[Kornphlake]

I'm considering going back to school for a Master's degree but I'm a little confused about what I'd actually get from a Master's program. I have a BS degree in Manufacturing Engineering and I'd really like to get a Master's in Mechanical Engineering with an empahsis in automation and machine design. The problem is that the schools I've looked at have vague descriptions of what graduate programs are offered and what the student will learn. I know that the university where I got my BS offered graduate courses based on professors current research projects, basically you found a professor that was working on something you wanted to work on and helped him get a patent, or write a book or whatever. I'm really looking for a specific type of education and a hands on training rather than theoretical, I'd hate to spend a semester working on all the applications, pettitions and such to be assigned a project that really won't fulfill my goals.

So who's been to grad school and want's to tell me how the whole thing works, or if somebody knows of a site that explains it all I'd be willing to read a bit.

 

[Ridemonkey]

Grad school sites are useless for the most part. Your best bet is to find some schools that seem inline with your interests and email some of the professors directly.

 

[profro]

I got a master's in ME from The University of Tennessee in Knoxville and the reason you don't see much listed about them is that grad school's are not accredited. So its basically whatever you and your advisor come up with. The Engineering college usally has some rules about number or hours, but most courses and study layout are done by you and your professor.

But if you want mostly hands on stuff then you need to find a University that has ties to an industry or industry partner. Tennessee has lots of ties with Oak Ridge National Lab and they do tons of hands on stuff in a lot of areas. Manufacturing, automotive, nuclear, biomedical, weapons, etc.

 

[urbaindk]

Grad school sites are useless for the most part. Your best bet is to find some schools that seem inline with your interests and email some of the professors directly.

Yep. That is your best bet. Most department websites will list their faculty members and give a brief description of each faculty members research interests. Do some research yourself, (look at faculty member websites, read some of their papers) and determine if any of their work fits your needs. Use that to determine where to apply.

As far as class work goes you will have much more freedom than in undergrad. You will have to take a few core ciriculum courses but you'll have lots of room to roam as far as your elective courses go. You can tailor your experience more towards your interests.

Good luck. Hope that helps.

And - Hey Profro, as soon as I'm done with this postdoc I'm looking for a job at ORNL or UT so I can come DH with you guys at windrock. I grew up in Ktown and want to get back.

 

[DamienC]

Generally speaking you'll start off with some coursework during the first and/or second years. Requirements will vary from department to department and from school to school. Most graduate programs are specialized enough that most classes they offer will have some benefits to you even if they are peripheral. For example, I went to graduate school in a geophysics program to do space sciences. I had to take a class in solid earth physics but some of the mathematical methods we used in that class (spherical harmonics) turned out to be really useful for space science applications (magnetic field modeling).

After completing coursework you'll generally move into the phase where you'll tackle some research or design project of your own choosing. You'll have a faculty advisor to help guide you and in the end evaluate your work, along with a committee of other faculty. The basic idea of graduate work at this point is to demonstrate that you can (more or less) independently define some problem to solve, learn and master the ways in which to solve it, and then show how your work either solves the problem or makes some incremental contribution to understanding it. That's essentially what any masters or Ph.D dissertation describes in most engineering and science fields.

Time to completion varies greatly. I've seen people finish Ph.D's starting from a bachelors degree in as little as 3 years and as many as 10. Masters degrees are typically 2-3 year processes in engineering and science. If you're lucky you'll be able to work off of some teaching or research assistant position within your department which usually pays enough to live the meager grad student lifestyle and sometimes provides a deep cut if not total waiver of most of the tuition.

 

[urbaindk]

Yeah my BS to PHD took about 7 years and I got masters thrown in there somewhere around the 3 year mark (with research started during undergrad).

 

[profro]

If you don't get your grad school paid for and get a stipend on top of that, you're doing something wrong. From what you have said Flake you need to look at a Gradaute research assistantship. Those are usually paid through the University buy a research grant or industry partner. Stay away from Graduate Assistantships. Those are usually paper graders and professor slaves. The GRAs usually do research for some project and its a nice way to gets lots of hands experience and ideas for your thesis.

jdshall, where are you now and what do you research?

 

[DamienC]

If you don't get your grad school paid for and get a stipend on top of that, you're doing something wrong. From what you have said Flake you need to look at a Gradaute research assistantship. Those are usually paid through the University buy a research grant or industry partner. Stay away from Graduate Assistantships. Those are usually paper graders and professor slaves.

Yup, exactly. In my department if you were stuck being a TA for any length of time you could pretty much count on adding at least one or two more years until you were done whereas being a research assistant you were being paid to do the research that eventually becomes your dissertation.

 

[urbaindk]

jdschall, where are you now and what do you research?

I'm an assistant Chemistry professor (postdoc) at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis MD. My degree is in Materials Science and engineering. Right now I am doing atomic-scale computer modelling of friction and wear properties of diamond and diamond like carbon films. I'm about 9 months into a postdoc here. I'll probably start looking for a real job sometime after I teach this fall depending how my CV is going (i.e. I need some publications).

I spent 3 summers interning at ORNL and liked it, plus it is home.

 

[DamienC]

I'm an assistant Chemistry professor (postdoc) at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis MD.

Interesting...I'm here in DC at the Naval Research Lab. My group usually has a few mids working with us over the summer on various projects. If you're ever here on the lab pop your head in and say hi. Space sciences is right across the parking lot from the Chemistry division.

 

[profro]

(i.e. I need some publications).

That is the end-all, be-all in a university setting. I actually work for the University as a research associate in the ME department so I'm familar with that benchmark. I'm working with ORNL researchers in the world of internal combustion engine efficiency and emissions. I've been getting more and more into catalysis and whoa, is that a magic act. The hardest college course I ever took was a linear algebra course tought by a chemical engineering professor. RIP

 

[urbaindk]

Interesting...I'm here in DC at the Naval Research Lab. My group usually has a few mids working with us over the summer on various projects. If you're ever here on the lab pop your head in and say hi. Space sciences is right across the parking lot from the Chemistry division.

You aren't going to the 'shed to pick up trash this weekend are you? If so maybe I'll see you there.

 

[urbaindk]

I've been getting more and more into catalysis and whoa, is that a magic act. The hardest college course I ever took was a linear algebra course tought by a chemical engineering professor. RIP

Yeah I had a buddy who worked for Caterpillar doing that kind of work. Sounds pretty weird. And please - don't confuse me for a real chemistry professor. I'm only qualified to teach plebe (freshmen) chemistry. I'd much rather be teaching strength of materials or some metallurgy course.

 

[Kornphlake]

So if my earning potential with a graduate degree is roughly equivalent to my earning potential with another 3 years of job experiance and masters programs aren't accredited is there much differance between finding a job where I'll get the training I want and finding a school where I'll get the training I want? (Assuming quality of life isn't a consideration.) I guess I was looking for something that will involve less work, sounds like an oxymoron doesn't it... If I'm going to have to define my own project and find funding or work thorugh the university for funding just to get a piece of paper, I might as well just stay at work and figure it all out with the guidance of senior engineers rather than professors and company funds rather than university funds. For some reason I was thinking that graduate programs were more like undergrad programs, where you take a series of classes that build on each other to get a degree.

Roughly what would a GRA be paid, does the university usually pay housing costs for family as well? I'm at the pivot point in my life, I don't have a house payment, I don't have a car payment, I'm used to getting by on pocket change, so it makes sense to go back to school now if I'm ever going to do it, but I'm a little uncertian rather it would really give me any advantage.

 

[DamienC]

That is the end-all, be-all in a university setting. I actually work for the University as a research associate in the ME department so I'm familar with that benchmark.

Heh heh...funny you mention that because I'm writing a manuscript for publication right now...well, between RM posts anyway neaky: .

You aren't going to the 'shed to pick up trash this weekend are you? If so maybe I'll see you there.

Yeah, I have to rearrange some things in my schedule but I'm going to try to be there. Hopefully we'll meet up there this weekend or some other time up at the 'Shed

 

[profro]

You'd be interested in this.. on the side I'm an expert witness for case where an exhaust valve, in an engine, broke and caused a fire. We did a SEM of the fracture area and found some pretty cool stuff. Its way over my head and outside my experience, but cool stuff and good for my client.

 

[urbaindk]

You'd be interested in this.. on the side I'm an expert witness for case where an exhaust valve, in an engine, broke and caused a fire. We did a SEM of the fracture area and found some pretty cool stuff. Its way over my head and outside my experience, but cool stuff and good for my client.

You are doing exactly what I'd love to do! I want to be one of those expert crash analysis guys that figures why airplanes blow up. That's my fantasy job anyway. Do you know William (Bill) Becker at UT? He does a lot of accident reconstruction stuff. He was one of my favorite profs at UT. (about half my undergrad was at UT before I transfered to NCSU). I did failure analysis for IBM for a few years as a part time job during undergrad. Funnest job I've had for sure.


Back to you Kornflake: Man that is a tough call. In retrospect I sort of wish I had just gone out and gotten a job after I got my undergrad. I didn't have to pay for gradschool but I am really far behind many of my peers financially just because I never had 2 cents more than my monthly rent and food for the whole time I was in school. There are two ways to look at it though. Yes you could stay in your job and garner on the job training from more senior staff - that might be the ideal solution - that is if your managers are into that sort of thing. Its just that in reality I don't see that happening to much. Seems like once you are in a job you move laterally and not up unless you quit and find a new job.

 

[profro]

Do you know William (Bill) Becker at UT? He does a lot of accident reconstruction stuff.

Names sounds familar, but I don't remember him. I lucked into this side job, but the money is CRAZY. Its helping fund my summer racing. neaky:

 

[Kornphlake]

Back to you Kornflake: Man that is a tough call. In retrospect I sort of wish I had just gone out and gotten a job after I got my undergrad. I didn't have to pay for gradschool but I am really far behind many of my peers financially just because I never had 2 cents more than my monthly rent and food for the whole time I was in school. There are two ways to look at it though. Yes you could stay in your job and garner on the job training from more senior staff - that might be the ideal solution - that is if your managers are into that sort of thing. Its just that in reality I don't see that happening to much. Seems like once you are in a job you move laterally and not up unless you quit and find a new job.

You're right about advancement. I work for a smallish company now (~130 employees) we're growing really quickly but hiring slowly. Part of my job is to make sure we can do just that. My real goal when I went into engineering was to be either a design engineer and design consumer products or design custom made one off type equipment. After being exposed to the industry for a while I don't think I've got what it takes to deal with marketing driving R&D, so I'm thinking I'd like to get into automation. I'm not going to get that experiance at my current employer, at least not for several years. I'm thinking that within the next year or so I'll either start searching for a new job where I'll have the opportunities I want or I'll start looking seriously at grad school. Like you I'm sick of renting, I'm tired of seeing guys I graduated highschool with who never went to college and now have a hummer and a 2500 sq/ft home that's paid for.

 

[urbaindk]

Roughly what would a GRA be paid, does the university usually pay housing costs for family as well? I'm at the pivot point in my life, I don't have a house payment, I don't have a car payment, I'm used to getting by on pocket change, so it makes sense to go back to school now if I'm ever going to do it, but I'm a little uncertian rather it would really give me any advantage.

I was making $18,500 at in North Carolina all fees and tuition payed. I don't know anything about housing. I just lived with lots of room mates. I had a small car payment. I lived decently. I went boating all the time and drove to the mountains almost every weekend. Its pretty fun. I would not want to do it with a family though! And like I said above, I was never able to save. Granted I could have traded quality of life now for savings and quality of life later but I chose quality of life now. Its more fun that way. Besides when I'm old my knees are going to be so screwed up I won't care if I never go anywhere or do anything.

 

[urbaindk]

Names sounds familar, but I don't remember him. I lucked into this side job, but the money is CRAZY. Its helping fund my summer racing. neaky:

Yeah. Accident reconstruction can be lucrative. I wish I had access to that kind of lab now. Its a lot of fun too.

 

[Mike B.]

Kornphlake - feel like moving across the country? The company I work for currently is looking for a manufacturing engineer (soon to be 2 of them) and pays for any degree you want to get. You pick the degree you want, get a C and they pay the bill. Finish your degree and you get $10k worth of company stock. You are free to persue as many degrees as you want at whatever pace you choose. BTW, it's aerospace work with some really cool products.