And, though these times may be dark, never, ever go into a PhD program that costs you tuition directly or does not provide a stipend.
“If you’re paying for grad school, you’re doing it wrong”
I don’t buy this as a blanket statement. It highly depends on what sort of educational track you’re pursuing.
At least in the US, there are many graduate level healthcare degrees out there that require you to pay for them. Yet they net a well paying career. Ex: physician associate, anesthesia assistant
If you’re specifically referring to research-focused graduate degrees and not job-focused graduate degrees, then I agree with you.
My original comment was about the PhD specifically, which is necessarily research focused.
But even so, I’d argue that it is prudent as a blanket statement about grad school generally. Wages across entire classes of roles can stagnate relatively quickly – more quickly than you can get a graduate degree – and if it happens, you’re still stuck with the grad school bill.
Entering a program which costs you directly means minimally taking significantly extra risk, and it should be presented as such.
There’s only so much funding to go around. Unfortunately, it’s just the way it works right now, so you have to be careful who you let work on your projects. If you don’t produce results, the funding agency is unlikely to give you funding next time you ask for a grant. Ergo, you have to be stingy about who you have work on projects funded by grants.
Source: My wife is a professor, and she always complains about the funding models she has to deal with.
I know a lot of scientists who were already getting let go around the winter because finding dried up.
And with the way the US is going, that well continues to shrink.
But at least, on the bright side…
Hrm, hold on a moment…
I can’t seem to find one of those.:-(