To grad school or not to grad school?

[DLOBE]

Hi guys,
Im Daniel, I am currently an undergraduate astrophysics student at CU Boulder.
Just coming into my junior year now and I've begun thinking about grad school.

My current career goal is to join the upcoming private space industry. I was hoping
to get some advice about what to do after my undergraduate degree. Whether I should
pursue a graduate degree or not or just jump into the industry and begin working.
Any suggestions or advice would be highly appreciated.

Thanks, D

 

[e.bar.goum]

The best advice I could give you is to start looking at job listings for the kind of jobs you would ideally see yourself in 10 years from now. For their requirements, are they looking with people with undergrad degrees, or with grad degrees?

 

[DEvens]

Also, get Physics Today and various magazines like that. Get the issue where it shows the jobs that recent grads have gotten. Find people who have gotten jobs you like the sound of. Find out what degree from what school. This gives you some shiny targets.

 

[ZapperZ]

Hi guys,
Im Daniel, I am currently an undergraduate astrophysics student at CU Boulder.
Just coming into my junior year now and I've begun thinking about grad school.

My current career goal is to join the upcoming private space industry.

Obviously, you must know something about these "private space industry". So the question you need to ask and find out yourself is (i) how much of a job opening is there, or will there be in such a sector and (ii) what kinds of people are they looking for?

Do you even know if they are looking for "astrophysicists"? Does a company like Space X need someone with that degree, or are they looking for engineers? After all, they are nothing more than a transportation company at this moment. Do they even care about "dark matter" and cosmology?

You have other equally important questions to answer beyond just whether you should go to grad school or not.

Zz.