<p>What are some job prospects for a person with a MS in any science degree as opposed to a BS and PhD??? And could any posters give some possible jobs/job outlook for different MS degrees?</p>
<p>I'll name a few areas of study - Applied math, biostatistics, biochemistry, biophysics, chemistry, environmental chemistry, physics (applied vs pure), and that's all I can think of off the top of my head! (Sorry if this is excessive - just getting some ideas going.)</p>
<p>I didn't mention engineering cause it's obvious that most engineers get hired and do well when they graduate with either a BS or MS.</p>
<p>I'm posting this question because I've read different threads or forum posts discussing jobs in science: how one level of degree is better than another, PhD's are useful only for the pure pursuit of knowledge, math is more respectful than physics and vice versa, and engineers are the money-superstars of the STEM world (which annoys me cause I don't think I'm interested in that field). i just need some examples and explanations to shed some light for my own (and other's) knowledge.</p>
<p>In this day of high unemployment, companies can be more selective in who they hire. Because they are more likely to hire a person with an advanced degree over someone with a BS only, they just go ahead and make it a requirement to have at least a Masters in order to apply for the job.</p>
<p>Now if we somehow reached a level of underemployment in the future (under 5% unemployment), you may see more opportunities in the sciences for only those with a BS. But as of today you really need at least a Masters to get anywhere in those fields you listed.</p>
<p>There is a correlation between grad school and unemployment levels. Higher the unemployment levels the higher the grad school application levels. </p>
<p>During boom economic times, grad schools typically see their lowest application/enrollment levels.</p>
<p>I can only give you a viewpoint of using Applied Math for either Software Engineering or Systems Engineering. Both are winners in the defense sector.</p>
<p>My son is an undergraduate Geology major and is getting the impression that while it is still possible to find entry level Geologist positions with a BS, many prospective employers, particularly the major oil companies, prefer to hire newly graduated geologists for entry level positions who have earned their MS in Geology. Here in California it is understandable. There are now so many required courses for a bachelors degree in public universities that are extraneous to Geology such as courses on the role of the state legistature and race and ethnic sensitivity that a four year degree program includes relatively few courses in your major if you are a science major. A MS would mean two more years of studying only Geology resulting in entry level geologists with much stronger basic skills and a higher level of relevant knowledge.</p>
<p>Last I checked, courses on understanding your state’s political system and diverse cultures were part of a liberal arts education - separating a bachelor’s degree from a DeVry certificate.</p>
<p>A master’s degree can help qualify for government jobs - many technical positions such as surveying, biological studies, land use planning, etc. require either extensive field experience or a master’s degree.</p>
<p>In most cases a MSc doesn’t help much in the sciences. BSc.'s and MSc.'s are lumped into the same category of bench scientists or a more accurate term would be lab serf. It is an insulting low paying, unstable, and dead end career. Just look at the ads. A lot of them say BS/MS. A food science, or very specific and industry relevant MS might be helpful, though you could do the same thing with an internship and work experience. </p>
<p>I have a MS in chemistry and find it less than worthless. I intend to get a MS in accounting to switch fields.</p>
<p>If the Master of Science is in engineering (except biomedical, because anything that contains “bio” or “medical” is worthless garbage and biomedical contains both), physics, materials science, engineering physics, CS or finance, yes, then a MS is worth it.</p>
<p>Otherwise its useless. I got on the wrong boat with chem, thinking it’ll be quantitative but I’m sitting here for my last required biochemistry class and there’s not 1 calculation. The only quantitative classes are analytical, inorganic and physical. Biochemistry is the most useless garbage you will ever learn.</p>
<p>Thanks for the input guys, it’s very helpful to me. I’ve been accepted to two uni’s and I’m deciding on a major. And props to LastThreeYears and sschoe2: I applied intending to be a chem major, and I’ve heard about the “treachors” of going into chem, so I’ll take your guys’ advice and not regret my major. </p>
<p>It’s pretty tough trying to narrow down what I’d wanna do that’d be worth doing in the long wrong, but I’m reconsidering engineering. I’ve always had a knack for number-crunching and math, I loved chemistry, and physics is pretty cool as well, so I think i got it down to engineering (science or mech or chem), applied physics, and possibly materials as well? I’d definitely be interested in nuke-e, but unfortunately I didn’t apply to anywhere that had that major -_- on the flip-side, I feel like if I do one of the other engineering majors, I can still go into some alternative energy field, which would be quite amazing :D</p>
<p>Materials is physical chemistry, some of inorganic chemistry and modern physics combined. Maybe 60% chemistry 40% physics. It’s not that heavy on number crunching… in every materials related class I’ve taken I haven’t solved a single “hard” differential equation by hand (everything is separable, if it isn’t plug it into the computer) and most of the math is single variable calc, geometry/trig, and adding/subtracting. If you get really deep into it, yes, there’s some crazy quantum mechanical calculations, but practically you don’t need to know that, just need to know the concepts.</p>
<p>MechE is caveman physics dressed up with very hard and very fancy math. I can’t do it but maybe you can, it has nothing to do with chemistry though.</p>
<p>Going by what you like, maybe Applied Physics is what you’re looking for.</p>
<p>LastThreeYears, you’re gonna think I’ve gone bonkers, but I think I might study something totally different now - nutrition It’s a big bigggg interest of mine, and I think when I scraped the idea long ago, that caused my whole “craziness” with worrying about college majors, because each idea I came up with didn’t feel right after a while.
Of course, anything can change within the next few years, but I believe I’ll be heading into the nutrition direction for now.
You guys know of any possible nutrition/food jobs with an MS?? Anything other than an RD? I might start a new thread for this.</p>