 75-100 school) to one with many recruiters (a top 10 school). You won’t have this issue at Wisconsin. Finally, an MS can be valuable to change career paths. For example, an ME who wants to refocus as a BME can do that with an MS.</p>
<p>A few other things to consider: for all intents and purposes, your cost to go to Wisconsin for 2 years isn’t just loan interest, it’s also lost salary. You’re giving up about $90,000 - $100,000 after taxes in salary to attend an MS program. Also, most employers these days pay for MS degrees. If you’re not committed to a research-based degree, there are some very nice night and distance MS programs from top schools that you can complete on the company dime without sacrificing salary.</p>
<p>Most, if not all accredited engineering programs require a capstone project for its senior (or last year)students. Most schools will conunt this as research. I used to recruit for my former employer (a Fortune 500) and here’s ther skinny. BS and MS Engineers are on equal footing when it comes to jobs. The CTO of my forrmer company was a BS ChemE from Ohio State, while most ChemE’s at my former company have BS degrees. You only see a bump in pay (a significant bump) in industry w/ a PhD. The difference between a BS Engineer and a PhD Engineer is about $20K (BS: ~$65-$70K entry, PhD: $90K entry). A graduate degree is a research degree, and should only be pursued if you 1) want to learn more about the subject, 2) want to gain research experience, 3) want to get a PhD and become an expert in an area of Engineering. You are sacrificing salary, and other opportunities. However, when you enter a company as an engineer, you are expected to “put out.” So you won’t have much work/life balance in general. Its like being a perpetual graduate student, just with better pay. My suggestion is to follow the path that I took. I worked in industry for 4 years, and decided I hated it. So I applied to grad school and have been accepted into a MS program. Just get a job, work for three years, pay down some of that debt. After three years, do a gut check, and decided wheather industry if for you, which means staying at your company; or, come to the conclusion that industry is not for you, and apply to graduate school. When you apply, you will have three years of impactful research under your belt, some of that debt will be paid down, and you will hopefully know what are you are passionate about. Remember to network, and don’t burn bridges. You will need recommendations. Also, try to join a professional organization in your city for engineers, you can pick up some recos there, as well as gain greater insight about your field.</p>
I have never heard of ANYONE counting a senior design project as research. I have never been asked about my senior design project in any interview or application for jobs or grad programs.</p>
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In my field (EE) MS holders typically see a $10-15k increase over BS holders, and PhD’s see $20-30k. At my current company we have 6 pay grades of engineers, those entering with the BS start at grade 1, MS at grade 2, and PhD at grade 3. This increase does not necessarily cover the opportunity cost of the degrees, but it ain’t nuthin. As an added benefit, in my experience the advanced degree makes promotions (and corresponding pay raises) much more attainable - we have very few people in “top” positions with only a BS, and most of those are really on the business or program management side.</p>
<p>Further, at the companies where I have worked some departments and specialties were only really open to those with advanced degrees - the antenna department at my company had NO ONE with just a BS degree when I visited.</p>
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There are problems with this path as well - it either delays certain life decisions (marriage, kids, getting a house) or drags them with you to grad school, and most engineers do not do anything resembling academic research in their day-to-day jobs. I do agree that it gives you time to pay down debt (although many do not) and decide what you really want to focus on, but this is not cut and dried.</p>
<p>They’ll ask for every school you attended and your GPA at those schools. But they will not average them. A 4.0 in community college for 2 years + a 2.0 at UC Berkeley for 2 years does not make you a 3.0 student with a degree from UC Berkeley.</p>
<p>When they ask for all of your grades, what they’re looking for is someone who failed out of one school, then transferred to a lower tier school and did well. That’s a very different situation than someone who started and finished at that lower tier school and did well. The OP doesn’t have that situation. In his case, they will only look at his Wisconsin GPA and GMAT for the first cut, then they’ll go into his research history, transcripts, and LOR for the second cut.</p>
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<p>Agree. Senior design is not research. It’s an application of previously taught theory to solve a vaguely defined problem. While that’s a valuable skill to demonstrate and you can show many personal attributes from your performance on that project, it’s far from research.</p>
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<p>You can pull some actual data. Let’s check GT for EE: </p>
<p>BS EE: $63,500 median
MS EE $75,000 median (+$11,500 from BS)
PhD EE: $101,000 median (+$37,500 from BS)</p>
<p>So it looks like you’re right. The only problem is that there is some bias. The average BSEE at GT student won’t get into GT’s MSEE program. You probably need to be in the top 25-30% of the class or so. So the median salary of a BSEE who could have gotten into the MSEE program is probably closer to $70,000, meaning that the difference in pay really isn’t a huge amount.</p>
There is another bias as well - many of the top MS graduates are not going into industry, they are going into PhD programs. Also, GT has an integrated BS-MS program, so not all of those MS graduates were necessarily in the top 25-30% of their class, they just looked like they would be when they enrolled as freshmen.</p>
<p>I am also considering hiring at my current company - with comparable standards for GPA and such, we hire MS holders at $10-15k more than BS holders. With good performance, a quality BS + 2-3 years experience roughly equals a similar quality MS.</p>
<p>Again, I think you’re wrong. I attended three institutions as an undergraduate (community college and two state flagships) and my cumulative GPA wouldn’t have been above 3.0 if they weren’t all averaged. I likely wouldn’t have been accepted anywhere. As it is, I was accepted basically everywhere.</p>
<p>You’re not admitted into the MS program as a freshman. You apply in your senior year based on GPA. </p>
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<p>I’m not. You never average GPAs across multiple schools. If you did, when you transfer into a school, you’d be admitted with the grade, not the credit. The reason is obvious: a B in community college E-Mag is not the same as a B in Berkeley E-Mag. If you average grades, you’re making the claim that it is. This penalizes the student that spent 4 years at Berkeley relative to a CC transfer. </p>
<p>As far as your situation, there are people with sub 3.0 GPA’s in grad schools.</p>
<p>I think we may be going a little off topic. My main question of ‘Is it worth it’ seems to be dependent upon where I get into grad school. This leads me to 'What kind of score will I need to get on my GRE to get into the quality of institutions like U of I, Berkeley, Stanford, UCLA, USC, here at UW, e.t.c. with great LORs, GPA of ~3.4 or 3.5 at Wisconsin with research and industry experience.</p>
<p>Really, the best way to get the value for your money is to get hired by an employer that will fund an MS through night classes. That way you’re paid at full BS salary while you’re taking classes. It’s a lot of work, but there’s a pretty big difference making $60k for 2-3 years while getting your degree versus taking out another $25k+ in loans to go to school for a year.</p>
<p>I worked full time and got an MS in EE from UCLA. I watched lectures online, but took my exams on campus. My employer funded 25% of my tuition and I funded the rest with scholarships, tax credits, and cold hard cash.</p>
<p>Some companies will advertise it other times you’ll have to ask during an interview. And, yes, it’s feasible to get your MS while working full time, it just takes a lot of work and dedication. While my girlfriend was doing her MS she’d leave for work at 6:15 AM, work a nine hour day, have a three hour class, and not get home until 10:30 or so. With all of her hard work, though, she’ll be making a salary equivalent to me when I finish my PhD without the 4-6 years of living off a grad student stipend.</p>
<p>When interviewing, ask. You can also get it written into the job offer if they don’t already have a policy. But these days most larger companies will pay for graduate school if it’s directly related to your job. They’re understandably more cautious about paying for MBA’s, but MS in engineering is very common. </p>
<p>I have an MS from a top 10 school funded 100% while working. I paid the tuition up front and showed the company my grades after every semester. They refunded a C or better. Then I used the refund from Fall to pay for Spring, etc. Basically I just had to float 1 semester worth of tuition for 2 years, which was refunded at the end. I took almost all of my classes at night (6pm to ~ 7:30pm four days per week). I had to take two classes at the end during the day, but my employer was accommodating. I quit as soon as I finished for another company (I don’t feel bad - that employer got an extra year out of me for relatively little in tuition costs). </p>
<p>You can do 100% online MS degrees now from Georgia Tech, Penn State, Stanford, Columbia, etc. Very good options.</p>
<p>I agree with the previous posts. Graduate school is usually not worth paying out of your own pocket. I would first look for a job in a solid company. Most companies typically reimburse $5,000/yr, but there are quite a few companies that reimburse the full amount. If fully funded, some well-known (and expensive ~$3000-$5000/class) online programs include Georgia Tech, USC, Stanford, Columbia, Penn State, Texas, BU, etc. The schools mentioned above do not distinguish between online vs. on-campus students.</p>
Just to elaborate, most large employers will cover 100% of a technical masters done part-time, but will approve non-technical degrees, PhD’s, or full-time study only under special circumstances.</p>
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I did the same, although the best school in my area was top-25, not top-10. My employer paid tuition up front, so I did not have to front anything, but only paid for a B or better and only completely forgave tuition for a particular course a year after it ended. They were excellent about allowing me to get to classes.</p>
<p>The only problem I have with a coursework-only masters is that it is not as good an educational experience as a research-based degree (usually). The quality education of a research degree can really help with advancement, although on paper it checks the same box.</p>