Grad School Decision Check List

Bill Coplin

Like undergraduate programs, graduate programs are relentless in promoting the message that they transform lives.  Don't buy that message.  It is no different than advertisements that imply buying a sexy sports car will lead to sex.  Transformation is under your control. Make educational choices that fit your needs and not your ego.

Here is a checklist on six reasons you might go to graduate school and some suggestions on how to think about them:

1.     ___The degree is a "union card."  Needed only with professions like, law, teaching and medicine where it is a requirement, most jobs in business, government and the non-profit sector don't require a degree especially if you have the experience. If you are in job where HR and others are telling to get a MBA, do it as painlessly as possible.

2.     ___You want to develop specific skills like web design, data analysis, graphic arts.  Degrees are frequently not the best path because they are high price bundles of credits containing excess stuff you don't want or need.  Better to take the training at your current firm or, if not available, skill specific courses through any program. Best if you can practice them in your current job or as a volunteer. Skill development is about practice, not brilliant coursework.

3.     ___You want to gain knowledge about a field.  Job shadowing and informational interviews are a more efficient and cost-saving path and in any case must be done before going to graduate school.

4.     ___You want a better job in your current field. Talk to HR in your current company; there may be more opportunities than you think. If not, you may be better off working with a headhunter or job placement service or even the career services of you undergraduate college than spending $50K+ for some graduate program.  If you can't find better opportunities in your existing field, maybe you need to find a new field.

5.     ___You want a career in a new field.   Select graduate programs that have field work and internship opportunities and a strong job placement record. Time and tuition costs should be minimized and prestige considered much less important than placement record.

Before you get sucked in by those sexy graduate schools ads, ask yourself some hard questions that focus on what would be best for your future rather than what will make you feel more accomplished.

Bill Coplin is a professor of public policy at the Maxwell School and The College of Arts and Sciences of Syracuse University, and author of "Ten Things Employers Want You to Learn in College" (Ten Speed Press, 2003) and "25 Ways to Make College Pay Off: Advice for Anxious Parents from a Professor Who's Seen it All" (AMACON, 2007). Readers may  e-mail him at wdcoplin@syr.edu.