About starting

[Ensign Steve]

I just registered to take the GRE and now I am having a mini panic attack. :freakout:

Every time the website asked me what my educational goal was, I clicked "Ph.D." and I thought to myself, "WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE KIDDING, DR. QUITTER?!"

I'm set to get my BS in May '12, and I want to start grad school that fall in August '12, so the ball is officially rolling now. :freakout: again!

The Ph.D. CS program at UGA is a five-to-six-year program. That is a really long time for me to commit to something like that. My five-year plan changes every six months. The longest I ever stayed at a job was the Air Force, and that was because quitting that job lands you in prison. Even then, I lived in different states, served in different units, and held various jobs, so it's not like it was four years of the same thing or anything.

I have transcripts from (I think) six colleges and universities. I started pursuing my BS in 1994 and have changed majors twice.

I'm going to put a positive spin on it and say that spending 18 years (OMFG) obtaining a four-year degree actually shows that I really can commit, I do have the endurance required, and after that, 5 or 6 years will be child's play.

Yeah, that's the ticket. :hyperventilate:

[Naru]

Congrats and good luck :goodluck:

[wildernesse]

Good luck! And (from my observation, not experience), getting a PhD has different phases so it won't necessarily feel like the same thing for the whole time.

[livius drusus]

I have friends I went to high school with (class of '90 lol olds) who have been in college this whole time. It's an Italian tradition to take as many decades getting your degree as humangly possible, so really you're just being multi-cultural.

[Goliath]

The best of luck to you.

FWIW, if you haven't already (and I wouldn't be at all surprised if you have), I'd sit down and make sure you have some kind of life plan. What do you want to do after graduating? Do you want to go into academia (if so, be prepared to enter a job market that is tighter than a virgin midget, and make sure you're getting a good pedigree)? Do you want to go into industry? If so, doing what? What kinds of jobs have been taken by the CS PhD alumni in your school?

[Ensign Steve]

FWIW, if you haven't already (and I wouldn't be at all surprised if you have), I'd sit down and make sure you have some kind of life plan.

My five-year plan changes every six months.

If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.

This is my life. Right now, all of it. If life is something that starts when I'm done with school, I may never have one, and that's fine with me. I love school for it's own sake, not as a means to an end, otherwise I'd get my MBA. I have the luxuries of a cheap mortgage, no kids, and a supportive spouse with a similar attitude toward school and career, which helps loads. I can get my Ph.D. and then go work as a receptionist until I retire or die for all I care. As long as I don't have to design web pages.

[livius drusus]

What do I get for five dollars?

[Ensign Steve]

Freethought Forum (http://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=2&music=2&url=www.freethought-forum.com)

[lisarea]

My babby bort was in school p. much until he was almost 40. He's got something like five degrees, and his post-school plans were maybe opening a bike shop or going back into welding.

He ended up getting a different job in a field completely unrelated to any of his studies, but his PhD did get him in on a technicality.

I don't know if you're born that way or if it's a lifestyle choice, but either way, you've got a community.

[Ensign Steve]

Yeah, I don't mean to be like I don't have a plan at all (right now the plan is: graduate, go to grad school) it's just that they never, ever, ever pan out like I plan them. Which is why I'm nervous to even start something that's not supposed to end until 2018, much less think about anything beyond that.

But, hey! Lots of people like plan to get married and have a house with a cheap mortgage and that's just like something that happened to me by accident while I kept being unable to decide which coast I wanted to live on. Which BTW if I'd decided to stay on the other coast the plan was to already have the BS degree by this time and who knows what the hell I'd be doing with it but I surely wouldn't have this rad house and spouse.

Anyway I told my doctor boss that the plan was to get the Ph.D. and then fucking retire, and he said that actually tons of people say they're going to do that but then they end up teaching for 40 years, which would also be cool.

[Goliath]

I can get my Ph.D. and then go work as a receptionist until I retire or die for all I care. As long as I don't have to design web pages.

In that case, have fun. :)

[Dingfod]

I just registered to take the GRE and now I am having a mini panic attack. :freakout:

Every time the website asked me what my educational goal was, I clicked "Ph.D." and I thought to myself, "WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE KIDDING, DR. QUITTER?!"That reminds me of my career goals when I first started with my most recent employer: Supervisor, Manager, Director, Vice-President, President, CEO, Chairman of the Board.

I'm such a quitter loser.

[Ensign Steve]

But you have my dream job!

:hammock:

[Ensign Steve]

Oh wait, I just remembered! I already have a life plan! (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=899954#post899954) And I'm on the right track, too. :giggles:

[Ensign Steve]

So, let us talk about the GRE. I'm taking the general test in August and the subject test in Computer Science in November.

Please tell me all your experiences with the GRE, especially what you did to prepare and whether you found said preparation useful or necessary when test time came. I'm looking at prep books on Amazon and reading the reviews, but I don't trust those idiots.

[Naru]

I learned that I had to take the GRE before September 1st in mid-August, so my studying was slightly rushed. I bought the Princeton Review GRE book because their SAT book is awesome. My mom is like a standardized test wizard, and she uses that book in the SAT class she teaches. I ended up reading through it twice, I think.

The verbal section of the GRE is fucking hard - a 740 is 99th percentile, compared to an 800 math being only 94th percentile. I wanted to really kick ass on the verbal section and make myself stand out, and I figured I suck at math anyway, so I spent way more time studying for the verbal section. I made flash cards of every GRE word I didn't know in my book, plus another book I got, plus any other word I heard that I didn't know. I also highly recommend supplementing a GRE book with the material that the ETS provides (scroll down): GRE General Test: Prepare for the Test (http://www.ets.org/gre/general/prepare/) . Their review of math concepts was especially helpful to me. I did very little to prepare for the essays, because vet schools don't care about them. I read over the material for them in my book, but never wrote anything.

On the day of the test, there will be someone sitting two computers down banging on the keyboard like a monkey. Bring earplugs. I learned about 350 fucking hard words and saw two or three of them total on the test. Unless you really go for it, just straight up learning vocabulary won't be that useful, so maybe also focusing on learning prefixes, suffixes, and stems would be helpful.

[ChuckF]

Did not prepare. They sent me a free CD with a sample test on it, but it took a long time to click through. That worked out fine. Should try harder for the bar exam.

[Ensign Steve]

:news: Update

I bought a box of vocabulary flash cards but decided against getting any books. I'm taking the revised test (http://www.ets.org/gre/revised_general/know) that comes out in August 1, and so everything is all different. They completely got rid of antonyms and analogies (they say it's because it's not meaningful to test vocabulary words outside of context but of course I think it's because of the dumbing down of America).

The Princeton Review and Kaplan and all them say that they have books for the revised version, but nobody has taken it yet so I don't trust them. Since I'm a registered and paid test-taker, I have access to all kinds of free and cheap prep material directly from ETS, and it all looks pretty basic. Not that that is likely to stop me from taking at least one prep course here at school if they offer it for the new test.

:biter:

[Ensign Steve]

I took the GRE general test last month or the month before, I guess. I took the new test, so I won't get my results until November. I'm going to take the computer science subject test next weekend.

At this point, I'm seriously reconsidering. I'm going to submit the application and apply for assistantships just in case, but my senior year is really taking the wind out of my sails. It's just so much damn work for no money, and I know grad school is just going to be 1000 times worse. I would love for the first time in my life to be done with school.

So the new plan (what do you know? it's been six months!) is to also go to job fairs and work on my resume and look for actual work in parallel with my grad school application timeline, and come graduation, if I have a choice to make, I'll consider myself lucky. I might also ask the Air Force about officer training opportunities in the guard or reserve.

[ChuckF]

That sounds like a very good new plan.

I really, really enjoyed grad school. I got to choose what to focus on and what classes to take. It didn't hurt that I got paid (modestly) to do it. BUT, I can't really encourage anyone else to do it right now unless there is some real, non-speculative career benefit to an advanced degree. My MA is the only thing more worthless than my JD is going to be, and that is pretty fucking worthless. So when you're thinking about doing an MS or whatever in Comp Sci (surely you are not thinking about a PhD right now) consider carefully whether there is a tangible career benefit to doing it immediately after you finish your first degree. Would getting that MS now qualify you for a job that you couldn't get with a BS? If not, don't do it now. Do it later. GRE scores are usually good for 3-5 years. Get a job and hold the fuck on to it.

[Ensign Steve]

The job search is ugly. The real world is scary. All the work is in Atlanta, and I love myself too much to start commuting like that again. Also it's all in web development, which, no.

However:

I emailed one of my previous professors about the possibility of independent study next semester and he wrote back within 6 minutes: "Yes! I have the perfect project for you!" Here's hoping it's not sharpening pencils all day. :giggles:

It's not sharpening pencils, y'all.

He wants us to develop a course together over spring which I would then teach (for cash money) as early as this summer. I am so fired up over this opportunity that I just can't get over myself. He really, really wants me to come to grad school, and he's talking to me like a recruiter. Don't worry about money. We have plenty of funding. You'll go far. Etc.

:tweek:

[Deadlokd]

That is enormously awesome ES. Great opportunity. If this works out would you consider academia as a career path?

[Kyuss Apollo]

What a delightful turn of events, ES! I hope that works out -- it sounds like a lot of fun!

Did you get your GREs back yet?

[Ensign Steve]

Not yet. Supposed to be this month, I think.

[Ensign Steve]

I got my official acceptance into the Computer Science MS program at UGA. I keep being on the fence about it, but I figure it's just 2 more years of school :gah: and it'd probably be easier to knock it out now rather than later. It's not like I have anything better to do right now.

I don't think an MS degree is going to do me any more good than my BS does at this time and place, but that's not saying much. If I do end up in Silicon Valley or some place in the future (time for a new five-year plan!), I think it will make me more competitive. I hope. I don't think it could hurt, anyway, at least not for the kind of work I'd like to do.

[Ensign Steve]

I'm posting this here and now so I can look back upon it and lol at myself for being an optimist.

You guys, this is so awesome. I haven't even graduated yet, and I'm already balls-deep in this thing and I love it.

All my life I've given the minimum I can get away with and still get the job done. I don't think it is because I am lazy or have a poor work ethic (although it definitely has a lot to do with how badly I tend to procrastinate), but rather because I discovered early on that I have talent and skill in certain areas where my half-assed job is still better than anyone expected. This also comes from a lifetime of being underemployed on purpose so I could focus on other things like school and/or having fun.

Suddenly on this project, for the first time that I can remember, I am truly fired up and giving it all I have. I am challenged by the work, and frankly terrified of fucking up and looking stupid. I am also actually genuinely excited to do the work and I'm enjoying all the different aspects of it, even the administrative stuff I usually hate. And the stuff that terrifies most everyone in my field, like writing and public speaking. You think I'm nervous to defend my thesis? Bitch, please, I sat promotion boards in the Air Force. I know what pressure feels like. I'm finding out that a lifetime of false starts and weird tangents has somehow culminated into a diverse and highly-valuable skill set. I think I'm going to surprise people with what I'm capable of.

I'm still an undergrad and I'm not getting paid except in college credit, and even that's okay. I recently heard some platitude like "don't take a job you wouldn't be willing to do for free" or some shit like that. Which I think is great in theory, but it's like, no dude, work sucks, that's why they have to pay you to do it. Well they're not paying me, and it doesn't suck, and I'm having a blast. I could see doing this for the next two years or so and not hating my life.

Like I said, this is all for :lol:z later when I'm hating my life.

Hey, look! A breadcrumb from January:
If I do end up in Silicon Valley or some place in the future (time for a new five-year plan!)

[Ymir's blood]

:jd:

[Waluigi]

:woohoo: :yay: :yay!: :w00t:

As for back-to-back B.S. to M.S. in Comp Sci -- in theory it's not going to buy you much, unless you'd like to get a Ph.D. some day. That said, it also won't hurt, and having a prof. who supports you and is courting you into grad school bodes very well for future job prospects in and around academia. Even if you're only an adjunct and have a "day job" programming or doing something else computer sciencey.

So... congrats! Glad to hear you're enjoying the work!

[Kael]

I recently heard some platitude like "don't take a job you wouldn't be willing to do for free" or some shit like that. Which I think is great in theory, but it's like, no dude, work sucks, that's why they have to pay you to do it. Well they're not paying me, and it doesn't suck, and I'm having a blast. I could see doing this for the next two years or so and not hating my life.
The platitude I remember was something like "find a job you love and you'll never work another day in your life." The takeaway for me was always that a lot of times you'll have to do things that suck just to keep bills paid, but if you're sufficiently careful and/or lucky you can find someone to pay you for something that you actually want to do, and that this is preferable to a hypothetically bigger paycheck for a job you hate.

My entire goal in school, aside from knowledge for its own sake, has been to find something I enjoy that I can also get paid for.