What do you do? And how did you get there?

necine

Diamond Member
Jan 25, 2005
3,631
0
0
I'm currently changing colleges. I went to Rutgers for 3 semesters, majoring in Philosophy. I have nearly 40 credits. Right now I am on a semester off, working at a small ISP for $10/hr. I will be going back to school next fall and want to explore career options. So give us your job title, some information about what exactly you do, and approximately how much you get paid. Please include past educational history as well. This will probably be good for those of us still in college deciding what the hell to do with our lives.
 

chrisms

Diamond Member
Mar 9, 2003
6,615
0
0
Dough Roller/Pizza Delivery Driver

My brother told the manager to hire me a few years ago.

I roll the dough some days and other days I deliver the pizzas. On some special days I do both.
 

LeadMagnet

Platinum Member
Mar 26, 2003
2,348
0
0
I design, implement, and repair SANs & WANs. I drove here. No college. $250/hr for consulting & $125/hr for teaching - you pay travel expenses.
 

nageov3t

Lifer
Feb 18, 2004
42,808
83
91
data center tech. basically doing hardware work on internet servers (building, upgrading, and fixing them). making about 35K/year, with good benefits.

dual-majored in English Lit and Sociology at Penn State. I'm going back to grad school for a BS in technical writing whenever I get the cash to pay for it.
 

ondarkness

Platinum Member
Nov 10, 2004
2,003
1
81
production manager for PAXAR. not Pixar. although that would be nice too.
used a temp agency, and then worked my way up.

 

Drakkon

Diamond Member
Aug 14, 2001
8,401
1
0
Went to College...got a degree in mathematics (minor in CS)....at the same time took on work as a web based class developer (through university $12/hr)...boss there went to work at another company where right before my graduation he looked me up, went to work for him developing software that goes in the back of teaching manuals for $30K a year (+benfits), now i lead up a team of programmers that are building stand alone educational software for $60K a year /w benefits with my name going on publications so i get a % of each sale....

its all about who ya know ;)
 

Ausm

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
25,213
14
81
Dropped out of College ran out of cash. Started working for a large corporation and started my mold making apprenticeship, made a journeyman in 3 years. My Boss found out I had an aptitude for computers( I was in charge of programming 3d surfs) so I applied for a low level tech peon job lost about 15K in wages. I was sent back to school earned every cert there was available worked myself into the Head Systems administrator job which took about five years. I make close to 4X as much as when I was a mold maker Journeyman.

Ausm
 

Megatomic

Lifer
Nov 9, 2000
20,127
6
81
Particle accelerator operator/sysadmin

I got here by having been a naval nuke ET and an instrument engineer in the private sector.
I have over 200 credit hours in math/physics/cs/engineering, but I lack a few humanities and some lit classes so I have no official BS yet. :eek:

I make about $55K/yr plus differential for working back shifts and holidays.
 

ivol07

Golden Member
Jun 25, 2002
1,475
0
0
Barely graduated high school. Went to Community College for a couple years while working at UPS. Studied Graphic Design and printing. Decided it would be best for me to get a "quickie" degree from one of the places you see in the Sunday paper. Got an Associates Degree the next year in Graphic Design while still working at UPS. By this time I had been promoted to Supervisor. All this time I'm teaching myself skills in web design. Had a job waiting for me as a Web Designer the week I graduated that I had found online. Started out making $20k a year. 5 years later I'm now "Lead Web Developer" (whatever that means) for a software company programming in PERL and PHP. I'm making $55k a year with benefits.
 

minendo

Elite Member
Aug 31, 2001
35,558
20
81
Production Supervisor/HACCP Coordinator. Oversee first shift production as well as food safety for a well-known food company. BS in Food Science from Purdue University and landed the job through the placement coordinator at school. As for pay, it pays enough. ;)
 

AdamSnow

Diamond Member
Nov 21, 2002
5,736
0
76
IT Coordinator - Canada for a very large natural gas company... :)

It's all in how you present yourself...
 

Jfrag Teh Foul

Diamond Member
Jul 18, 2001
3,146
0
0
Originally posted by: loki8481
data center tech. basically doing hardware work on internet servers (building, upgrading, and fixing them). making about 35K/year, with good benefits.

Just about the same here.

 

Armitage

Banned
Feb 23, 2001
8,086
0
0
Went to school (Virginia Tech) on ROTC scholarship - finished with M.S. in Aerospace Eng., emphasis on structures

Got an educational delay of active duty to continue on for my M.S. at VT in Engineering Mech, emphasis on composite material & structures.

Air Force decides to send to to Los Angeles AFB, to work in an area I have absolutely no background in.

While I'm there, I teach myself astrodynamics, and managed to get into an internship program available for company grade officers. This allowed me to work hands-n on the astrodynamics dept. of a defense company. My CO denied my first request to participate in this program, but I went back and asked again, which was not my nature at the time. Was a very stressful decision. Did well at the internship, published some papers.

Got out of the Air Force 1 year later (4 years total). Didn't see any future beyond pushing papers as an engineer in the Air Force. There are some opportunites, but few & far between.

Got a job with a smallish defense contractor in Colorado Springs - I doubt I would have been offered any hands-on jobs if I hadn't done the intership, and published out of it. I had some high level clearances out of the Air Force which helped as well.

Got acquired by another company, didn't like the new deal so found a position with the company I had done the internship with.

Busted my @ss, got some good break, waited out some lean times, and, for the moment, things are looking good. Doing interesting work and getting paid well for it :p

edit Currently doing astrodynamics & satellite operations R&D
 

mwmorph

Diamond Member
Dec 27, 2004
8,877
1
81
Senior Engineer for GE Medical

VA telecommute everyday.
$70K +benefits.

I plan to be transferred to GE Aeronautical soon since that's what I majored in.

UVA Cavaliers. majors: Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering
Minors: ROTC, Physics.
Wasted a lot of time in the marines. My reserve time is almost up. if you dontneed the scholarship or absolutely LOVE america, dont join the military. not fun. my former roommate said to me, get out as soon as you can man.
 

aircooled

Lifer
Oct 10, 2000
15,965
1
0
all around I.T. guy/network tech for about 100 person company.
High school dropout, turned hobby into career. got some certs early on (Net+, MCSE...)
 

Jzero

Lifer
Oct 10, 1999
18,834
1
0
Information Security.
Graduated from TCNJ in 2001 with a BS in CompSci.

I pretty much lucked into it, but the lynchpin was networking - knowing the right people got me here.
 

Ornery

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
20,022
17
81
Once in a Lifetime - Talking Heads
Remain In Light - 1980
  • And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
    And you may find yourself in another part of the world
    And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
    And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful Wife
    And you may ask yourself-well...how did I get here?

    Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
    Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
    Into the blue again/after the money?s gone
    Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

    And you may ask yourself
    How do I work this?
    And you may ask yourself
    Where is that large automobile?
    And you may tell yourself
    This is not my beautiful house!
    And you may tell yourself
    This is not my beautiful wife!

    Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
    Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
    Into the blue again/after the money?s gone
    Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

    Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
    Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
    Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...

    Water dissolving...and water removing
    There is water at the bottom of the ocean
    Carry the water at the bottom of the ocean
    Remove the water at the bottom of the ocean!

    Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
    Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
    Into the blue again/in the silent water
    Under the rocks and stones/there is water underground.

    Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
    Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
    Into the blue again/after the money?s gone
    Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

    And you may ask yourself
    What is that beautiful house?
    And you may ask yourself
    Where does that highway go?
    And you may ask yourself
    Am I right? ...am I wrong?
    And you may tell yourself
    My god!...what have I done?

    Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
    Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
    Into the blue again/in the silent water
    Under the rocks and stones/there is water underground.

    Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
    Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
    Into the blue again/after the money?s gone
    Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

    Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
    Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
    Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
 

Tifababy

Senior member
Feb 5, 2001
654
1
81
Graduated from UW-Madison 2 years ago with degree in Computer Engineering. Landed a job at a very large computer company as a Computer Engineer (duh), make close to $60k. Life is good.
 
Dec 28, 2001
11,391
3
0
I'm a philosophy major at a state school. With a lousy GPA in my highschool, I got in with a high score in the ACTs.

As far as what I do for a job/possible career option, I train students in kung fu. Got here through lots of bruises (and the occasional blood).
 
L

Lola

was going to Univers. of MI as a theatre major. I needed a p/t job and i started working at my aunts Allstate two days a week. Soon, it was trhee days a week...
several years later, i am successful, still in insurance sales full time.

I am the most un-desk-job person ever, but i like what i do and i am good at it!

I hope to some day own my own agency!
 

jjones

Lifer
Oct 9, 2001
15,424
2
0
I have my own online business, with some web work on the side, which nets me about 75k/year and allows me to live in Cancun and hang out on the beach whenever I want to. I got here by driving my convertible RX-7 from Los Angeles. I have an education but these days I feel pretty stupid; most likely that's from all the tequila I've been drinking for the past 25 years, along with a healthy dose of preferring to be blissfully ignorant. I managed to get into my current business by complete accident when a friend thought I might be interested in writing web pages. I wasn't doing anything at the time so I thought, why not, and then borrowed his book on html.