Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does your employer have tuition reimbursement?

Yes, a small amount can be reimbursed. But my points still stand. I'm mid-career prof with a busy job and very busy home life caring for multiple kids and parents. Not trying to be snarky, but how the hell do I float a PT masters program on top of that both time wise and financially? I would love to hear suggestions on this honestly. Have some of you done this with these kinds of constraints?

I do not have aging parents near by, but I did just finish my Masters. I work full time, have three school aged kids, and my spouse has a high demand career with travel. I went part time, online with an established brick and mortar school. I took exams on campus. It wasn't easy, and I haven't had much of a social life the past three years. I did the majority of my course work between the hours of 9pm-1am, most evenings. This included writing papers in the car as we drove to family vacation, and I used a PTO day each semester to study for finals.

I did it because I found myself in exactly your position, and took advantage of every cent of tuition reimbursement.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does your employer have tuition reimbursement?

Yes, a small amount can be reimbursed. But my points still stand. I'm mid-career prof with a busy job and very busy home life caring for multiple kids and parents. Not trying to be snarky, but how the hell do I float a PT masters program on top of that both time wise and financially? I would love to hear suggestions on this honestly. Have some of you done this with these kinds of constraints?

We have a family member that did it and know of other people who pursued other degrees while having kids, career, etc. Some successfully completing it and some others didn't. It did cause a lot of stress in our own family.

It does take a lot of sacrifice and commitment, this includes all family members, if it's a reputable program and degree. And honestly I might not waste my time with a meaningless degree. Although this thread has me thinking about getting a masters degree now.

My one thing is that it had better be worth it. And that's why I would only consider doing it with a reputable program and something that you know will directly contribute to your career growth. Unless you're really just looking for a paper degree to pad your resume so that you'd be eligible for any postings that come up. And some of the diploma mills are really easy, where all you have to do is show up every day and pay your tuition.

The way I look at it and was one of things in reminding people who were going through the programs is that it's not supposed to be easy. If it was than everyone would be able to do the same thing or have the same credentials. So takes a commitment both by time and financially.

It used to be that people went back for higher level degrees after getting some years of experience. At least in some degrees. Nowadays more people are getting higher level degrees right after their four year degree. But there are still people who are pursuing their higher level degrees while juggling the other sides of life too.

It's up to you if you think it's worth it or not. But if you really wanted to or think it's holding you back, it should be possible with a lot of work and commitment.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does your employer have tuition reimbursement?

Yes, a small amount can be reimbursed. But my points still stand. I'm mid-career prof with a busy job and very busy home life caring for multiple kids and parents. Not trying to be snarky, but how the hell do I float a PT masters program on top of that both time wise and financially? I would love to hear suggestions on this honestly. Have some of you done this with these kinds of constraints?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does your employer have tuition reimbursement?

Yes, a small amount can be reimbursed. But my points still stand. I'm mid-career prof with a busy job and very busy home life caring for multiple kids and parents. Not trying to be snarky, but how the hell do I float a PT masters program on top of that both time wise and financially? I would love to hear suggestions on this honestly. Have some of you done this with these kinds of constraints?

I got my masters part time while I worked full time (and a busy full time job at that), but I was single and without children.

It was a conscious decision I made: to get a masters degree before my life got too complicated.

It's fine that you didn't make that decision, but I don't think it's fair of you to downplay the value of a master's or even what it shows. Most brick-and-mortar master's programs involve some sort of thesis and a lot more collaborative work than a regular bachelor's degree. They also require a higher level of research. (I'm not talking about online degrees, and many employers do distinguish between the two.)

If you are talking about administrative jobs, the trend I see is that many administrative jobs are actually a bunch of functions rolled into one. So while there may be a secretarial/admin component, they also want that person to be able to write, edit, do other things as needed.

Also, as a bachelor's becomes more common, requiring a master's is a way of narrowing the pool of applicants. That's not a new thing. There are many jobs that once only required a high school degree, but then those positions changed and the applicant pool changed, so they started requiring more.

Many government positions will allow you to substitute experience for education. It all depends on the position.

Without knowing what your background is and specifically what you are looking for, it's difficult to know how to advise you. If you are mid-career and want to advance but advancement requires additional degrees, there's really no other answer -- unless you know someone who can help you get your foot in the door.

For what it's worth, I have a master's degree from a prestigious institution, and I feel like my options are limited for other reasons. I think the bigger picture is that there are just too many applicants for each job out there. So while some jobs require degrees, others will require such specific experience (like experience with X software that only our company uses), that they eliminate people that way.

Personally, I think a lot of hiring is done through networking. They post jobs for the appearance of fairness, but private and public sector, most people prefer to hire someone they know or someone someone they know knows or someone with whom they once interacted with on some level. And this is more true for the D.C. region than other places.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does your employer have tuition reimbursement?

Yes, a small amount can be reimbursed. But my points still stand. I'm mid-career prof with a busy job and very busy home life caring for multiple kids and parents. Not trying to be snarky, but how the hell do I float a PT masters program on top of that both time wise and financially? I would love to hear suggestions on this honestly. Have some of you done this with these kinds of constraints?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does your employer have tuition reimbursement?

Yes, a small amount can be reimbursed. But my points still stand. I'm mid-career prof with a busy job and very busy home life caring for multiple kids and parents. Not trying to be snarky, but how the hell do I float a PT masters program on top of that both time wise and financially? I would love to hear suggestions on this honestly. Have some of you done this with these kinds of constraints?

Anonymous wrote:This is a key point to remember


If you are a high-achiever, as you say, and you make the right friends.... you can get hired into a better position without any of the credentials listed for the job.

Many highly qualified technical people spend so many years seeking degrees and certificates to prove they can do a job... and along comes an A-type personality that clicks with a senior manager and BAM... they get the job managing and move up the corporate latter quickly.

Make good connections and you can move up. Simple as that.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does it say it's REQUIRED or just preferred? Some places allow substituting years of experience for education.

I might avoid places that doesn't seem to be in tune with the requirements of a job and might be an indicator of their culture.

I have worked with some people who really tout their doctorates, ie introduce themselves as Dr. so and so, have it in their signature lines, etc. But then find out that they're not really cut out for the job and some of them are let go pretty quickly. Or end up bouncing around between different organizations. It actually seems like this happens to the people who tout their doctorates more, or maybe they're just more noticable. (there are others that do amazing work who I sometimes forget are doctorates until I see a reminder on their wall) But people with doctorates still hold more cachet in the organization and also the level of degree determines the ceiling you hit.

But I do appreciate what degrees bring. Where I've noticed or assume that people with degrees are more well rounded than some people without. So are able to grasp and pick up concepts quickly and expand on it. This is mostly in regards to two and four year degrees. Don't know if this applies to masters degrees and higher.

If it's a job that you're really interested in, I would suggest trying to apply for the job anyways and say something along the lines of how your years of experience can be considered as a substitute for a masters degree. You might find a manager who is willing to take that into account and it has worked for me in the past for some organizations. Some of them mentioned how the job posting description was created by the people in HR without their opinion or input. So it might not necessarily be the hiring manager's requirement.

It's also possible that your application never makes it past the HR system due to not meeting the checkboxes of requirements. And as mentioned before, you'd probably have to think about if you really want to work at a place that doesn't seem to be in tune of the real requirements of a job.

Also some of this might require you to really evaluate your position and the type of jobs you are looking for. Most of what I said above is based on the description of your original post, which I believe based on what I've seen. But it's possible that the positions you're looking at really do require a masters degree or higher. And if that's the case, you might want to look into making the time and money investment in pursuing a higher level degree.

And I originally wasn't going to say something along the lines of what the poster from 9:52 said. But kind of agree with this, that their are many diploma mills out there nowadays. But again, it goes back to the point if you really want to work for a place that's not in tune with the real requirements of the job. And knowing that some diplomas/degrees aren't as meaningful as others.

Good points. The jobs they are posting now require a masters degree. It doesn't even specify what kind of masters degree. This is a new trend. Outside of Lawyers and Phds, very few of the people above me have masters degrees, or ones worth talking about. If you don't have the connects, this trend it essentially freezes mid-career professionals w/out a masters like me out of the market.

You are right about re-evaluating my career. I have been doing that lately. It seems a change of industry for me would result in a budget-crippling drop in pay that our family could not withstand at this point in time financially. In a sense, I feel a bit trapped.

I am thankful to have a good paying job. Just disappointed that uncessary barriers are being created to make it more difficult for me (and others like me) to advance.

Not sure what "worth one talking about" means, but in my field (I'm an engineer) at my current job, lots of my colleagues have master's or above. But I haven't really seen a lot of job postings at my work that explicitly required a Master's or PHD or one that didn't allow you to substitute relevant work experience. However, if you have the credentials, then some promotions and pay raises can be accelerated.

At another research lab I worked at, very few people had Master's or PHDs in my department.

I say - if you can get your employer to pay for your Master's, you should suck it up and just do it. You'll have very little social life for 2-3 years if you're working at the same time, but it definitely helps out with job promotions and salary increases.