What is a second masters degree worth?

August 22, 2011 6:33 PM

What is a second masters degree worth?

Also how does a PhD withdrawal look to employers?

I'm in my mid-twenties and just finished my first year of an engineering PhD (at a UC school) and have decided it isn't for me (mostly that I couldn't deal with my advisor for the length of time it would take to finish and switching isn't an option). So I've told him I'm leaving. The question now is should I stick around long enough to get a second masters degree. In theory it should be possible to finish the classes I need in one more quarter. If I were to get the second masters it would be in a field not directly related to my research/career interests but there is some overlap. I expect it would cost about $10,000 to finish things here. That assumes that I have the motivation left for one more quarter of hard work, which is questionable since my heart isn't really in it anymore.

I have a BS and a masters already, both in engineering fields, from a big public research school and an UK university respectively. I finished my masters degree 2 years ago and the BS the year before that. The topic of my masters is quite narrow but is in the field I'd like to have a career in.

posted by Medw to Education (4 answers total)

I agree that continued learning is part of the goal but a handful more classes isn't going to gain me a huge amount of new experience/interest. I've talked to the right people and investigated my options and they just aren't really there for continuing the PhD. The reason that I can't find a new advisor is that the work my lab does (and my research interest) is a bit of an odd fit in the department (it would usually be in a different department). So there aren't many professors doing work in my area in my department. There, for whatever reason, also are very few professors that would work in other departments.

I think it is one thing to learn to work with people you don't like; binding myself to someone that I need to count on for a huge part of my life for the next 5 years is another thing. His former students are running up on the 6 year time limit for university support and leaving without a PhD.
posted by Medw at 10:41 PM on August 22, 2011

As an employer of technical skills I probably wouldn't offer anything extra for a second masters unless it was super relevant to the job I was hiring for.

When deciding on an employment offer for my company a PhD is worth 5 years work experience on top of a masters, about a full pay grade (a jump of US$10~20K in starting salary in Silicon Valley). More than 1 or 2 years working as a postdoc starts to become a huge negative. The assumption is you won't successfully make the transition from academia to industry.
posted by Long Way To Go at 11:23 PM on August 22, 2011

Engineer with an m.sc. here. One masters is lovely to have, but a second isn't likely to help you unless it's in something particularly useful. I think it makes it more apparent that you tried for a Ph.D. and quit. I can't speak as a hiring agent, but I'd say don't bother. There's no shame in realizing a Ph.D. isn't for you, but I wouldn't advertise that I quit something like that. It's somehow better to simply admit what you spent your last year working on, when asked in job interviews. Later on, an MBA might be additionally attractive to some employers though - as an example of when a 2nd masters is beneficial.
posted by ergo at 5:21 AM on August 23, 2011

I agree with the comments.

*A second Master's degree will make you highly specialized with more debt. It is not worth it.
*No one in industry will care that you dropped out of a PhD program. In fact - you can probably hide it on your resume if done correctly. Where you working during that time? If you were merely a research assistant you can place that down as a job and leave out the fact you were attending the PhD program.
posted by BuffaloChickenWing at 6:30 AM on August 23, 2011