[HN Gopher] Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?
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Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?
I want some advice from people over 40 who started their higher
education after they reached that age. I'm mostly looking at people
who decided to do PhD or Masters post 40. How was your whole
journey? What advice do you have to share?
Author : wizardofmysore
Score : 156 points
Date : 2022-09-11 12:01 UTC (11 hours ago)
| ch33zer wrote:
| Not me, but my mom went to med school at 60. She didn't get into
| any US med schools her first time around so she went to a school
| in the Caribbean. She then transfered to a US med school and from
| there followed the normal path through med school and residency.
| She's practicing now.
|
| She said that she did see ageism, mostly in the form of people
| just assuming that she'd be incompetent (she's not she was in the
| top 5% or something when she took her board exams). She said she
| struggled with the memorization aspect: some things are just
| easier when you're young but if you work hard you can do it. This
| may or may not apply to you but late nights doing work (in her
| case being OnCall at a hospital) became very hard for her. Her
| young classmates had a much easier time. The truth is that school
| does kind of assume you're young. It's possible to overcome it
| but it isn't easy.
|
| Fwiw my mom is the happiest she's ever been and said she would do
| it all again.
| chriskanan wrote:
| I'm a professor in my 40s, but I did my PhD in my mid 20s to
| early 30s.
|
| To give you good advice, it would be helpful to know where you
| are in your life: What country or region are you looking to do a
| MS or PhD in? Expectations for what you have to accomplish vary
| geographically. Are you financially supporting others? Are you
| independently wealthy? Why do you want to do a PhD or MS? For a
| PhD, what is your career objective (tenure-track professorship,
| teaching professorship, researcher in industry, etc.) An MS is
| often just a bunch of classes over about two years, whereas a PhD
| involves about four more years (in the USA) where you establish
| yourself as being capable of conducting and communicating
| independent research.
|
| Myself and many of my peers treated the PhD program a bit like
| being in a monastery: you are taking a vow of poverty and there
| is little time for much more than your research once you complete
| your coursework. A PhD program will give you a modest stipend,
| but this is rare for MS programs. I've seen it done, but it is
| extremely hard to complete a PhD when also raising young
| children. I worked 60+ hour weeks most of the time, and often a
| lot more than that around deadlines. Now that I have a young
| child, it is hard to imagine working that way, unless my partner
| was almost entirely responsible for childcare, but that's going
| to be hard to do with the stipends given in the USA.
|
| Keep in mind, just getting into a PhD program is challenging. In
| computer science in the USA, top-50 programs typically expect you
| to already have some experience in conducting research, as
| evidenced through having authored one or more peer-reviewed
| publications.
| dangus wrote:
| I don't know if this the right advice for everyone, but for me
| these are things I thought of when choosing a school:
|
| - Pick a school based on what learning management system they
| use. All your coursework is going to be done on these systems, so
| you should think about which one your prospective school uses.
| Canvas and Moodle seem to be well-liked, Blackboard is in the
| middle, D2L Brightspace sucks. At least, that seems to be the
| general consensus. [1] Other questions might revolve around
| whether your school actually keeps their solution up to date. I
| think that this is possibly important enough to be a deal breaker
| if your school's LMS solution sucks.
|
| - If you are _at all_ good with computers, do asynchronous
| classes online. Don 't mess with in-person learning or virtual
| time scheduled lectures unless you're trying to do a prestigious
| program or something involving laboratory work. Online is going
| to be cheaper and the whole "fall asleep during lectures" model
| of learning sucks. You're probably still working so you want
| flexibility on your time.
|
| - Closely inspect your prospective programs' curriculum. How many
| options do they have for electives and specializations? What are
| the course schedules like?
|
| - Consider whether you actually want/need school for anything. My
| employer won't notice or care that I am getting my master's
| degree, and I'm going to guess yours won't, either. It's for my
| own knowledge and personal enjoyment.
|
| - Obviously don't mess with unaccredited/poorly accredited
| programs and for-profit schools. For online schools I mostly
| considered long-established state schools that had a good history
| of running online programs. Other than that, I didn't really
| consider ranking or prestige.
|
| - School is very easy for adults. It's all about showing up and
| putting in effort. I got terrible grades in undergraduate with
| all the distractions of young adulthood, the masters has been
| comparatively easy.
|
| - !!! Very Important !!!: Along with the above, do you actually
| need or want school in the form of a full degree program? It's a
| commitment once you get into it and it's usually expensive. Lots
| of ways to learn these days.
|
| [1]
| https://www.reddit.com/r/Professors/comments/ik76kq/whats_yo...
| bernulli wrote:
| Just a few words from the other side of the table: I have the
| highest respect for students sitting there who juggle college,
| family, sometimes job, after having worked for a while already.
|
| It's wonderful to have someone listening because of a conscious
| decision rather than just following the obvious next step.
| Interact with your professor, ask questions, I'd hope most will
| try to be supportive, especially when you're their age or even
| older. Best of luck to everyone doing this, it's amazing.
| iainctduncan wrote:
| And it is great for these people to have profs like you. They
| aren't all! :-)
| jacksonkmarley wrote:
| Ongoing PhD at 40+ (EE). It turned into a bit of an endurance
| event in the end. Covid didn't help, but the supervisor attitude
| was a vital consideration that I didn't really take enough notice
| of going in.
|
| Also I wouldn't even consider doing it without a proper full-time
| wage as part of the deal, so you can just concentrate without
| having to worry about other work etc.
| driscoll42 wrote:
| While I'm not older than 40, there are quite a few people in my
| Master's program who are. I'm in the OMSCS program at Georgia
| Tech, Online Maters in Computer Science
| (https://omscs.gatech.edu/). It's exactly as it sounds, a 10
| course Master's degree from Georgia tech that you can get from
| your own home. That is not to say that it's like a MOOC you might
| take on Coursera randomly, it's a full Master's program where you
| need to complete the same assignments as any on-campus student.
| It's not easy, one will easily spend 20+ hours a week studying or
| working on projects/homework.
|
| Further on the plus side, it's only ~$6400 for the entire degree
| and you can take just one course at a time.
| orsenthil wrote:
| I did from 34 to 39. It corrected my thinking in a few ways, it
| changed me, made me more honest, and lead me to enjoy rest of my
| life because of one of my previous life desires was fulfilled.
| EwanToo wrote:
| I'm just finishing a masters, it's been very enjoyable but
| definitely a challenge to balance education, work, and family.
|
| It's not just the hours of work to be done, the biggest challenge
| for me has been the pieces of work that need to be done on
| specific days at specific times, like one-off lectures,
| workshops, and so on, where I've had to say to my kids I can't
| take them places or play with them that day.
| specproc wrote:
| Heh, yeah. Adjusting to harder deadlines was definitely
| something I noticed.
| g051051 wrote:
| I did my master's from age 50 to 52. It wasn't a "journey",
| whatever that means. It was fine, I really enjoyed it. Having 25+
| years professional experience was a huge advantage compared to
| many of the others in the program. The only class that gave me
| trouble was DS&A, due to a crippling math disability (I love it
| but it hates me).
| koolba wrote:
| What is DS&A?
| progman32 wrote:
| Guessing: data science & algorithms.
| siggen wrote:
| Data Structures and Algorithms
| coldcode wrote:
| I wanted to get a PhD in CS at 40 but was convinced by a local
| professor of CS that it was a waste of everyone's time and there
| were no jobs to be had in the academic world anyway. Shortly
| thereafter Google started hiring them by the truckload. I wish I
| had ignored him.
|
| I did have a 4 decade career as a programmer, but who knows what
| might have happened if I had taken the time mid-career to do the
| doctorate.
| dominotw wrote:
| > Shortly thereafter Google started hiring them by the
| truckload. I wish I had ignored him.
|
| Google hires people without PHD by truckloads too, if anything
| they hire more ppl without phds.
| jeffbee wrote:
| And the people with PhDs are just as likely as the rest of
| them to be writing code that moves protobufs from one place
| to another.
| beezlebroxxxxxx wrote:
| Ironically, CS professors and teachers are, from last I heard,
| in extremely high demand now because so many CS PhD grads leave
| for industry (and 3 or 5x the pay of academics). I don't think
| that was just as adjuncts either. Some universities are willing
| to pay way more than adjunct salaries to get CS grads with real
| teaching ability. I doubt you'll ever see industry competitive
| salaries though.
| manholio wrote:
| This economic opportunity is only true for PhDs in CS or
| engineering and even there, only for hot research areas. Good
| luck getting 5x academic pay with a PhD in geology.
|
| Generally speaking, the professor's advice from 25 years ago
| is still solid: don't get a PhD unless you are interested in
| an academic career, research, teaching etc. Due to the
| prestige of such a career, it tends to have an oversupply of
| applicants - the majority of which will not get a
| commensurate payback for the efforts required by a proper PhD
| thesis. So they will either flunk / present a low effort
| thesis, or worse still, they will invest a few years into a
| good thesis but never develop their career and skills gained
| into a full academic job.
|
| So getting a PhD for the sake of it might not be a good
| investment of your time and effort career-wise; If you want
| to do it for the intelectual challenge on a topic you are
| very interested in, that's always a suficient motivation.
| Silverback_VII wrote:
| Not worth the hassle in my opinion. People who don't have it
| often think they need it but the reality is that you can learn on
| your own and fast as well.
| axpy906 wrote:
| With amount of debt it requires, I would agree with this. If
| you can get a free ride to school the only thing you are
| looking at is the time and opportunity cost. Adding monetary
| cost makes the return more difficult to justify.
| specproc wrote:
| I've taught myself plenty, but in my experience, unless you're
| incredibly single minded, there's nothing quite like the
| immersion experience to push you forward.
| sfpotter wrote:
| This really depends on what the goal is. If you want to work as
| a researcher, it is more appropriate to view a PhD at least as
| a apprenticeship which teaches you how to be a researcher.
| There are a lot of skills you pick up doing this that are quite
| difficult to pick up without doing a PhD--not because they're
| hard, but simply because you're unlikely to be aware of what
| they are.
| smeej wrote:
| This may be true in many cases, but without more context for
| the question, it isn't helpful here.
|
| If someone's trying to change fields into one that _requires_ a
| credential (I was recently looking into a pivot into becoming a
| psychologist or a counselor for someone), it doesn 't really
| make any difference if the material could be learned another
| way, even if it could be learned _better_ that way.
| Silverback_VII wrote:
| >If someone's trying to change fields into one that requires
| a credential.
|
| If you need credentials then somebody needs to care about
| those credentials which means that you will be someone's
| employee. You will be stuck on what MJ DeMarco calls the slow
| lane. Even more so if you get into debt because of it.
| Howerver, I think big discoveries, money or writing a
| bestselling book do not care about your credentials. You can
| achieve higher education and big success on your own.
| i_am_proteus wrote:
| Have an extremely specific vision for what you want to do after
| getting the degree.
|
| The lion's share of general "entry-level" opportunities for
| newly-minted technical masters/doctorates will struggle to value
| whatever experience you had before going to graduate school. This
| is less true for certain industry-specific positions, which is
| why identifying those positions before starting is a good idea.
|
| If you're comfortable restarting your career as a junior
| researcher in your late 40s, be aware of the unusual place you'll
| occupy in the academic hierarchy.
| wwarner wrote:
| I got a masters in cs at the age of 48 and i would do it again!
| My rationale was this: I wanted to learn about ML and NLP and was
| willing to risk a certain amount of money to do it. I figured
| that if I could increase my earning power enough to repay myself
| in 5 years, then it would be well worth it (that worked out
| easily). I don't think there is any way to dive into theory
| outside of school. And I think the collaboration can't be matched
| in the workplace. You will stand out! Your work experience
| probably won't help you much!
| thunkshift1 wrote:
| Hi, did that extra qualification that late in life help you in
| the career? I am asking because tech is notoriously for ageism
| pelasaco wrote:
| I'm starting now Philosophy, remote. I did study computer
| sciences when I was 20, then because of Corona, I did a post
| graduation in game development, and now I applied to a BA in
| Philosophy, starting in October. I think now I can plan much
| better my day and be more disciplined. After some life experience
| under my belt (or belly) I think (I wish) I can grasp better such
| topic.
|
| EDIT: I'm married and have kids, which add some unavoidable
| appointment clashes. But I'm able to manage them mostly studying
| either at 5:00 or after 21:00...
| eric4smith wrote:
| Unless you're teaching don't waste your time.
|
| To me it smells like a vanity play, unless you're doing it so you
| can get another 100k per year.
|
| And yes, I can hear the people saying education is always a good
| thing to have.
|
| But it reminds me of so many friends who have jobs less than 100k
| per year in the USA and go to take a masters degree. In almost
| every case, the higher degree did not change the outcomes they
| wanted in their life. They ended up with debt in their 40's.
|
| In almost every case it was a waste of time for the person.
| Imagine you're 45 years old and you take 2 years to take this
| degree. The cost is just not worth it.
|
| The world is moving to a place where degrees are no longer worth
| what they were in almost every profession (barring medicine, law,
| etc).
|
| Don't do it.
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| I think you're over-generalizing from your experience.
|
| I got a PhD in CS around 40. It opened up some job
| opportunities in software development that greatly improved my
| career.
| stagger87 wrote:
| There are still a huge number of industries and fields in the
| engineering and sciences that require graduate degrees and that
| will not be changing anytime soon.
| specproc wrote:
| It's not all about money. I'm not earning staggering amounts
| more since doing this, but I'm able to do more interesting work
| and I loved the experience. Life is a very sad place when
| everything is viewed as an item on a balance sheet.
|
| The one thing I do agree with there is that education is
| overpriced in America. As a European, I'd go as far as to say
| it's exploitative.
|
| That OP is considering suggests the cost, where ever they are,
| is at least roughly within their means.
| [deleted]
| dahart wrote:
| > To me it smells like a vanity play, unless you're doing it so
| you can get another 100k per year.
|
| Hehe, it's vanity _unless_ you're only doing it for money? This
| is twisted! ;)
|
| > The world is moving to a place where degrees are no longer
| worth what they were in almost every profession
|
| Do you have any stats or data to back this up? This is a common
| trope here and elsewhere (ala "Joe the Plumber"), but it seems
| to be largely not true AFAICT. The St. Louis Fed recently
| published a paper [1] arguing degree holders are saving less
| over time. The problem is, it was misleading because savings
| was measured relative to income (they're suggesting that
| someone with $100k salary and $1M in savings is better off that
| someone with a $200k salary and $1.9M in savings.) And in the
| paper they demonstrated conclusively that in the US, 4-year
| degree holders earn on average 2x what non-degree-holders earn.
| And advanced degree holders (master's, PhD, doctors, lawyers)
| earn on average 3x what non-degree holders earn (and 50% more
| than bachelors). Three times! This data isn't a statistical
| sampling, BTW, the Fed has data on _all_ US citizens.
|
| As someone who's generally in favor of education for
| education's sake, I was blown away by how high the income
| premium of degrees is, I thought the bachelor's degree might be
| worth something like 15% extra income, maybe. 2x and 3x
| averages are simply freaking enormous, and TBH a bit concerning
| how high they are. It's hard to justify numbers that large,
| similar to what's happened to CEO pay in the US. But with this
| in mind, it's easy to see why parents push their kids to
| university, and why the costs have been going up and up and up.
|
| So based on the Fed's data, it seems like your summary here
| could be the opposite of good advice? Shouldn't people know if
| having a degree generally enables a different lifestyle? I
| don't doubt your friends' experience; it is possible your
| anecdotal sampling doesn't match this data. Averages are
| averages, and degrees definitely do not guarantee any specific
| income for any specific person. But the part your argument
| completely fails to address is the credentialism of advanced
| degrees - the number of jobs not available to anyone without
| one. The research teams in large corps for example are
| generally PhDs, it's very hard to get in otherwise.
|
| https://files.stlouisfed.org/files/htdocs/publications/revie...
| vitus wrote:
| > This data isn't a statistical sampling, BTW, the Fed has
| data on all US citizens.
|
| Actually... that report leans very heavily on the Survey of
| Consumer Finances [0], which is absolutely a sampling (latest
| iteration was 6500 families out of the 120 million households
| in the US).
|
| Per page 3 of the report: "We use the Federal Reserve Board's
| Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), which covers family heads
| born throughout the twentieth century, to determine whether
| the economic and financial benefits of obtaining a
| postsecondary degree have changed over time."
|
| [0] https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/aboutscf.htm
| nprateem wrote:
| I think you need to be clear on your time commitment and reasons
| for studying. I'm studying a part-time MBA (online, remote) while
| working full-time (although thankfully my day job has been quiet
| for the last few months due to cock-ups in project planning,
| etc.).
|
| I'm allowed up to 5 years to finish, but I'm cramming it in to
| 2.5 years altogether. I could take fewer modules and spin it out,
| but I don't want to be studying forever. The workload this last 6
| months has been insane. If I'd had kids or had had to do any real
| work in my day job there's no way I'd have managed. The last 3
| months especially have just involved pretty much constant
| studying, coursework and revising.
|
| While they pitched the course as being flexible, the reality is
| there's limited flexibility once you've started a module with my
| uni. I asked whether I could postpone one of my 3 pieces of
| coursework by extending one module by 3 months and was told no.
| The online support from the university has been, frankly, shit.
| Any questions beyond the most basic (such as being able to see
| high-scoring past exam submissions to try to improve my marks)
| were met with delays of several months. I've had multiple
| instances where my questions have only been answered after
| contacting the formal complaints team. However, support from
| tutors/teaching assistants has been good, although I've rarely
| needed to contact them.
|
| So my advice is to be clear about how much time you're willing to
| give to studying, what your motivation is, and to do your
| research on how good any support is likely to be. Related to the
| first point is how much of an impact you mind it taking on your
| social life.
|
| In my case, studying online means I won't build any kind of
| network, which is one of the most touted benefits of an in-person
| MBA. Still, it's costing me PS20k all in. Full-time for 2 years
| isn't really an option since it'd cost me so much in lost income,
| so I'll have to build a network later.
|
| Having said all that, as a senior developer, I've found the MBA
| to be very interesting. I've tried starting multiple side
| projects in the past and haven't really got anywhere. I now have
| a much greater understanding of business and am confident that my
| odds of being able to start a successful business have massively
| improved. It's helped me clarify my life goals, understand the
| world more, will make me a better investor and open the doors to
| more interesting work if I decide not to start my own business.
| The combination of top-tier technical skills and an MBA will
| inevitably be powerful and give me more options. I'm looking
| forward to it all being over this time next year though.
| The_Adger wrote:
| Depends on the country you're in. I'm in my early 50s and in
| Germany where attending university is not as costly as elsewhere.
| Having a degree can help your career but it's no guarantee. The
| by far most challenging part for me was coming to terms with
| myself. Do you really want to do it or not? "Maybee" is no
| sufficient answer. If your answer is "Yes!" ask yourself "Why?"
| Don't stop short of an answer that satisfies your best and most
| sceptical friend. This took me a lot of talking and time but it
| paid off in the long run whenever motivation became an issue
| (motivation will wear thin at some point.) After that I went to
| the university of my choice and talked with the office dedicated
| to "older and long term students". This was tremendeously helpful
| in many ways. Most importantly during this meeting I learned that
| I could shave two semesters and various "required" courses from
| the BA curriculum. And it allowed me to skip the numerus clausus
| because of previous job experience. I'm currently applying the
| finishing touches to my MA and am offered (without me asking for)
| to do my PhD afterward by two different professors, which to my
| knowledge is a first in my university, so yeah, I certainly have
| done some things right. Looking back it was quite a ride. I
| learned tons and became very good friends with amazingly
| brilliant people. My life has changed in so many ways. Some of
| the people who used to be part of my life before university have
| parted ways because I changed on the inside. I spent endless
| hours reading stuff that still does not interest me. Not even
| remotely. I've written pages on end about stuff that I couldn't
| care less about. All of this because others told me I had to do
| it. In doing so I grew and I really like what I have become: More
| knowledgable, understanding and critically thinking. Come on in!
| The water is fine! But don't do it for the merits. Do it because
| you really want to.
| barry-cotter wrote:
| I got a Master's without ever having a Bachelor's starting when I
| was well over 30. Feel free to email me if you want to know
| anything.
|
| If you already have a successful career in a non-credential field
| it's unlikely getting a vanity credential like a taught Master's
| will do much for you, unless it's a finishing school proof of
| class _habitus_ like an MBA. A Ph.D. like an MBA is good for
| changing fields and perhaps social class entirely but it's
| unlikely to pay off in monetary terms.
| specproc wrote:
| My partner didn't finish her undergrad, but was accepted onto
| an MSc program in Manchester in the UK on the basis of her work
| experience.
|
| I think students with experience are great for courses, and
| applications from these sorts of candidates look great amongst
| piles of identikit young over achievers.
| barry-cotter wrote:
| It's a taught Master's. They want the money and some scrap of
| a justification for admitting you. Don't overthink it.
| cluelessmaker wrote:
| If you don't mind, could you share the university you went? I
| dropped out my bachelors in final year, and kinda old now.
| Spending 1 or 2 year for masters is okay for me now, but don't
| want to spent 4 years for bachelors again. Trying to figure out
| options.
| barry-cotter wrote:
| University of London. There's more than one Master's degree
| that allows you to take individual modules as stand alone
| qualification and once you hit the limit you transfer to
| being a Master's student proper. I did Finance. Last I looked
| the London School of Tropical Medicine also did this. If they
| offer a Postgraduate Certificate they'll probably take your
| money for an individual module if you have _any_ evidence you
| can do postgraduate level study. I had a MicroMaster's from
| EdX.
|
| https://www.london.ac.uk/courses/international_type_of_study.
| ..
| cluelessmaker wrote:
| If I do edx micromasters, will they consider for Msc
| computer science or related courses?
| inhumantsar wrote:
| Thanks for this insight. I've been looking for programs
| like these. There are plenty of MBA programs but I'm more
| interested in doing a CS degree.
|
| I have a decade of experience in software development and a
| smattering of Coursera certificates in relevant areas.
| Doing a BSc feels like it would be, not a waste exactly but
| inefficient and overly expensive. But it looks like
| University of London they offer a PCert->MSc pathway for
| CS.
|
| Did you do the micro-master because you didn't have (much)
| relevant experience in the field? How important do you
| think it was on your application?
| jrumbut wrote:
| A lot of universities have (often not well publicized)
| programs to help you finish bachelor's degrees after you drop
| out and are gone for a few years. You can sometimes get
| credit for work experience or other things you've done and
| take all/most classes online.
|
| I went through one myself and am currently working on my PhD.
| If you have a relevant career or just come off as pretty
| mature a master's program will be happy to have you even if
| there were issues in your undergrad, but very few
| institutions worth going to will admit you without a
| bachelor's of any kind and the circumstances would have to be
| something truly remarkable.
| rr808 wrote:
| You didn't mention what the degree is or why you're doing it. If
| you have a specific job you have in mind maybe ask HR if they
| think a masters were help. Maybe ask your boss or senior manager
| if they think it'll help you. Otherwise its probably not worth
| it. I know a lot of people think they want a higher paying job
| and are willing to learn, the magic leap of new job after getting
| degree doesn't usually happen unless you have a real plan.
| sriram_malhar wrote:
| I wrote about my experience of starting a PhD at age 42.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21302020
| daviddever23box wrote:
| Don't go back for grad school if you think it will enhance your
| earning power / job prospects. The best use of your time is to
| leverage university resources to satisfy your own ends
| (inexpensive software, liberal OSS licensing, etc.)
| CobaltFire wrote:
| I'm finishing my BS at 39 and debating on doing a Masters or PhD
| (if I can get into one).
|
| I keep circling back to the premise that I want to do a graduate
| degree in Philosophy or maybe History. Something that really
| interests me, rather than an MBA or a STEM degree (undergrad is
| STEM).
|
| Looking forward to seeing the comments here.
| opyate wrote:
| Howdy, I've done web dev for 20 years and wanted to learn more
| about game design to help me get better at my game development
| hobby. I did a bunch of Coursera courses, but found that everyone
| rushed through it and didn't stick around for crits or forum
| discussions. I then looked around for a proper university thing
| where I would be taking it slowly with a cohort. I found a nice
| Indie Dev MA with Falmouth University which encouraged us to
| craft our own path (mine was game design, market analysis and
| marketing).
|
| 2 years later: finally finished, and built a nice network of
| codevelopers and industry professionals. I'm 43 this year, and a
| few others were my age or older. I submitted a week early due to
| summer holidays, and still got a distinction. (That doesn't
| matter to me, though, as the real proof in the pudding would be
| whether my games will sell or not.)
|
| I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it, and built strong
| friendships along the way, and even sent the staff a crate of
| cider, because they're so awesome.
|
| My motivation to stick around and do the work was very strong, as
| I really do want to phase out webdev and do more gamedev. It's
| sooo much more creative and suited to me as an individual. If I
| have to sit in a meeting where someone bikesheds how to connect a
| database to a website one more time, I'm going to scream, so it
| had to happen.
|
| My partner was onboard with it, and I could afford to (as a
| contractor) take the odd day off to do more masters work, which
| really helped, as it was part time at 20 hours per week.
|
| If you subscribe to my RSS feed, I'll be writing a post mortem on
| the programme soon: https://juanuys.com
|
| My main advice is to do it for you, and really be sure you'll
| have time and passion for it throughout. A few of my cohort
| realised that it took too much time, or they didn't like the
| critical reflection element of some of the modules, and gave up.
| So, also check exactly what the modules entail, what needs to be
| delivered, etc. E.g. some of the younger students were
| disappointed that they weren't going to be "taught" Unreal Engine
| , for instance, but rather had to maintain a blog and write about
| their own learnings (as is the nature with master of arts, as
| opposed to science).
| tgdr wrote:
| I'm about to start out on this journey. I graduated from
| university in the UK in 2002 with a mediocre degree result (2:2).
| That hasn't held me back in industry having various roles within
| organisations and latterly consulting roles and briefly
| consulting/contracting independently.
|
| I've also had three years of not working due to looking after my
| children while my partner worked. That was incredibly rewarding
| and incredibly tiring. Now with them in childcare it's a great
| time for me to go back to university for a masters with the
| intention of finding a PhD place after that.
|
| For me, the goal is to get more rewarding work. Personally, that
| means working for what I feel is a better goal that purely making
| money for a company owner. I plan to take a masters in Software
| Engineering and then use that skill to transfer to a subject in
| Earth Science (or similar) where I can use programming to fulfil
| research needs and hopefully continue in that vein for a rebooted
| career.
|
| Luckily now I'm living in Norway means that a masters is free and
| as my partner works I can concentrate on study without needing to
| worry about money.
|
| Advice from my thinking so far would be: - know what your aim is.
| Education for it's own sake is great but if you have a different
| goal in mind then consider whether higher education is the best
| way to get there. If you know other people in a position you'd
| like to be in, ask them what the current best route to get there
| is. - try and discuss with potential course supervisors in
| advance whether or not you will be accepted. With 20 years out of
| education, I've found it interesting to consider whether or not
| my industry skills will be valued as much as the
| school/university level education. I'm definitely not as sharp on
| lots of things but that experience does count for lots. - if
| you're behind on what current "feed in" courses teach fellow
| masters students, sit in on lectures and read the course material
| as much as possible so you're not behind when you start. - the
| academics I know love to talk about academia and are a great
| source of knowledge on the education routes that are open. Being
| an older student will probably mean you're better able to
| approach them and get this knowledge. Everyone I've spoken to has
| wanted to help so take advantage of this.
|
| Good luck, hope you find the right route for you!
| cdicelico wrote:
| I went straight to work and didn't get to college until 41/42.
| I'm working on my undergrad and plan to continue to my masters.
| I've found it incredibly rewarding for two main reasons.
|
| First, since I have a career already, I'm free of the pressure to
| go to school for career purposes and can focus on something I
| enjoy, which also provides immense value to what I'm doing every
| day (I chose philosophy, much more relevant and practical than I
| think many realize).
|
| Second, I enjoy the experience and get quite a bit more depth
| from it than I would have in my 20's. It's a richer, more
| meaningful experience now that I'm older, have a strong sense of
| who I am, and am not put off in the slightest by naysayers or
| influenced by people's opinions of what I should or shouldn't be
| doing. I have more maturity now than at any other time in my
| life, and this has served me well in the sense of approaching
| topics with intellectual humility and just enjoying the process
| of knowing nothing to knowing a little. I do all the reading and
| then some, reading far and wide as well as doing deep analysis,
| writing all my notes, reviewing, and doing practice essays, and I
| enjoy every bit of it rather than seeing it as a chore.
|
| So, some initial thoughts for you, hope they're helpful. The only
| advice I can give is to enjoy it, realize it's a wonderful
| opportunity, be structured and disciplined with your time, and
| use your hard-earned experience to your advantage.
| specproc wrote:
| I really second this. The best thing about study as an adult is
| that you're largely studying for pleasure, even if there is a
| work goal in there somewhere.
|
| You know what's relevant and interesting to you and what's not.
| [deleted]
| devwastaken wrote:
| Philosophy is essential, how it's taught is unfortunate. In my
| philosophy class it was almost all about the history of
| philosophy, not the reasoning behind it. Assignments and tests
| were all about time periods, the specific names of
| philosophical ideas, from whom they came from, etc.
|
| I'd rather have open ended assignments. Ones that give moral
| dilemmas, and challenge their solutions. Make me think about
| something In a perspective I haven't thought of before. That's
| a powerful tool.
|
| But that's how academics works, the culture wants tests and
| assignments with check boxes.
| capitalsigma wrote:
| I have never taken a philosophy class that involved tests or
| naming philosophical ideas. The work of an academic
| philosopher is to write papers (like an academic historian or
| sociologist), so a philosophy degree should focus on writing
| papers. Often the papers will be analyzing previous
| philosophical work and attempting to present some novel
| synthesis of it, either with itself or with some broader
| context. Neither "giving moral dilemmas" nor "quizzes about
| history" fit anywhere into that picture.
| codingdave wrote:
| I'm not sure where you went, but my undergrad philosophy
| courses matched your desired approach:. We were presented
| with problems, and presented solutions in return. Sure, we
| had to know the historical context of what solutions other
| have brought already... but our work was not regurgitation of
| those ideas, it was reconstruction into new ways to advance
| the discussions.
| nathan_compton wrote:
| I can't help but come to the defense of the traditional
| style, particularly for introductory philosophical classes.
| The fact is, people have thought about every moral situation
| from every angle already and just asking undergraduates to
| wax on about the trolley problem is kind of a waste of time.
| It is much more valuable to get them into the detailed
| history of ideas so they can appreciate just how long these
| problems have been open and discussed.
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| > (I chose philosophy, much more relevant and practical than I
| think many realize).
|
| As others have already asked, could you expand on this? Very
| interested.
| FarhadG wrote:
| Not exclusive to philosophy but a strong emphasis within
| philosophy is the focus on developing the ability to:
|
| - Intelligently entertain various perspectives
|
| - Effectively imagine "possible worlds" where positions may
| be held or refuted
|
| - Formalize language and all of its "fuzzy" characteristics
| into clear positions
|
| - Hypothesize generalizations and abstractions to map across
| domains
|
| - Think from first principles and explore their logical
| conclusions in conceptual and foreign territories
|
| These were my big takeaways from philosophy undergrad and I
| find them increasingly important in my various technical
| careers.
| capitalsigma wrote:
| I was a double major in philosophy and CS in my undergrad.
| Philosophy was fun, but in hindsight I wish I did math or
| stats or some other STEM instead. I would say my main
| takeaway from the philosophy degree was developing a sense of
| intellectual respect for big, important ideas that I don't
| personally agree with (various religious thinkers, Marx,
| Aristotle etc), but it really doesn't compare to the actual
| nuts-and-bolts abstract reasoning skills you pick up in an
| abstract algebra course, for example.
|
| I also found that I could consistently get As in humanities
| courses with ~20-40 hours of work per quarter (the time to
| write 1-3 papers) once I picked up the skill of "writing like
| an academic", vs my CS courses which continued to be
| challenging and require a ton of effort to succeed in up
| until my graduation. My senior year, for example, I had some
| core-requirement course about theater -- I attended zero
| classes and did zero readings until I sat down to write the
| paper, and I got As with compliments from the professor on
| how well-written my papers were. YMMV.
| rafaelero wrote:
| I doubt there is significant transfer between philosophy
| education and other tasks (like programming). Curiously, the
| people who should doubt this conclusion (the educated
| philosophers) are the ones that jump to accept it. Anyways,
| the literature on this matter is wide enough that our prior
| should be that there is no transfer and evidence to the
| contrary must be stated.
| andkon wrote:
| I'm a philosophy grad who learned to code a couple years out
| of school.
|
| Philosophy gives you a set of meta cognitive skills that help
| everywhere. It teaches you how to think. It shows you what
| class of problems are soluble, and which are things where we
| just have to accept tradeoffs. And it's really focused, in a
| funny way, on economy: does your argument actually do
| something? Does this theory offer clarity and bring us closer
| to truth? If not, well, why are you wasting your breath on
| it? Philosophy teaches you to see that some avenues are
| fruitless or just kinda not worth the effort.
|
| Also, non-practically, it shows you the full depth of wonder
| in the world. Wherever there is capacity for thinking to be
| done, philosophy says, you can elucidate something important
| to our human condition.
| ramesh31 wrote:
| > As others have already asked, could you expand on this?
| Very interested.
|
| I started undergrad in my 30s, and also majored philosophy
| for similar reasons. It really is the most rigorous non-STEM
| undergrad degree you can get. And for people (like myself)
| who can't pass calculus, but are still fairly intelligent, it
| can easily be parlayed into a more technical graduate
| program.
| markdestouches wrote:
| Everybody can pass calculus. The only way one can fail at
| math is gaps in knowledge. If you managed to get through
| something like Kant or Hegel, you can get through any math
| subject provided you have the necessary prerequisites.
| [deleted]
| qorrect wrote:
| I hear a lot of non-engineers say this. Talking about formal
| logic, and how philosophy and math were once the same
| discipline, how math proofs are akin to philosophical
| arguments etc.
|
| I don't think this crowd would get much out of it.
| roenxi wrote:
| It depends. Some people have really weak philosophical
| foundations and really need to hear about it if there is
| something out there that grounds them a bit better.
|
| We can't say if any particular approach to life is the
| best, but we can say that if you change your mind about
| which approach is best at age 70 you've spent a lot of
| years setting up for the wrong outcome. It is never to late
| in theory. But as a practical matter 70 is a bit late to
| sit down, take a step back, ask why and try to act on it.
| Better for people to line themselves up with good
| foundations from their 20s or maybe 30s. It is good to
| explore the options early, and think a bit about what the
| word 'option' even means philosophically.
| capitalsigma wrote:
| I agree. Philosophy gives you a level of abstract reasoning
| of the form: "if we agree (with Kant) that we should only
| take those actions which could be universal law, does it
| follow that the death penalty is morally justifiable?"
| There is some degree of reasoning from premises here, but
| all of the objects you deal with are things that you come
| into with a bunch of intuition that you never really leave
| behind.
|
| On the other hand, something like:
|
| > Given a one-dimensional invariant subspace, prove that
| any nonzero vector in that space is an eigenvector and all
| such eigenvectors have the same eigenvalue.
|
| really forces you to grapple with an entirely different
| level of abstraction
| Der_Einzige wrote:
| If you get spooked by deontology in most philosophy
| classes, than maybe it's better to not take those
| philosophy classes in the first place.
|
| This world needs more utilitarianism and less categorical
| imperatives...
| capitalsigma wrote:
| Kant is actually towards the top of my list of "stuff I
| thought was dumb before I read the actual source material
| but which I now have a lot of respect for." The
| categorical imperative stuff is a reflection of a really
| profound value that Kant assigns to human life.
|
| Utilitarianism benefits a lot from having a Cliff notes
| version that sounds less dumb than the Cliff notes
| versions of other ethical frameworks, but I don't think
| that is the right way to evaluate ethics. Besides,
| philosophy class ethics is really more of an exercise in
| "let's construct a formal framework that matches our
| intuitions" rather than "let's make normative judgements
| about stuff in the real world."
| Isamu wrote:
| As an engineer I got into logic through the philosophy
| department. It was very eye opening for me.
|
| Engineers are not models of logical thinking that they
| assume they are. Illogic is everywhere and it takes
| constant vigilance to avoid always going with your gut
| feelings.
| bee_rider wrote:
| In the very least, I think every engineer should take a
| "philosophy of science" class. We tend to focus quite
| intensely on how to do things. Borrow a little bit of
| "where do proofs and the scientific method sit in the grand
| pantheon of human knowledge" from philosophy is a bit
| grounding. Anyway it is probably a gen-ed that is at least
| somewhat useful.
| letsgo39 wrote:
| Can you expand on how you found philosophy practical?
| inphovore wrote:
| I find philosophy is the sauce that goes well on everything.
|
| Sure, you can live on the bland essentials, and you cannot
| live on toppings alone, yet who doesn't like a little...
| sauce with that?
| AussieWog93 wrote:
| Just to offer a counter-point to the others here, I've
| personally noticed that quite a few people who study
| philosophy (either formally or via self-study) tend to become
| "disembodied". Formal reason becomes king, even when informal
| methods are more appropriate for solving the task at hand,
| and the intangible becomes irrelevant, even when it matters
| deeply.
|
| Perhaps things would be different for someone in their 40s,
| who has a wealth of real world experience to draw on,
| philosophy would be valuable. But for the average 18 year old
| kid, studying it seems to create a set of terrible habits
| that take years to undo before the student can become a
| properly integrated adult.
| melvinmelih wrote:
| > Perhaps things would be different for someone in their
| 40s, who has a wealth of real world experience to draw on,
| philosophy would be valuable. But for the average 18 year
| old kid, studying it seems to create a set of terrible
| habits that take years to undo before the student can
| become a properly integrated adult.
|
| In the time of Plato and Aristotle it was frowned upon to
| teach philosophy to students below the age of 35 because
| they wouldn't know what to do with that knowledge.
| writeinpencil wrote:
| I started as a philosophy major and switched to history and
| economics for this exact reason. My philosophy classes
| became incredibly disconnected from reality and ended up
| being endless arguments about frameworks and formalisms,
| but without the rigor of mathematics outside of formal
| logic. I still loved my philosophy classes, but I'd
| recommend anyone studying it as their first undergraduate
| degree pair it with something more concrete.
| gergov wrote:
| I guess philosophy education tends to vary from region to
| region, but "young people into phil" tend to be
| insufferable in one way or another, while older people with
| an understanding of philosophy (...and a great many real
| world problems) tend to be pretty okay people.
|
| But that seems to be a broader issue with specialization
| anyway. Focus on one lane for too long and your brain
| starts to disfunction in odd ways.
| isthisthingon99 wrote:
| Teaches you to think in ways that other courses won't.
| capitalsigma wrote:
| Upper level proof based math courses are much better in my
| experience (speaking as someone with a BA in philosophy who
| has been taking math courses part time for the past few
| years)
| isthisthingon99 wrote:
| Not mutually exclusive. I took comp sci and philosophy so
| yeah I would agree.
| daviddever23box wrote:
| The ability to conceptualize and abstract a problem into its
| component parts is a key skill that will never underserve
| you.
| killjoywashere wrote:
| My daughter is a philosophy major while most of my family has
| been STEM for generations (father's an engineer, mother
| taught college math, grandfather was an engineer). I'm
| reassured by the requirements for formal logic, and the
| obvious applications in law, but also at the intersection of
| law, ethics, and many of the ML systems that I foresee coming
| online.
|
| She actually brought up this Harvard philosophy professor who
| had a story about keeping track of parantheses. I took
| advantage of the opportunity to show her the connections to
| Curry and from there to Lisp and the Little Schemer. She got
| it. She can reason, formally. That's important.
| lampshades wrote:
| In my experience, philosophers make great software
| engineers. I've worked with a few and always been happy to
| work with them.
| sanj wrote:
| Be sure that you talk this over with your spouse/partner.
|
| School - in all of its forms - has different rhythms, patterns,
| and timing than most work Be sure you can work together to
| rebalance your lives.
| rapjr9 wrote:
| I got a job programming for a research group at a college when I
| was 40 and worked there for 20 years. The work was an education
| in itself. I built a Beowulf cluster, electronically herded cows,
| designed wireless sensor systems, built opportunistic sensing
| systems, worked on security systems, medical systems, and a lot
| more and was exposed to a lot more peripherally (sociology,
| psychology, medicine, robotics). I didn't work on a degree but if
| I'd wanted to they made it easy to do and other people around me
| did. In the years before I left a fellow in his 60's applied for
| the PhD program and I worked with him for some years. He got his
| PhD based on work designing secure wireless transfer
| protocols/systems using near field RF. What made it possible was
| our boss was willing to accommodate his life (daughter in school,
| family life, etc.) instead of demanding servitude like most
| advisors demand of their grad students. In part, age gets you
| some respect, though not all advisors will be willing to do that,
| so you would need to find a good advisor. If you work for them
| first for a year to two before starting a PhD that gives you
| chance to figure out if you are mutually compatible (and to get
| to know others in the department in case you are not.) Be warned
| though that academic work is very different from industry work.
| You may never finish most projects only building proof-of-
| concepts, and in some ways it's like being in a startup where you
| have to do some of everything (work with students, purchasing,
| web research, hacking hardware, grant writing, building slide
| decks, figuring how to do things no one else has ever tried to do
| with systems that were never intended for it.) Often paths are
| abandoned if they don't work out quickly. Student code can be
| atrocious and you may have to use and modify it after the student
| leaves. People come and go, projects come and go, funding comes
| and goes, nothing is permanent. As a grad student you'll probably
| have to do some teaching and lesson grading as well.
| protomyth wrote:
| A lot of colleges have Older Than Average programs. They not only
| are accelerated ways to get your degree, but meet at night to
| make them easier to continue your career. I've had a couple of
| relatives go this route. They tend to have a lot more support
| available.
|
| Students starting after 40 is actually fairly normal at the
| Native American colleges. Our TCU (tribal college or university)
| has a lot of almost independent work classes to support this. If
| anyone needs a suggestion to help single mothers, find
| instructors willing to teach remote / zoom classes starting a
| 9PM.
| Ologn wrote:
| For my Bachelors I was in one of these programs. You get some
| accelerated credit for experience and classes outside my major
| (CS) were available at night or on weekends. Many CS classes
| were available at night as well.
|
| In terms of people talking about debt - I went to a decent
| state school, took one class a semester or much of it and paid
| as I went - so there was not much financial strain. I work in
| IT and am in a higher tax bracket after all. On the other side
| of finance, during interviews I can talk about my college
| experience if asked about it. Also Leetcode interviews and the
| like seems to be a test if I remember what I learned in college
| - dynamic programming, big O notation, how to implement a stack
| etc. So you pay in terms of time and money but you get paid
| back in terms of possibly greater opportunities.
|
| Insofar as people talking about learning on your own - as far
| as I see, most self-taught people tend to have gaps in knowing
| more theoretical stuff like pushdown automata, or concurrent
| critical sections, or abstract syntax trees or Goedel numbers
| or second normal form or that kind of thing. You're supposed to
| spend at least three times as much time studying as in class,
| so if a Bachelors is four years, those three years are similar
| to self-study, minus things like the chance at the chance of
| questions during and after class and during office hours. So
| the only difference from self-study is not four years but one
| year, minus the benefits of classmates, professors and the
| rigor of a more theoretical curriculum than most self-taught
| people do, if they even know they should learn about things
| like the pumping lemma.
| [deleted]
| kurupt213 wrote:
| I'm 43 and in a PhD program. And working full time. It only gets
| harder the longer you wait.
| stagger87 wrote:
| I started an MS in applied math in my very late 30s only having a
| BS in CS. I did it one class at a time, and it was relatively
| easy to juggle with work and family. At the time, I was looking
| at a lot of jobs that required an MS, which was the original
| motivation for starting it. I ended up not needing it in that
| way, but it has still been instrumental in my career and I don't
| regret it.
|
| I paid out of pocket and it has financially been worth it. A lot
| of companies will pay for it, but I wasn't in that position. If a
| company pays for it they might want you to agree to work for them
| several years after you finish.
|
| If you don't love learning and being in school, it's going to be
| a long unenjoyable slog. If you're only doing it for money or
| vanity, that may not be enough to carry you through the hundreds
| to thousands of hours of study and homework you will have to do.
|
| You will encounter a lot of naysayers, as you have already seen
| in this thread. This includes family and friends.
|
| You will also get better advice in a different forum. A sub
| reddit dedicated to your industry for instance?
| maCDzP wrote:
| I am 34 years old and thinking about doing the same. I have an
| degree in civil engineering but the last couple of years I have
| a big interest in CS and math.
|
| If you wouldn't mind - could you elaborate how it was
| instrumental in your career and how long it took?
| stagger87 wrote:
| As far as being instrumental, it's the usual suspects. Better
| role, salary, respect, job satisfaction, confidence, etc. It
| doesn't happen overnight, you still have to consistently
| perform. It's also what you make of it. If you get a degree
| that you never use and no one knows about, your life might
| not change much. I personally used my degree to help me
| tackle more challenging projects and work towards being an
| authority in my field. I found success in that, not everyone
| does.
|
| It took about 3 years to complete the degree.
| brailsafe wrote:
| I like this approach, but find it hard to deal with the
| somewhat inefficient tuition fees that you get doing one course
| at a time, at the school I've been to. The one course ends up
| costing quite a lot
| iainctduncan wrote:
| My advice (I am doing this now) pick your profs carefully and
| talk to them about your situation. Some will love having you, and
| will completely understand that you are not in the same place as
| other students. Make sure the directors and supervisors of your
| program are happy to have you and know why you are there.
|
| Some profs (usually younger!) have this attitude that if you come
| back to school you should be prepared to live just like the other
| students. They can have a bad attitude to you out of the gate,
| especially if you are financially more successful than them and
| have to occasionally make other things a higher priority.
| Unfortunately insecurity can be found anywhere. These people can
| be a real pain in the ass as a mature student and are best
| avoided.
|
| So whatever you do, make damn sure your supervisor(s) want mature
| students! I am fortunate that mine are great - they love having
| me, and we've had frank conversations about how I will hand in A+
| material every time, but sometimes I have adult responsibilities
| I have to deal with instead of making a class.
|
| It's really nice not to be beholden to anyone else's funding. I
| pick my topics, I pick my thesis, I don't owe anyone anything
| there.
| account-5 wrote:
| I'm finishing up a Comp Science degree, distance learning. Didn't
| do well at school, due to severe undiagnosed dyslexia, so went
| into the military as a boy soldier.
|
| After being diagnosed (32) I was told I could have gone to
| university had it been diagnosed at school. So when I had a
| secure enough job with enough money to try I did.
|
| My experience of starting this later in life is that you are more
| focused, patient with yourself, and dedicated. It's been hard
| working a full time job, with kids, and other commitments but has
| been worth it for me.
|
| My imposter syndrome has decreased, as my confidence in my
| abilities has increased.
|
| I will finish it soon but now realise, for me personally,
| academia is not for me. I like practical useful stuff and with a
| few exceptions most of these academic courses aren't useful.
| fm2606 wrote:
| I did my master's online part-time at DePaul. I started at 40 and
| finished at 45. I feel it was basically a glorified BS degree but
| it has served its purpose. No regrets.
|
| My kids were 5 y/o and 2 y/o when I started.
|
| I'm 52 now and just started a job that has tuition reimbursement.
| I was (am) all excited about getting another MS but right now not
| sure. The soonest I would start would be next August, I want to
| get my feet under me at the new job.
|
| If you have the means and determination I say go for it.
| monkeycantype wrote:
| I'm a software developer, and had got into a rut of working for
| finance companies, because they have the money. I'm in my early
| 50's with four kids, three still at home, and I'm working my way
| slowly through a biomedical science degree, already it's given me
| the domain knowledge to able switch industries - I'm still a
| software developer but now in a biomed startup and much happier
| for it. One of my colleagues just completed his PhD, he's about
| to turn 60. Personally, my experience is that higher education is
| much easier now that I'm older, I'm more mature and disciplined,
| and I have a different attitude, I only do classes because I want
| the knowledge that class will present to me. Sure I could read
| the text books on my own, but I find knowing I'll have to front
| up to an exam on a fixed date motivating.
| dev_0 wrote:
| You can do that only if you are FIRE
| wbc wrote:
| Can you talk more about the transition? Did you start over w/
| bachelors in biology? Are you taking classes online/on the
| side?
|
| I'm in a very similar situation as you and want to jump into
| grad school, but it looks like that's not possible w/o
| undergraduate degree.
| specproc wrote:
| I did it a bit younger, 35, but a few of the same principles
| would apply.
|
| Context: moving to a new city with my wife and dog for a 1 year
| masters.
|
| First of all, I absolutely loved it, particularly the course and
| the study. Getting up every morning with the main goal being
| learning is magnificent. My main piece of advice is that this is
| (in my experience) an excellent thing to do.
|
| I've taken a whole new and highly satisfying path with my work
| since. All in all it's been one of my better life choices.
|
| I was initially worried I'd struggle to keep up with my peers,
| based on the assumption they'd be more into the academic mindset,
| brighter and more energetic. Quite the opposite, I was pretty
| much top of my class.
|
| I found I was able to use a lot of unexpected stuff from my
| career, and that treating it like a 9 to 5 made it easy to
| organise my work and get through the material.
|
| You'll find some frustrations. I particularly hated the rigid
| course structure, and didn't see why I had to put up with modules
| I found irrelevant to my learning goals. YMMV depending on your
| course, but it's worth really kicking the tire on the non-
| optional stuff.
|
| My favourite courses were hands down the optional stuff I was
| taking from PhD programs and other departments. My core stuff
| sucked for the most part.
|
| It was also a little tough socially. I had course mates I really
| liked and respected, but most were in their twenties. I'm a
| happily married, mostly sober guy. We all had a very different
| idea of what a good time looks like. Probably different on a PhD
| program.
|
| The lecturers will be your age or younger. I had a few good
| nights hanging out with them, but that was rare.
|
| All in all, I wasn't that bothered with the social life because I
| was far too into the study to notice most of the time, but my
| wife (who was working remotely) found it hard.
|
| I hope you go for it. It was an amazing experience for me.
| yodsanklai wrote:
| > The lecturers will be your age or younger.
|
| I was a lecturer of CS, and the (very rare) older students were
| the most interesting to interact with.
| mark_l_watson wrote:
| My experience doesn't really match what you are asking, but I
| wanted to add that hopefully your education never stops. I
| consider myself under-educated in a formal sense (BS in Physics
| about 50 years ago) so I have always invested heavily in books
| and the time for self study. In the last 12 years, I have taken a
| large number of online classes.
|
| Obvious advice from me: if you can afford it and want to go back
| to school, go for it! I would take some care in choosing a field
| with good future employment prospects. Good luck.
| ivan_ah wrote:
| Tangentially related to your question, but I figured it might
| help if you need to review math at some point. Given it has been
| a while since you last did math courses, I have a non-free book
| on CALCULUS[1] and another one on LINEAR ALGEBRA[2] that are
| written specifically for adults who need a condensed (but
| complete) review of the material. See PDF previews below.
|
| [1]
| https://minireference.com/static/excerpts/noBSmathphys_v5_pr...
| [2]
| https://minireference.com/static/excerpts/noBSLA_v2_preview....
| bogwog wrote:
| Did you accidentally upload the entire books as PDFs? If not,
| then those are some really long previews.
| ivan_ah wrote:
| Yes, the long previews are intentional. Basically I wanted to
| have a full chapter from each book, then went through the
| rest of the book to select pages with topics that looked
| interesting, so I ends up with 100+ pages.
|
| The full books are 600pp and 700pp respectively (on small
| paper format 5.5"x8.5")
| readingnews wrote:
| There are a lot of comments in here, but I will throw mine in.
|
| I did the B.S. and M.S. before I was 40, but went back later to
| do the Ph.D. in my 40s.
|
| I did not have family support. My SO was totally against this. As
| an engineer, sysadmin, physicist, I feel like I have a problem
| solving mindset. It took a lot of problem solving and ignoring to
| get over the problem of no family support (I do not mean
| financial, I mean "hey, don't go do that, its a waste of time,
| what is it for, you are too old, etc, etc". Find out early on if
| people around you support this, and what mindset you will have if
| they do not.
|
| Financial. Can you afford this? You figure it out.
|
| Academic... As I have worked at three universities, I feel like
| this is probably the biggest advice or question I would ask: Are
| you of the academic / research mindset? I am assuming you are
| going into a tech / STEM field and not philosophy or the arts, so
| this can make or break you. Some people are 4.0 students and suck
| miserably at research. Some people can teach well, and do not do
| research well. Some people do research well and can not teach.
| This brings about two questions:
|
| 1) What is your goal after the Ph.D.? 2) Are you good at
| research? Most Ph.D. programs are going to have you do a pretty
| significant breadth of research to graduate.
|
| My advice: What is your main objective? Does that coincide with
| getting a Ph.D.? Are you good at research? Do you have support
| for this (if you have a SO / Family / Partner), as that can make
| it doubly tough.
|
| Finally, when you figure our your main objective be SURE your
| advisor KNOWS what you want as your goal. Most of them either
| think "you are going to finish and teach" or "you are going to
| finish and do research" or "you are going to finish and go get a
| job". The courses you take, and the amounts of
| research/papers/teaching you do will impact which path you take.
| Do not that that for granted. Tell your advisor "my goal is X".
| Remind them of this from time to time, as they will forget. You
| do not want to end up graduating, looking your advisor in the eye
| as they are telling you they have a job lined up for you and
| saying "but I really just want to go be a professor at a
| university" (which is what happened to me, and frankly, I am not
| a professor, I am a staff person that teaches when we are short
| professors, but I can not get a teaching job, as I have too few
| papers written).
|
| Hope that helps some.
| iainctduncan wrote:
| last paragraph is right on the money. Super important
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