What type of work are you involved in

StatGuy2000

Hi everyone. I had previously had a poll which identified how many people had worked in an area related to their field of study in graduate school versus those who worked in a different field. I'm starting a new poll which parses this information a little more precisely than previously.

Of course as many of you know, this is by no means a scientific poll, but it would still be interesting to see the results as a snapshot (however imprecise) of the community here at Physics Forums.

turbo

Unemployed due to medical disability. I'd rather be working.

I spend my winters clearing snow, etc, and the non-winters (short as they are) tilling, planting, and harvesting vegetables from my garden. We save a LOT on groceries when the garden vegetables are coming in.

ModusPwnd

I work in the restaurant industry as a server, same thing I did before college.

Borek

How come there is "None" to vote for?

StatGuy2000

I had intended "Other" to be a catch-all for anything I haven't already listed above.

JakeBrodskyPE

Define "in original field of study."

In my case, I studied electrical engineering but ended up using that education and learning in Control Systems Engineering. I use many of the same things, and the math is very similar.

But it is not precisely what I studied for. Thoughts?

StatGuy2000

Correct me if I'm mistaken, but I have always thought of control systems engineering to be a sub-branch within electrical engineering (in my former alma mater, research in control systems fall under the purview of the electrical engineering department, with some cross-appointed faculty from mechanical engineering).

Therefore, I would think you work in your original field of study.

JakeBrodskyPE

Not really. Control Engineering is sort of an amalgamation of many engineering disciplines. They could include Chemical. Mechanical, and Electrical Engineering as well as significant elements of a Computer Science degree. My Principles and Practices exam included questions regarding the selection of packing material for a high temperature steam valve application, and questions regarding what kinds of materials would NOT be appropriate for using a mag-meter (the answer was kerosine). There were questions regarding practices for potentially explosive environments, Safety Integration Functions, and many more things.

Some things are similar, such as tuning PID loop responses. However, few of these are covered in common Electrical Engineering curricula.

StatGuy2000

Thanks for clarifying the definition of control engineering; up until this point, I had thought of control engineering in light of the Systems Control research group within the electrical engineering department at my alma mater, whose work include control theory, signals & communications, wavelet transforms, robotics, etc.

Going back to your question about "in original field of study", I consider someone who received an engineering degree working in a field outside of or unrelated to engineering as being "outside of original field" (e.g. an engineer working in finance or management consulting).

TMFKAN64

I interpreted "outside your original field" as "completely unrelated to the subject of your dissertation."

StatGuy2000

That pretty much sums up what I had meant.