Hello all,

I find myself at a cross roads in life and looking for advice.

I have posted in this forum before and so some of you may know some of my history: I graduated in May 2014 with a chemical engineering degree. However, I had a quite a bit of trouble finding a chemical engineering job (still don't know why, I had a 3.92 Major GPA, research and internship experience etc. but this is not the thread for that).

However, I had strong programming skills that I had picked up from a variety of sources. In September I was offered a full-time programming position by the University of Chicago programming for their informatics department.

A couple of months in and I feel fairly settled in. Still learning a lot every day of course (since I am not really a comp sci major) but I am programming in SQL/ASP.NET/Angular and finding it fairly interesting.

Looking forward though I feel kind of lost. A lot of people are asking me whether I am planning on taking continuing education. I just don't know.

I can go so many different directions:
I kind of gave up on engineering after I couldn't find a job.
I like programming, I am thinking perhaps to get a masters in computer science. If so, I can't decide between getting it at UofC or perhaps doing one of the online training programs offered by Harvard etc.
I also kind of like finance. I have briefly considered trying to pass the CFA or getting a masters in finance. Maybe I could combine computing and finance for some algorithmic type stuff idk...

I have always tried to make the best financial decision with respect to academia. Many of my professors tried to convince me to go for my Phd. I didn't go for it because I feel like it isn't a good financial investment (given the time, opportunity loss and potential salary gain)

I had also originally decided on chemical engineering for financial reasons. I had read that the salaries were some of the best in engineering so I went for that major (turns out that that was a mistake).

I don't want to make a mistake again. I would like to make the most financially sensible decision. Perhaps it is not to get any more continuing education.

I guess I should also mention that UofC offers 50% off tuition as one of my perks (50% is still a lot).

appreciate all advice, thanks in advance.

It sounds like you don't have much direction. Don't worry, neither do I or many others. My thoughts on CE are to pursue it when financed by your employer, or if you think it is +EV and fun enough to pay for it with your own time and money. I'd definitely recommend thinking about what you want to do as a career before simply resorting to more schooling (and debt or lost income). Either way, good luck.

Sounds like you would be a good actuarial candidate.

You should speak to a careers adviser (perhaps more than one). The answer to your question is pretty specific to what's available in your field and likely salaries, as well as your individual competencies. Talk to old professors and relay your problems - they no doubt have all kinds of industry contacts and knowledge and may well recommend/hook up someone they thought was a good PhD candidate.

Hey OP, i think you should piggyback onto your programming experience right now and get some certifications related to programming.

Your experience is in programming/comp sci now so i would forget about chemical engineering unless you are really passionate about this subject.

Poster above said you could be a good actuarial candidate but you would be starting behind as grads probably have 3 papers above you at the point they graduate and you starting from 0.

In the end, you really need to discover what you love and your passion! Dont stop searching for it. I wish you best of luck.

What certifications would be good to get? Should I just start getting certifications in whatever I am working with?

I guess I should add that I am not really the hacker type. I mean, there are some people I meet programming who are really hacker/video gamer types, I am not that way. I am not so interested in playing around with tools and figuring out what they can do etc.

I really did like engineering/math/physics. It was very though-provoking, I still enjoy thinking about that kind of stuff.

So, translating that into programming: I think that I am much more drawn to the architecht/design aspects of programmin, rather than the hacking and coding. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind doing my share of the down and dirty coding...

That said, what certifications should I get? What careers should I consider?

Thanks.

tl;dr version: What do you want to do, aside from make lots of money?

Is there a good reason to be so focused on keeping your costs down? For example, if you are poor and have poor job prospects due to some personal reason (criminal background, horrific disfigurements, poor spoken English, etc), then sure, keep your school debt down because you may have a very hard time paying it back. But if those factors don't apply, the opportunity cost of getting a PhD seems like a horrible reason not to get one -- but then again, if that is your deciding factor, there are probably other (better) reasons not to get one, i.e. you have no motivation or drive to get one in the first place.

All this is to say, maybe I'm just lucky or privileged and I'd be whistling a different tune if my life had run neutral EV instead of +EV, but in my view the most important question to focus on right now for you is what do I want to do? not what is the most cost effective next step for me to take.

Like if you want to do continuing education, do you want it to be a pointless chore that is essentially a waste of your time but will get you a certificate that might improve your job prospects by 1% and your salary by 2%? Then get some online certification and learn nothing from it in the process. On the other hand, want to possibly enrich your life by challenging yourself and coming out successful in a way that actually means something? Try getting into a good/difficult actual degree program at an actual school and really giving it a strong effort. (And I'm not asking this sarcastically -- I really mean it: the meaningless/easy certificate route is valid for some people).

You like the sciences, you also like finance; I'm not sure how to combine them, but maybe that is worth thinking about. You like architecture/design, but don't have a hacker spirit... I'm not sure how you get to be an architect without rising through the ranks -- and without a CS degree (didn't used to be a problem, but these days I think it matters more, could be wrong though) -- but you could try to talk to people in the industry who actually know what you should do to get from where you are now to be an architect/designer; if it involves being a coder for 12 years first, it may not be the right job for you after all.

If you enjoyed your chemical engineering studies and internships, etc., maybe it is worth the effort to figure out why you didn't get hired and keep trying that route. That would give you the salary you are concerned with but in a field you think you will enjoy.

Good luck.