Advice on my Educational Future

[vivalaultra 0]

So, here's the deal-

 

I'm scheduled to graduate in December of this year with a BA in English Literature (minor in Psychoology). The plan up until now was that I was going to spend 2007 getting certified to teach High School Literature and then do that for the next 60 or so years, until they invent robot replacement teachers. Lately, however, I've been considering Grad School. It's not just that my girlfriend recently told me that she's going to stay in school until she gets her Masters in Economics, and I wanna be "more degreed" than her, I just figure that, obviously, there will be more opportunities available to me if I have my Masters as opposed to just my Bachelors. I also enjoy the Hell out of school-the ritual of getting up and going every day and, also, the classes and such. I figure it would probably take 2 to 3 years to get my Masters Degree. Whether I decide to get it or not, I was planning on graduating this year (with a 3.7 GPA. Yee-haw!) and getting certified to teach next year so if I lose interest or money somewhere in the course of getting my Masters, I'll have another option. There's also the money issue, as I'm currently not having to pay anything for school; my wealthy Texas Daddy's paying for all of it. However, I'm sure that if I were to choose to pursue an advanced degree, money would become a part of the discussion. So, anyway, I'm just looking for some opinions (especially from those with advanced degrees) on this subject. Have at it, yo.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

Smitty and some other people in the teaching arena might be able to help you out on this, but aren't some states now requiring teachers to get Maaster Degrees if you want a somewhat decent job in the education field?

[vivalaultra 0]

In Texas to teach anywhere at the university level, community college or otherwise, you have to have at least a Masters. To teach at the High School level, you only need a Bachelors. I really want to teach English Lit, but I'm starting to think that if I were to do it at the High School level, I'd just be "settling", as I really hate teenagers, but, then again, I do kinda wanna get started on my career before I get to my 30s, but, then again I'm only 23 now (24 when I graduate), so if I were to get a Masters, I'd only be about 26 or 27.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

How much debt do you currently have?

[vivalaultra 0]

I have no debt. I'm unmarried. I live at home. I own my vehicle. I don't have any student loans or anything outstanding. My yearly college tuition (about $11,00) has been paid for every year in full. Yeah, so I'm in pretty good shape financially.

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

Wait until you get a teaching job, then pursue it. Several of my friends are teachers, and that's the route they went. Your school would most likely reimburse you for some/most/all of your tuition (and maybe books). Find an online program, or maybe a community college or local branch campus of a bigger school near you, to run it through.

 

The only downside to that would be adding masters schoolwork onto your job workload.

[vivalaultra 0]

Thanks.

 

Another question that maybe someone will know the answer to (or not). I was looking at the coursework and such for the Teacher Certification Program at my university and it looks like it would take me about two years or so to finish. Then I was looking at some Alternative Teaching Certification programs which look like they'll take about half that time. I was wondering if anyone knew if the ATC programs are as credible in regards to finding employment as the one at the university. I've talked to my advisor a couple times and she's pushed me towards the program at the university, but I guess it's in her job description to try to get people to take programs offered at the university. I'm leaning towards doing the Alternative Certification, if only because it seems like it'll take alot less time, but I wanna make sure it's not some fly-by-night/scam deal.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

Well, if you have a clean slate debt-wise, can afford to pay for much of the debt you'll have with this M.A. pursuit, then best of luck to you.

[vivalaultra 0]

Thanks to the one guy that voted yes...and the 4 who voted "La Parka". I'm feeling kinda overwhelmed. It just occured to me recently that...in a couple months, I'll be completely done with school forever if I so choose. It's a weird transition.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

I just finished my English MA in May and was in a similar situation to where you are now (fortunate enough to be debtless). I, however, had no designs on being a teacher--I just had the opportunity and decided to take it. I now work in the private sector using the power of English to tell other people that they're dumb, so I guess it's still somewhat akin to teaching. Anyway, my thoughts:

 

-Grad school's kinda silly. It's an endurance test before anything else--work enough to perform adequately and you'll get your diploma. You could certainly do it while working a full-time job, though it would take you a few years. When I was finished, my first thought was "jesus fucking christ, thank god."

 

-That being said, I enjoyed a whole lot of what I did, and the 6 months I spent working on my thesis taught me a shit ton of stuff, both in terms of academic edification and how to manage projects of absolutely any scale.

 

-For me, a lot of the appeal was that I'd have my MA diploma in hand a couple weeks before my 23rd birthday. I probably wouldn't have done it myself had I taken time off or had it taken longer than one more year (I started during my 4th year of undergrad).

 

-If you think you might want to teach something higher than high school/be a professor, give it a shot. One of the biggest benefits of a terminal MA program is that it lets you do a sort of trial run to see if you really want to go for the Ph.D. and lifetime academia. You'll have to write some papers to conference standards, you'll have to produce publishable-level material, and you'll get a good sense of what it's like to live in an English department. I learned that the internal politicking and current insistence on extremely, extremely esoteric scholarship isn't what I'm into now, but that I might be gung-ho for it a few years down the road.

 

If careers are your concern, you might want to just look for more prospective jobs, too. You don't have to be a high school teacher by default. I write proposals for a government contractor, and a friend who graduated from the same program I did does web editing and newsfeeds for a think tank. I know an English B.A. who works in circulation for DC Comics, one who's an editorial assistant for a magazine, and another who's a paralegal. Lotta stuff out there for humanities degrees, even if teaching is the most obvious possibility.

[vivalaultra 0]

I'm leaning towards going for my M.A. I've heard that it's mostly a war of attrition and not significantly harder than my undergrad Lit. classes. The only thing that people say I should be advised of is the amount of essay writing that there is. However, I routinely turn in 20-25 page well-researched essays, so I'm not overly concerned about that. I'm really interested in doing the thesis work and getting my Masters not only for the potential job opportunities/prestige but because I really wanna get into researching Latin American literature on the large scale, and I figure the Masters Program would be my best chance to do it. I know that if/when I get my Masters, there's going to be the temptation to just go for my Doctorate and be a lifetime academic, but I really don't wanna do that. I've spent very little time in the English Dept. at my university, but I still know that's not a place I want to spend much more time. It's a good thing I wasn't trying to get serious advice from this thread, or else I'd be wearing a skeleton jumpsuit and whacking luchadores with chairs.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Well, it sounds like you're interested in it for what I'd consider the right reasons. Going to grad school primarily for your own edification and because you love studying history/literature/whatever gets slagged on a lot, but if you're fortunate enough to have the means then it's a great opportunity. An M.A. won't beat a few years good work experience for finding a job, but it seems nice for a pay bump when you land one. I make about 5-6 grand more than my B.A.-totin' peers at work, and I'm probably otherwise no more qualified than they are.

 

The "war of attrition" assessment is a pretty good one. The biggest difference in coursework is in the addition of more theory. You also end up with more source texts; I had one class where we were expected to read Clarissa, Tom Jones, Tristram Shandy, and several other novels in full, for a total of over 6000 pages by semester's end. Fudged that one a bit.

[vivalaultra 0]

Hey...how ironic! In my "18th Century British Literature" class that I'm taking this semester and about to go to, we have to read Clarissa, Tristam Shandy, Tom Jones, Joseph Andrews, and a few more Daniel DeFoe novels. I think Clarissa might be the longest book I have ever attempted to read.