BRIAN DILLE
Staff Writer
Simpson’s creator and erstwhile comic artist Matt Groening famously posed the above question “Should you go to Graduate School?” in his strip, followed by a self-help-style true/false quiz (complete with boxes to check next to the questions): “1. I am a compulsive neurotic; 2. I like my imagination crushed into dust; 3. I enjoy being a professor’s slave; 4. My idea of a good time is using jargon and citing authorities; 5. I feel a deep need to continue the process of avoiding life.” Although this particular strip was drawn in 1987– long after Groening himself dropped out of graduate school – this bitter view continues to be held by many graduate students today.
At the time of his writing, it would likely have been hard for Groening to imagine the scores of people presently lining up to return for still more education. As stated by Aman Singh, in his article “Out of the Office”, graduate school is becoming an increasingly attractive option – even for people like myself, who already have one advanced degree and want to change careers.
Graduate school can be difficult and dear – downright damaging to both physical and mental health – and the rewards of further study are not always clear. Sure, holders of advanced degrees earn higher salaries on average, but this says nothing about whether a particular possessor of a professional or master’s degree will make more money upon his or her graduation.
A once-hot job market for graduates can cool off in the time it takes to earn a new degree. Opportunity costs – the money you could be making at a job if you weren’t back in school – must be factored into any grad school decision.
Furthermore, graduate school inherently involves a high degree of specialization that can actually narrow the scope of opportunities post-graduation. This is especially distressing because grad school has a tendency to kill the joy in the subject matter that once motivated further study. Finally, it’s important to note that if you don’t study something practical – and simultaneously develop life skills outside of the classroom – you could end up like a real-life Ignatius Reilly, the hero of John Kennedy Toole’s brilliant comic masterpiece, “A Confederacy of Dunces:” holding a master’s degree, annoyingly opinionated and known to stand on his soapbox, living at home and selling hot dogs out of a cart to tourists while wearing a pirate costume. Indeed, the novel as a whole can be seen as a warning of the perils of receiving too much education and should be required reading for all current or aspiring grad students.
Many people seem to go to graduate school these days simply because they don’t know what else to do. Burgeoning graduate school admission rates may just be a symptom of the unprecedented sociological phenomenon, the so-called “quarter-life crisis.” No one knows what’s causing this new life-cycle trend (for an in-depth look, see my 2005 article “Cool Crisis” in Flagpole Magazine, available online at www.flagpole.com). But it’s a safe bet that rising expectations are substantially to blame: more than ever before, careers are seen as instruments for “self-fulfillment.” When young university graduates join the workforce and have their first realization that their professional lives aren’t going to be that much different from those of the characters on “The Office” (either the British or American version).
Who can blame them for getting nostalgic about college and wanting to go back and start the whole career-launching process anew?
Before you go back to school, you should consider the idea of taking the money you would have paid for grad school and spend it traveling the world instead.
It’s a cliché, but I’ve learned more about life backpacking and working menial jobs abroad than I ever have in a classroom.
And take seriously Groening’s bitter view of grad school as well. Hardly a week goes by on the Drescher campus without a professor trying to crush my spiritedness and imagination.
If you must go to grad school, be smart about it and follow Groening’s “Five Secrets of Grad School Success: 1. Do not annoy the professor; 2. Be consistently mediocre; 3. Avoid anything smacking of originality; 4. Do exactly what you are told; and 5. Stop reading this right now and get back to work.”
03-16-2006