chestnutcurls | (Reply)

From:

I'll be moving away to graduate school in less than a month. Some of the main reasons I wanted to:

Job interest-factor. I like doing research and working on challenging problems, and many "cutting-edge" tech jobs these days require a master's degree. I want to solve new problems, not spend all day applying known solutions to known problems, which is what (as an employee) I'm realizing is what a lot of people do all day long.
Financial considerations. People with advanced degrees earn more money. However, this isn't really a big one, since I'm essentially skipping out on 2 years of income to get my graduate degree -- I'll probably earn it back over the course of my career, but not exceed it significantly.
Change/experience. Jessica's post was quite insightful; after 4.5 years at my current job, I'm realizing it isn't something I want to do forever. Also, I've never moved away to college -- I completed my bachelor's degree at night school, which, while amazingly economical, also caused my to miss the non-formal aspects of college; I want to learn to be fiscally and socially independent.