I'm Screwed!

[MrMan]

jrd.ffr,

I'm sorry to hear about the lousy time you are having at school. When I was in college, I went to Christian campus ministries, so making friends wasn't that hard. My university had an 'international coffee' hour, and I've seen something similar at other schools. Some internationals are looking to make friends with locals. The females may be more interested in you, also.

As far as physics goes, I'm not sure what you would do with that. You'd probably have to compete with all the folks trying to get entry level jobs with a generic college degree not related to the job, which may put you at a disadvantage. You might be able to apply for a PhD program. If your school isn't highly ranked, you might be able to get in a lower ranked PhD, which may not be a bad gig after all. If you can get a four year free ride and get your dissertation done on time, that's probably something like $14k a year to live on and free tuition. That's really scraping by, but if you are single, it's worth considering. If your professors like you, they might even consider you for their own PhD program if they have one.

You'd want to do a little research before investing 4 or 4+ years if you chose the PhD route. How hard is it to get a job in your field? Is it something you'd want to do? Read a few academic papers before jumping in. If you want to be 'happier abroad' foreign universities hire PhD's as well.

While you are studying languages, maybe you could pick up an ESL course if you wanted to teach English abroad for a few years to save up some cash.

[Cornfed]

Now on C++, I have no knowledge or experience. But its a high-level language, how hard can it be? And anything is going to be less annoying than COBOL.

There must be someone who will give you a damn certificate in that or another language.

Then you're golden.

No, programming has jumped the shark as well.

[Cornfed]

America (and more to the point the American job market) doesn't respect scientists, mathematicians, physicists and anyone else that chooses a research-based career. These are the best and brightest of our society, the people that advance knowledge and human progress, and we, as a society, collectively sh*t on them.

People who work in the financial services sector (ie: leeches on society that contribute nothing to society) get paid many times over what a scientist or mathematician gets paid. Hell cops get paid more. It's ridiculous; there are so many worthless professions that get paid far more than those who've chosen the hard path of dedicating their life to advancing humanity. Where I work, most of the secretaries get paid more than the post-doctoral fellows doing medical research! These ladies spend most of their day shopping on the internet and cruising facebook, and they get paid more than the guys and gals in the white lab coats.

I'm amazed that anyone even goes into the sciences anymore. Actually, they increasingly don't. I've watched our post-docs and low-level faculty (the ones that don't have tenure) get burned out and give up, one after another. Most of them went to work as lab technicians for pharma companies, or went to pharmacy school and became pharmacists. I kept up with a lot of these folks and found that in every case, they made more money in their new careers but were always a bit sad about having been forced to abandon their dream of a career in science. And sad for all the years they wasted in academia.

Finally some common sense on the subject from someone other than me.

[Jester]

No, programming has jumped the shark as well.

I agree that programming pay has been headed down for sometime. The trick would be to find a niche where you could work remote, deliver product online, from a low-cost location.

[Ghost]

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[xiongmao]

Programming has been good to me. I've almost always got an interview for every job I've applied for. Yes I'm doing my CELTA at the moment, but teaching isn't such an easy way to make a living. There are a lot of wannabe teachers out there, especially in popular cities like Barcelona.

I did enjoy doing my PhD. It was everything my bachelors wasn't. I had a lot more freedom, and a much better social life. If I hadn't done mine nearly 20 years ago, then I'd maybe consider doing one at a foreign university somewhere. Still, I did get a lot of luck in being at the right place and the right time. I got my PhD from somewhere I never applied to because I thought I'd never even get in.

I won't say it's ever been easy though. I wrote a lot of letters to get on a PhD program, and finding my first job after graduation was a military exercise.

[Ghost]

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[momopi]

What's a good way to get into the programming field? My background is in teaching, and while that technically opens up many countries to me, you do hit certain limitations doing it long term. Do programming jobs require a degree in the field, or are skills alone enough? What's a good way to get started? (Aside from going to school for it.) What's the "best" programming language to learn? (I know nothing about programming, so I realize that question may not make sense.) It sounds like the opportunities are still out there for it and it is useful, but I know nothing about it or where to begin.
I've got a list of schools in Spain I can trade you for info.

Lynda.com has a lot of online training videos for programming, if you're interested.

[alexbrown]

good post