{"id":332,"date":"2009-03-25T16:18:23","date_gmt":"2009-03-25T21:18:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/?p=332"},"modified":"2023-12-20T16:25:21","modified_gmt":"2023-12-20T21:25:21","slug":"in-defense-of-grad-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/2009\/03\/25\/in-defense-of-grad-school\/","title":{"rendered":"In Defense of Grad School"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve received lots of praise and pats-on-the-back for my acceptance into Grad School here at UofT for Computer Science.<\/p>\n

However, there’s another side of the coin.\u00a0 While I was still mulling the decision, I mentioned it to a few people here and there, and sometimes I got a strange look…like I’d agreed to have a lobotomy, or take experimental medication or something.<\/p>\n

Believe it or not, I’m still getting it from time to time.\u00a0 It’s strange.<\/p>\n

At one point, I posted my Grad School status on Twitter, and got back the response “Don’t!\u00a0 It’s a trap!”\u00a0 Trap?\u00a0 Really?\u00a0 Have aliens taken over the school?\u00a0 Am I unwittingly joining some bizarre cult?\u00a0 Am I going to get pushed down an empty elevator shaft on my first day?\u00a0 Awful hazing rituals?\u00a0 What’s going on?<\/p>\n

What’s wrong with Grad School?<\/strong> I’ve asked a few people this question, and gotten the following (paraphrased) responses:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. You’ve been in school too long.\u00a0 Get out now and enter the work force!\u00a0 Don’t you want to have fun?<\/li>\n
  2. Grad School is expensive.\u00a0 You’re going to go deeper into debt.<\/li>\n
  3. If you choose a thesis\/subject that you end up disliking, it will be an awful experience<\/li>\n
  4. Work first.\u00a0 Then go to Grad School.\u00a0 Just trust me.<\/li>\n
  5. You’re educated enough – you don’t need a Masters degree.\u00a0 You’ll learn everything you need in the field.<\/li>\n
  6. The courses are super hard and boring.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Here are my responses, in defense of Grad School – they’re numbered to correspond.<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Who says Grad School isn’t fun?\u00a0 I really enjoy the field of Computer Science, and this is my opportunity to do some cutting edge research.\u00a0 The whole point of a thesis (I believe) is to focus on something in the field and make it my own – to master <\/em>it.\u00a0 This means background research, thesis, experiments, conclusion, the whole bit.\u00a0 That’s the science part.
      \nAlso, there’s a self-serving economic payoff:\u00a0 Bachelors degrees are going down in value.\u00a0 Lots of people have a B.Sc.\u00a0 A Master’s degree stands out, and will bring higher pay and more interesting jobs.
      \nMy uncle once said that his days in Grad School were the most educational because of the people that surrounded him, and the conversations that he had.\u00a0 I think I’ll find that here, and it’s exciting.<\/li>\n
    2. Believe it or not, I’m actually getting paid <\/strong>to do this.\u00a0 Sure, I owe the University a chunk of money.\u00a0 Thankfully, the Department of Computer Science is paying for it, and I should have enough left over to live a modest lifestyle.\u00a0 Living like a student for one more year isn’t so bad – it could certainly be worse.<\/li>\n
    3. Why would I choose a thesis or subject that I don’t like?\u00a0 From what I’m told, the first few weeks of Grad School are spent scouring around with a supervisor, trying to nail down a thesis subject.\u00a0 I plan to do one better, and try to nail a thesis subject down this summer<\/em>.\u00a0 Once I’ve got it nailed down, I’ll do the background reading, and try to figure out some interesting experiments.\u00a0 It’s easier said than done, but I’m not going to be stupid enough to pick a thesis on something I really can’t stand.\u00a0 Am I going to do my thesis on complexity theory?\u00a0 No, of course not.\u00a0 Am I going to do it on how to teach software engineering students design patterns in a more visual, animated way?\u00a0 Who knows, maybe.<\/li>\n
    4. This answer assumes that I haven’t worked before.\u00a0 I’ve worked.\u00a0 I’ve been out there.\u00a0 “You haven’t seen the real working world”…well, maybe I haven’t, but I’ve seen something that’s probably pretty close.\u00a0 Working three summers at the school board hasn’t been a cakewalk.
      \nSome might argue that working for a while before going to Grad School will help me to gain the discipline necessary to work in an unsupervised environment.\u00a0 Well, I have to tell you, I was barely <\/em>supervised at the school board.\u00a0 They gave me a task, and I did it to the best of my ability, with little-to-no oversight.\u00a0 I set my own schedules, I dealt with clients directly.\u00a0 I can work on my own.\u00a0 I can manage my time.\u00a0 I know how to work hard.\u00a0 Don’t give me that “real world” crap.<\/li>\n
    5. Like I said in #1, a B.Sc. isn’t what it used to be.\u00a0 Lots of people have them, and it’s probably becoming less useful as a marker for separating the wheat from the chaff.\u00a0 It’s only 17 months more work, but I think the payoff is going to be considerable.<\/li>\n
    6. Maybe.\u00a0 Thankfully, I’m only taking two<\/span> a maximum of three per semester.\u00a0 Workload does not frighten me anymore – I’ve been overloading myself for years, and I’m fine.\u00a0 I’m not at all saying that Graduate School courses are going to be a breeze – but, and I hope I don’t sound arrogant,\u00a0 I’m more-or-less used to doing the practically impossible<\/em>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Have I missed any reasons for not going to Grad School?\u00a0 Do my rebuttals miss something entirely?\u00a0 It’s a bit of a moot point now – I’ve already accepted the offer.\u00a0 But if there are any interesting reasons that I missed, I’d love to hear them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      I’ve received lots of praise and pats-on-the-back for my acceptance into Grad School here at UofT for Computer Science. However, there’s another side of the coin.\u00a0 While I was still mulling the decision, I mentioned it to a few people here and there, and sometimes I got a strange look…like I’d agreed to have a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[110,6],"tags":[177,179,178,183,67],"class_list":["post-332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-musings","category-personal","tag-grad-school","tag-graduate","tag-masters","tag-masters-degree","tag-uoft"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/prmTy-5m","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3253,"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions\/3253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mikeconley.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}