Graduating from college a year early

[Anonymous]

So for those who have been there done that...what are your opinions on graduating college a year early? My son is a sophomore right now and met with his advisor this past week and DS realized he only needs to take 30 more credits to meet the requirements of his degree/school (majoring in biology with minors in psychology and Spanish. He wants to get his MPH).. He has awhile to decide but was hoping to get some other perspectives we might not have thought about. If he graduates early, he’s thinking about either A) going back home and working/volunteering for a year while he applies to graduate school, B) finding a six month to year long internship/fellowship in his field or C) applying to grad school right away D) something totally different like Peace/ameri corps or teaching English somewhere for a year. If you or your kid did graduate early- regrets? I think the reason it’s appealing to him is that we’ve told him we have enough to cover your undergrad but grad is on your own- so he’d have that year of undergrad $$$ to apply to his grad school tuition.

[Anonymous]

Does he have GRE scores and/or whatever else he needs to apply to grad school?

What part of PH is he interested in?

[Anonymous]

He’s mostly interested in industrial hygiene/occupational health. Taking the GRE this summer.

[Anonymous]

I graduated in three years from college at age 20. I took a couple of years off before grad school and spent time abroad as well as time exploring my future field. I have no regrets and often speak to my children about these choices -- usually in the sense that I urge them to be imaginative with their futures -- that there is more than one path to where they want to go and the time to explore an alternate route is when they are young without any encumbrances. Sitting here writing this, I cannot think of any downside. I remain, to this day, friends with my college friends, some of whom I graduated with, some of whom graduated the following year. (Because I was taking the upper level courses that allowed me to graduate early, I was friends already with students who were graduating on my timeline). I think I would have felt bored and resentful had I stayed in college one more year simply to say I was in college for four years. The time between college and grad school was very important to my development and the sense of purpose I ultimately felt when I went back to school at age 23.

HTH

[Anonymous]

I did it, no regrets.

[Anonymous]

I did it, strictly to save $30k. I went straight to work a month after graduating. I wish I had relaxed a bit more in college, though I'm not sure that would be worth $30k of debt.

[Anonymous]

I graduated a year early, lived and worked abroad after that. Went onto grad school and am enjoying an interesting career. It was a wonderful time, but the downside I noticed is I didn't have enough time to really develop the social/networking aspect of it. I'm only still in touch with one friend (ex-bf) and one professor.

[Anonymous]

What would you do with a masters degree in bio?

[Anonymous]

I did it and there were pros and cons. It was a lot harder socially than I expected (never anticipated any kind of social impact). So much changed in my group of friends after I left, and I always kind of felt on the outside after that. Not sure if I’m explaining that right but since I was not present during everyone else’s final year, it was almost like people kind of forgot about me.

I ended up deciding to work for 2 yrs before applying to graduate school in one field, and ended up never going to graduate school and continuing to work in the field in which I had started. Once I was working, it felt hard to imagine going back to school FT. My career worked out really well though so it was fine.

Not sure if I’d do it again if I could do everything over..

[Anonymous]

My coworker got her bachelors in three years instead of four. She just wanted to save money. She works in a law firm as a legal secretary. I don't think she regrets it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What would you do with a masters degree in bio?

What does that have to do with this thread?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What would you do with a masters degree in bio?

Read. MPH.

[Anonymous]

I had the option to and stayed the 4th year. Got a second major. Did an internship. Took a lot of interesting classes. I loved college and never regretted it. BUT (big but...) I was on a full merit scholarship (included room and board), so there was no financial downside. Things might have looked differently if I was borrowing money or my parents were sacrificing a lot to make college happen.

I went directly to grad school from college and do regret that. I should have worked a year or two in my area of interest. Definitely would not have done 3 years of college then grad school.

[Anonymous]

I did it and worked for a year before going to grad school. No regrets. I was more focused and enjoyed grad school more after working full time for that year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would you do with a masters degree in bio?

Read. MPH.

PP has no idea what a MPH is.