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Graduate level education
Limp moose
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I have a sort of strange scenario I am trying to work through and would appreciate any advice people have. A little back round. I am in the US Navy currently stationed in Japan and transferring to Australia for a 3 year tour in the fall. I currently have a BA in history with good grades. I am looking into getting a graduate degree while working in Australia and have a couple of decisions I have to make. I have not taken the GRE yet but plan on taking it this summer.
First off for career reasons I will need the masters within the next 10 years preferably the sooner the better. These next 3 years in AUS will be the best opportunity to get it based on work load. I am going from a 80 hour + work week on average down to 40 or so.
If I stay in the military on my current career track a masters in any subject will do. However I have a strong desire to swap career tracks to a specialized foreign area officer. The prereqs for this swap are language skills and a masters in international relations specifically coded and covered by the GOV (graduate education voucher program IE $40k free money for school. Unless I plan on making money with the degree I prefer it to be free.) I will probably not stay in the military for 20 years unless I do this career swap.
However I am not 100% sure I want to stay in the military for another 12 years and a masters in international relations is pretty useless outside of the military. I think? (Does anyone have one of these and make over 120K a year outside the military?) I feel I would be much better serviced financially getting an MBA over the next 3 years and then getting out in 2016 with a 2 year time late MBA. At least looking for a job in the finance sector either in the states or internationally. How marketable are MBA's these days? Anyone have one and have a tough time finding work? I would love to work in Hong Kong or Singapore for a US bank.
Finally My choices for schools are somewhat limited. It would either have to be a school in Sydney that allows weekend classes as going during the week is probably not realistic unless it is just one night a week. Or it would have to be internet based with only a few meetings a semester when I could get off work to travel. Does anyone have any recommendations for GOOD online masters degrees in either an MBA or international relations.
So TLDR
1. International relations= Is it useless outside the military?
2. How good is an MBA these days? Is it easy to get work with one even if it is 2 or 3 years old?
3. Does anyone know any online masters degrees that are worthwhile and got you a job?
I know this is a weird board to ask for this sort of advice but I have been talking to pretty much military people only on this and would appreciate some civilian feedback. Any random masters advice would be great too. Most of the people I have talked to about this did their masters right after college not 6 years later.
First off for career reasons I will need the masters within the next 10 years preferably the sooner the better. These next 3 years in AUS will be the best opportunity to get it based on work load. I am going from a 80 hour + work week on average down to 40 or so.
If I stay in the military on my current career track a masters in any subject will do. However I have a strong desire to swap career tracks to a specialized foreign area officer. The prereqs for this swap are language skills and a masters in international relations specifically coded and covered by the GOV (graduate education voucher program IE $40k free money for school. Unless I plan on making money with the degree I prefer it to be free.) I will probably not stay in the military for 20 years unless I do this career swap.
However I am not 100% sure I want to stay in the military for another 12 years and a masters in international relations is pretty useless outside of the military. I think? (Does anyone have one of these and make over 120K a year outside the military?) I feel I would be much better serviced financially getting an MBA over the next 3 years and then getting out in 2016 with a 2 year time late MBA. At least looking for a job in the finance sector either in the states or internationally. How marketable are MBA's these days? Anyone have one and have a tough time finding work? I would love to work in Hong Kong or Singapore for a US bank.
Finally My choices for schools are somewhat limited. It would either have to be a school in Sydney that allows weekend classes as going during the week is probably not realistic unless it is just one night a week. Or it would have to be internet based with only a few meetings a semester when I could get off work to travel. Does anyone have any recommendations for GOOD online masters degrees in either an MBA or international relations.
So TLDR
1. International relations= Is it useless outside the military?
2. How good is an MBA these days? Is it easy to get work with one even if it is 2 or 3 years old?
3. Does anyone know any online masters degrees that are worthwhile and got you a job?
I know this is a weird board to ask for this sort of advice but I have been talking to pretty much military people only on this and would appreciate some civilian feedback. Any random masters advice would be great too. Most of the people I have talked to about this did their masters right after college not 6 years later.
Limp moose on
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2. MBAs aren't what they used to be. From what I understand, the MBA itself isn't nearly as important as the connections you make while earning it. I'm not an expert, but I'd question the value of any kind of long distance MBA degree.
3. The degrees that tend to lead to well-paying steady jobs are computer, hard sciences, engineering, accounting and medical degrees. Look at degrees that don't teach just ideas, but solid concrete skills that you can sell to employers.
Defense contractors love them some pilots, so you'll be fine.
So, a caveat - I am not prior military. But, I have spent a fair amount of my adult career working for the military, and I am fairly familiar with career tracks of those who transition within and away from service. So I guess I could say I've seen my fair share of guys n'gals in similar situations as yours.
Anyways, a Masters degree is not useless. It's hard damn work, no matter what it's in. International relations is hardly worthless - there are a ton of non-military federal jobs that would love to see that. Most of those jobs are with three letter agencies, but they pay very well, and you can roll your military service into the retirement programs. The real key isn't your masters degree - because with time and effort, that will come. What matters is you switch your MOS or cross train into your desired job field and start getting experience in it before you leave service. Just about everyone I know who left service for civilian life are performing the same jobs they did while they were in. So if you want to fly commercially or for a defense contractor, you'd be set. If that's not the case, then now is the time to switch careers and start thinking about what you want to do.
Ultimately, your job experiences in the military will translate to what you do outside of the military. Case in point, you can get an MBA and attempt a financial sector job - but depending on what you want to do within that sector, without a past portfolio or depth of experience in finance, a job probably won't be very forthcoming. My point being you'd be a pilot with an MBA and zero experience managing and dealing with things that are desirable to work within finance. Be realistic with the skills you obtain while you're serving, and how they will work outside of the service. An MBA is still a worthy masters degree to obtain mind you - just be realistic about what kind of job it can land you when you leave service, or until you can build a greater depth of job experience in finance.
www.open.edu.au
They are all real universities, with actual campuses, and you would be required to attend exams on site, so I would suggest picking something in Sydney. As Australian students use HECs (so we don't start out post uni with a massive debt the government pays for us, and we pay back with a little extra tax) you will need to call and see how much it costs as an international student.
I know a few guys in our military who are doing this, and they say its pretty good. They do use a day of leave every now and then to go in and have a proper chat with professors, ask questions etc, and they have never been knocked back.
If I wasn't about to deploy, I'd do my Masters in Information Systems through them.
Right now I am thinking international relations/studies is the way to go. I get paid so much overseas for the navy that it just seems stupid to plan on getting out and doing something else until I get my 20 and the beni's (if they are still there in 12 years) And that one will hit all the wickets for my 1310 designator or the FAO swap. as well as give me the specialist designator that will help with the swap. The problem is timing for aviators in the navy sucks. We have an 8 year commitment AFTER we get winged so we aren't even free to switch designators until the 10.5 year mark which is WAY later than any other line officer.
So I guess now I need to find a university to apply to for that degree.
What online degrees have people found success with?
And to answer gnome tanks question
You can probably become a test pilot, or if you don't want to fly anymore (why?)
In the last 6 years I have flown 1200+ hours and crashed like 4 birds. On a long enough time line I die. I just don't want to do this forever. Plus now most of my flights are as an instructor and I dislike it. I prefer to do operational stuff and my days of being an operator are quickly getting numbered as I move more in the management direction of my career. Yeah strapping on a bird for a SAR or Medevac is still exciting and fun but the daily grind of it gets old. Even playboy photographers get tired of looking at naked chicks I imagine.
Do you speak Japanese?
http://studyat.anu.edu.au/programs/7818XMAIR;overview.html - Master of IR link
http://studyat.anu.edu.au/graduate_coursework.html - Postgrad studies link
I did the Human Relations program, not IR though.
My coursework was I think like 9 or 10 classes maybe? Pretty quick. I was able to knock it out in around 15 months, thanks to some fortuitous timing. Also I took 2-3 classes every semester.
I speak very limited conversational Japanese but pretty great restaurant and cab driver Japanese.
Those links were GREAT! This looks like exactly what I was looking for. I just need to make sure it meets the navy college offices accreditation requirements for my funding. It looks like it is one of the better universities world wide. And I would be able to actually go to the campus if required each semester.
Check out the employment statistics for Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs' (SIPA) Master in International Affairs program. A lot of the graduates go into consulting, finance/banking, and other business services at multinational corporations, all of which can pay quite well if you're looking to make bank.
I don't know much about online degree programs, though I'd hesitate to recommend them. As someone who is currently in a Master program for Public Policy and International Affairs, I think one of the best parts about it is actually being in a classroom and networking with the fellows and other students. The coursework and career services themselves can be hit or miss, and some of the best opportunities come from simply talking to other people who already do/did the work you want to do.
I do Student Advising for Graduate Programs
1) No, International Relations is a field a lot of companies are looking to integrate in the global marketplace and having a background in it can be pretty useful in most industries if you are willing to travel and have proper credentials to back it up. Foreign language experience is also valuable when paired with this. Most universities are expanding their offerings in this sort of business aspect while tooling down their general MBA programs...
2)...which means that your traditional MBA is not as valuable as it used to be. Too many graduates went into the field all at once, and the MBA market pool is vastly over saturated. It is possible to do quite well with one, but you will be competing with a lot more people than a more specialized degree might offer you. Finding a program that works with a specific element of business, possibly Public Sector Business, might be a good call with your military experiences as almost all Public Sector jobs are mandated to give veterans and reservists preference over other potential candidates.
3) There are too many to count, but make sure you ONLY DO A MASTERS PROGRAM FROM A PUBLIC COLLEGE, ONLINE OR OTHERWISE. For Profit schools are often unaccredited and will take your money and offer very little return investment. Make sure whatever school you go to is accredited by the same institution as the State College System in the area it is located in. State schools have the top tier of accreditation ( by law) and often also have better veterans preference programs (again, by law).
Ivy League Schools can be a huge asset, especially in business, but unless you are getting a full or mostly full ride from the military or a scholarship the investment is not worth it long term. After you secure a position in the workforce for 4 or more years that will be worth more than your Harvard MA program. If you want to teach in a field, this is a different story (but only if you want to teach).