- #1
fpsulli3
- 5
- 5
My name is Frank. I found this place through Google, and it looks like a great physics community. I regret that I didn't search long ago.
In 2006, I began my career as a software developer. I did not have a college education at the time, which made it difficult to find jobs, particularly in the nadir of the Great Recession. In 2011, I finally felt stable enough in my career to pursue a degree in my spare time. Instead of going with Computer Science (a natural choice for a programmer), I decided to go into Physics. I thought it would be interesting to try something new that dovetailed with my programming experience, rather than completely overlapping it. I've always had a huge interest in Physics. From January 2011 until April 2016, I worked and attended school (full time both, except my last couple semesters of school were part-time). I finally graduated with a bachelor's last Spring.
I would have loved to move on to a graduate program and get my PhD, but unfortunately it's not prudent for me at this stage in life. I am 35 years old, with a wife and a 12-year-old daughter who are ready for me to be done with school and return to normal family life. And although it's generous for graduate programs to pay tuition and provide a stipend, as many do, it would rob me of my main source of income as a software developer. So I've decided to stick with programming, probably forever.
My plan to keep physics in my life is to work on projects. I have an entire undergrad curriculum worth of textbooks on my shelf, and honestly as a student I've only skimmed the surface of each. Much of my programming experience is in computer graphics, and so I've decided to create some cool, modern physics demos that illustrate the undergrad material in a cool way. I'll be ready to release my first demo (a simple web-based project) in just a couple of weeks. Hopefully these projects will help me keep the cobwebs at bay, and maybe even reinforce the stuff I've learned so that I understand it better than ever.
In 2006, I began my career as a software developer. I did not have a college education at the time, which made it difficult to find jobs, particularly in the nadir of the Great Recession. In 2011, I finally felt stable enough in my career to pursue a degree in my spare time. Instead of going with Computer Science (a natural choice for a programmer), I decided to go into Physics. I thought it would be interesting to try something new that dovetailed with my programming experience, rather than completely overlapping it. I've always had a huge interest in Physics. From January 2011 until April 2016, I worked and attended school (full time both, except my last couple semesters of school were part-time). I finally graduated with a bachelor's last Spring.
I would have loved to move on to a graduate program and get my PhD, but unfortunately it's not prudent for me at this stage in life. I am 35 years old, with a wife and a 12-year-old daughter who are ready for me to be done with school and return to normal family life. And although it's generous for graduate programs to pay tuition and provide a stipend, as many do, it would rob me of my main source of income as a software developer. So I've decided to stick with programming, probably forever.
My plan to keep physics in my life is to work on projects. I have an entire undergrad curriculum worth of textbooks on my shelf, and honestly as a student I've only skimmed the surface of each. Much of my programming experience is in computer graphics, and so I've decided to create some cool, modern physics demos that illustrate the undergrad material in a cool way. I'll be ready to release my first demo (a simple web-based project) in just a couple of weeks. Hopefully these projects will help me keep the cobwebs at bay, and maybe even reinforce the stuff I've learned so that I understand it better than ever.
