lack of hard skills in preparation for future jobs?

[Dear Summer]

I graduated college with a B.S degree that is broad
I look at my friends who are in medical, pharmacy, dental, law, etc.. and they are getting trained to use the exact SPECIFIC skills that they are taught.
I'm in the process of looking at M.S. graduate programs and even after I finish the program, I have no idea if I'll be using those skills. I don't know what else I'd be fit for. There is a lot of flexibility and different industries that I can go that it's a gift and a curse.
In the corporate world, people in finance develop modeling, valuation, and a bunch of other skills so they are employable in the finance industry. Unlike them, I feel like I'm not developing any hard skills.. everything is so broad and general

 

[IronWing]

If you're going to grad school, don't sweat it. Grad school is like voc tech, you'll learn useful stuff you never had time for as an undergrad.

 

[rcxEric]

ronald mcdonald will probably take u in

 

[CRXican]

read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

 

[looker001]

You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

 

[ggnl]

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

 

[Dear Summer]

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

 

[RKS]

Originally posted by: Dear Summer

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

My I.S. degree was as equally worthless.

 

[Capt Caveman]

Originally posted by: RKS

Originally posted by: Dear Summer

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

My I.S. degree was as equally worthless.

Neither of you did any interns to get some experience?

 

[imported_Imp]

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman

Originally posted by: RKS

Originally posted by: Dear Summer

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

My I.S. degree was as equally worthless.

Neither of you did any interns to get some experience?

I'm in roughly the same boat as OP, but with an engineering degree. Thanks to that degree, I'm currently reviewing and re-designing an entire database system using everything I learned doing design projects. They didn't ask me to do it, I just hate seeing shit so inefficient, and it's the first time I had to use my noggin in a while.

So many transferable skills, but I still can't score an engineering related job cause I did no internships. My first summer, I failed a course, so I didn't bother applying to anything. My second summer, I didn't quite know where to look, so just got a well paying I.T. related job. Third summer, I went back to I.T. cause I didn't get any early offers; I finally got an offer to do transport work 1 week before I was to go back to the I.T. gig. And the fourth year, I had other career goals, and I wasn't officially eligible since I wasn't going back to school in the fall. Ah shit...

 

[finite automaton]

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman

Originally posted by: RKS

Originally posted by: Dear Summer

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

My I.S. degree was as equally worthless.

Neither of you did any interns to get some experience?

I'll be getting my BA in CS in May. I would be SOL if I hadn't been doing internships for ~3 years.

 

[Dear Summer]

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman

Originally posted by: RKS

Originally posted by: Dear Summer

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

My I.S. degree was as equally worthless.

Neither of you did any interns to get some experience?

well for me, I have no trouble getting jobs but I'm concerned about my future
in the business world, I am getting exposure but becoming a master of none.
there's no guided path because I am not trained like doctors, dentists, lawyers, or engineers where they went to school to learn specific skills

 

[RKS]

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman

Originally posted by: RKS

Originally posted by: Dear Summer

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: looker001
You don't know anything when you finish with bs degree and employer knows that. I have b.s. finance degree and i know nothing beyond the theory. Whenever i get a job, an employer will teach me everything that i need to know.

Not sure about other industries, but this is pretty much exactly right in the business world.

OP, what is your degree in?

Information science

My I.S. degree was as equally worthless.

Neither of you did any interns to get some experience?

No intern experience for me but I was in a much better market (late 90's). Right after graduation I got as job doing COBOL programming and after a few weeks I realized that it was a good thing I didn't cash my signing bonus. I got a new job the next day working with VB. After about 3 years I had an epiphany and decided I didn't go to school to sit in a cube all day; maybe it was years of sitting next to a vegan hippie who didn't use deodrant, insisted on eating massive quantities of beans every lunch but wasn't shy about his daily flatulance issue.

long story short: I got my JD.

 

[pontifex]

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

look at what their degrees are in though. Theater...human development (what is human development?), and meteorology...

the news article would probably get better publicity had they used people with more traditional degrees or at least BS degrees instead of BA degrees.

 

[shoRunner]

Originally posted by: pontifex

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

look at what their degrees are in though. Theater...human development (what is human development?), and meteorology...

the news article would probably get better publicity had they used people with more traditional degrees or at least BS degrees instead of BA degrees.

exactly, kid got a theater degree and is suprised he's having trouble getting a job....

 

[sjwaste]

Originally posted by: Dear Summer
I graduated college with a B.S degree that is broad
I look at my friends who are in medical, pharmacy, dental, law, etc.. and they are getting trained to use the exact SPECIFIC skills that they are taught.
I'm in the process of looking at M.S. graduate programs and even after I finish the program, I have no idea if I'll be using those skills. I don't know what else I'd be fit for. There is a lot of flexibility and different industries that I can go that it's a gift and a curse.
In the corporate world, people in finance develop modeling, valuation, and a bunch of other skills so they are employable in the finance industry. Unlike them, I feel like I'm not developing any hard skills.. everything is so broad and general

Med, pharm, law, dental, etc are professions, in that you go to a professional school to learn them. They teach you those specific skills, and you generally come out eligible for licensure to practice. Also, as a law student (graduating this yr), I object to your stating that they teach us specific skills to practice law We learn a whole lot of law, but very little of the mechanics (how/when to draft, file, procedure, etc). That's stuff we get to learn "in practice", woohoo!

Other graduate degrees may vary in how vocational they actually are. For instance, an MFA probably isn't going to prepare you to be a professional artist, but you might be able to come out and teach. It's a broad degree, in which you can choose to concentrate.

 

[IGBT]

..luck=preparation and opportunity. I wish you luck.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

Alfred said he owes more than $125,000 for his degrees in theater when he's not even working in that field.

Maybe I'm just ignorant on the subject but, exactly what kind of jobs are out there in the field of Theater?
And $125k in debt for it? With that kind of debt, you'd better have at least a Master's degree in one of the sciences, or medicine.
Or go to a public school. I'm going to Penn State, and tuition is closing in on $7k per semester.

And maybe it's just me, but maintaining a decent GPA isn't too tough either. The biggest thing that'll kill you is time. Homework takes time, as does preparing for tests (which homework can do). With that, if you demonstrate sufficient financial need, you can get grants. If you're really good, and have all that nice extra-curricular stuff, and are all outgoing and community-oriented, then scholarships are also an option.

My sister got some scholarships, and it allowed her to attend a private university she really wanted to get into. She had job offers before she even graduated, and is now on track to pay off her loans in just a few years. It can pay off, but the decisions you make, such as how much to spend on college, what field, and others, can greatly influence that payback time.

 

[BrownTown]

Originally posted by: pontifex

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

look at what their degrees are in though. Theater...human development (what is human development?), and meteorology...

the news article would probably get better publicity had they used people with more traditional degrees or at least BS degrees instead of BA degrees.

how can those even be possible? How can you get 125,000$ in debt going to college then gets a 10$/hr job? Someone that retarded deserves to have a crappy life. I mean hes gonna default on his loan and then us tax payers are gonna foot the bill for his idiocy.

I mean I had 14,000$ in debt from college which seems very high to me, and I will pay it off in one year. Maybe these idiots should have actually though about their career path before getting into huge debt...

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: BrownTown

Originally posted by: pontifex

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

look at what their degrees are in though. Theater...human development (what is human development?), and meteorology...

the news article would probably get better publicity had they used people with more traditional degrees or at least BS degrees instead of BA degrees.

how can those even be possible? How can you get 125,000$ in debt going to college then gets a 10$/hr job? Someone that retarded deserves to have a crappy life. I mean hes gonna default on his loan and then us tax payers are gonna foot the bill for his idiocy.

I mean I had 14,000$ in debt from college which seems very high to me, and I will pay it off in one year. Maybe these idiots should have actually though about their career path before getting into huge debt...

Private loans can no longer be expunged right? And government ones never could be? He can go bankrupt, but that debt load isn't going anywhere until he flees the country or dies. So he's totally fucked.

Yes, going 125K into debt for a theater is pretty damn stupid but that's a hell of a price to pay for a few years of stupid. Especially since you've got everyone and their brother just telling you "go to college and you'll be rich!" He's a stupid kid, so he thinks if he can just get a degree in theater he'll make some good money. His destiny may have been to flip hamburgers at McDonalds his whole (house...WTF?) life, which would have sucked but now he gets to be ass raped by a mountain of inescapable debt while living the shit life.

Do you think private lenders would have lent him all that cash for theater degree if it were possible for him to default on the loan?

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: PingSpike
...
Yes, going 125K into debt for a theater is pretty damn stupid but that's a hell of a price to pay for a few years of stupid. Especially since you've got everyone and their brother just telling you "go to college and you'll be rich!" He's a stupid kid, so he thinks if he can just get a degree in theater he'll make some good money. His destiny may have been to flip hamburgers at McDonalds his house life, which would have sucked but now he gets to be ass raped by a mountain of inescapable debt while living the shit life.
...

Maybe his theater education will enable him to convince more to buy Value Meals, making him the sales leader at the franchise, putting him on the fast track to management. Why with a management salary at McDonalds, he can probably pay off that debt before he dies of old age....assuming he lives to be 175.

 

[BrownTown]

Originally posted by: PingSpike
Do you think private lenders would have lent him all that cash for theater degree if it were possible for him to default on the loan?

well, I don't know how it all works, but college loans are guaranteed by the federal government right, so what do they care, they are gonna get paid by the taxpayers if not by this kid.

I mean, SOMEONE is gonna have to end up paying for all of this, he clearly will never be able to pay off the debt flipping burgers. He probably couldn't even make the interest payments. In reality, maybe bank will lose its money, or the government, it doesn't really matter, it will mean higher prices for the rest of us. Sure its spread out over so many people that it seems like nothing, but its morally equivalent (in my mind) to randomly choosing one of us posters here and saying we have to pay off half his debt. You could take that money and save how many lives with it? The world would have been a better place if this kid were never born, his life will be a net loser for society since he will have consumed more goods and services then he will likely ever be able to pay back.

 

[Corporate Thug]

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

I love stories like this. Don't go to college because 3 people with crappy degrees can't find jobs!

 

[BrownTown]

Originally posted by: Corporate Thug

Originally posted by: CRXican
read/watch:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business...tory?id=6654468&page=1

I love stories like this. Don't go to college because 3 people with crappy degrees can't find jobs!

yeah, I'm sure we could all post the exact opposite on here too. None of the people I knew with engineering degrees had trouble finding jobs. Even the ones with "worthless" degrees ended up making decent money like 40,000$/yr in business, and those sorts of jobs have alot more growth potential than engineering ever will.