Doing a masters while working in Spain
jan-herlyn.com
jan-herlyn.com
In the states during late covid, I thought the downtime would be good to do a second masters in something unrelated to working in software. I chose a remote program with a univeristy here in the states, I did the first year, but it reminded me that studying - especially a program unrelated to anything you have currently done - is actually not easy.
I chose Geology. I have BS/BA in Comp Eng and Chemistry and an MS in Comp Eng. So this was personal interest.
Revisiting math I hadn't used in awhile was the easy part. Making the time, while working, reminded my why I also ended up ABD (all but dissertation - toward PHD) post masters. Sometimes your brain needs to relax.
Glad it worked for you. And the European Universities are significantly cheaper than Universities in the states (this was a state univerisity which is - per state - considered a step above a state school. For instance a UC vs a CSU in california).
Which work visa did you apply for? Or do you have an EU passport?
to be clear, i think that's cool, and i might try it at some point.
but how do you deal with the fact that university, in practice, is not "for the joy of learning"?
for most people there, students and professors, it's more like "just a job". and this does have an effect. colleagues that only want to pass the test and are watching out for their careers (or even worse, don't even care about anything and are there because of societal expectations) do not make good learning companions. professors who are very dispassionate about the subject don't want you taking up their time with fancy questions and administer dumb tests such that studying for the test is useless beyond passing the course.
(to be clear i'm not criticizing these people directly. obviously, i understand that bills have to be paid -- after all, i took some fun electives, not a degree in fun)
personally, during my time in university i did try a lot of elective courses "for the joy". it forced me a schedule, which was good, because it's something i struggled with self-studying. a few times, professors offered some real gems of knowledge which i wouldn't have found otherwise. and obviously, in practical classes, i got to play stuff i otherwise wouldn't. but the battle against the bullshit took up most of my time and energy.
I think this strongly depends on the subject you study, most people in mechanical engineering will have a very different attitude to people studying world literature or astrophysics.
there's still the professors though. the courses may not necessarily be different from their point of view.
also, what do you make of physics grads going to work on finance? doesn't strike as very "scholarly" of them, at first.
physics students were cited as examples of people who went to university "for the joy of learning". i mentioned the existence of a path from a physics education to a very well-paying career which is moreover not generally considered intellectually stimulating, which suggests (though certainly not proves) the existence of (some -- though certainly not necessarily all) physics students who are not really there "for the joy of learning" -- which again, was one of the concerns i originally cited.
if you are or know a physics grad who studied physics "for the joy of learning" and then worked on finance and you think i'm not correct (say, because finance is actually intellectually stimulating, or that you were really into learning when in school but now are more focused on your career (i actually know a bunch of people for whom this is one is true, now that i think of it), or...), then by all means feel free to share your story, as this is literally what my question was about.
certainly questions can be raised about "corruption" and "nobility", as you did, but i did not intend to do that.
Aren’t they? Would you say a doctor who works for no money is more noble? I would.
https://www.colorado.edu/physics/2025/09/22/quantum-physics-...
At the end of the day part of what makes (theoretical) physics "scholarly" is the poor job prospects outside of academia, but there simply aren't enough positions for everyone graduating with a masters and they have to find some job eventually. Being a quant certainly beats becoming weapon designers.
When I spent about 8 years living in a remote area with a lot of old mines, etc. exploring rocks, having a mining claim, etc was interesting and it was not directly related to work. So, trying Geology made some sense because I had an interest.
Yes the near Lit minor and my second Bachelors (chemistry) were literally for fun - but there was a roundedness to not just staring at computers all the time.
Different people have different interests and approaches.
Also costs when I was doing the initial schooling wasn't as bad as it is now (a TAing job, working in a lab, and maybe some part time tech support) covered most bills. Rent, tuition, and other expenses were under 10k for the year - even at a UC - yes this was awhile ago. My step-daughter is looking at closer to $30k a year (give or take) for a CSU.
There's something here called "second chance", which I don't remember seeing this in Brazil. My wife did a masters at University of Barcelona and they also had a second chance. In every subject if you fail, then you take the exam or submit some assignments to get the required grade. Some students realised they wouldn't get a good grade, and preferred to skip the exam or assignment, just to get a better grade on the second chance to graduate with a good score/honours/etc.. I found that interesting, but I focused more learning things that would help me at $work and tried to avoid stress (I was probably the oldest student in my class, 40+ yo).
Kicking someone out and effectively voiding all progress just for failing one challenging final year class twice is completely mad.
Was it rather that you lost a scholarship and couldn’t afford to finish or something like that?
Sorry to dwell, I’m sure it must be painful, I wish you the best luck.
It was mostly painful to see people I had courses with graduate just this month, however I do have a good software engineering job so all is well?
And I'm very sorry to hear that either way :(
As for the appeal - these usually aren't successful, even my thesis advisor said that he probably wouldn't go out of his way to talk to the analysis course examiner etc. etc.
My friend was in a similar situation as you, the same school, possibly, except it was "Electric Circuits 2".
On Wednesday he failed the last exam, Thursday he applied as new student, on Monday he was 1st year student and by Friday he was 3rd year student with all classes accepted. Still had to do the Electric Circuits 2 of course.
Now I'm studying part time for my masters degree( cybersec) whilst also working full time, only this time the job is very mentally draining.
This makes german supervision sound pretty abysmal! Maybe that's why the thesis project I had with a German professor crashed and burned (I was to implement an simulation method, and he wouldn't help with debugging), they are just raised in a culture where you don't help students?
If you need someone to hold your hand every other week perhaps you shouldn’t go into academics. You should be operating autonomous at that point.
I've seen many people who are quite competent under close supervision but completely clueless on their own.
We could debate if academia would be better off with different approach though.
Being able to work on complicated research topics on your own is what universities are centrally preparing for.
If you really need close supervision, you likely are not made for academia or often not even for a course of studies at a university.
Yes, this is a harsh truth, but academia is really a brutal game of sink or swim.
In Germany, the master degree is considered as such. Basically the final test before you decide for or against "the whole brutal game of joining a doctoral study program".
A professor that I know clearly said: "In a master's thesis I expect something scientifically novel. It does not have to be something deep, but if you want 'a 1 before the comma' (in Germany, the grading at a uninversity goes from 1,0 to 5,0 where 5,0 means 'failed'), it has to be something scientifically novel. The number after the mark is to distinguish whether it is really a deep discovery or not."
Be also culturally aware that in practice, for a final thesis
- 1.0 means "good",
- 1.3 means "average",
- 1.7 means "bad",
- everything below (from 2.0 on) basically means "failure" (you get a degree, but are marked as failure).
So, the professor clearly stated that every grade for a master thesis that "is not in practice a failure grade" means "some novel scientific discovery". And every grade that is better than "in practice 'bad'" means "some very non-trivial scientific discovery".
I know that many professors think this way, though most of them would phrase this more diplomatically.
This notion that Masters are for academia is so contrary to my experience altogether. They are not even associated with research, in my experience. What I have seen is:
* BSc: General professionals.
* MSc: More specialized professionals.
* PhD: Baseline for research, but more often than not just doing even more specialized work than folks with MSc.
* Postdocs: Actual researchers, including but not limited to academic careers.
You would not do high school without primary school, right?
The way to get a PHD is to get an bachelor's degree first, then masters degree.
Your supervisor should at different times, as appropriate, wear the collaborator cap or the examiner cap. During the course of your project, he should be your collaborative advisor who helps you flesh out ideas and improve them. At the start and end, he should be your formal examiner.
This is how I have seen most Masters (and PhD) projects proceed in Physics in North America.
After showing the article to one of my friends who‘s doing the thesis right now, he told me that his experience with his supervisor is very different from mine. In my case I might have gotten very lucky.
I'm studying part-time to complete a BA in political science while working full-time as a software developer. I love learning the subject, but the workload can be tough. Happy to hear it's not just me.
Thank you for sharing!
In Argentina doing a bachelor + master while working is called a Monday. It's partially unfortunate since it "delays" the finish date of the degree and even makes a lot of people drop out because they found a cushy enough job.
But coming out with a degree along with years of professional experience makes up for the "delay" in getting the degree at least tenfold.
Leisure time is a human need btw, I learnt it too late after a burnout.
the conclusion was as expected
edit> Spain is one of my fav countries and I may even be half spanish, Im just saying if I was going to focus on work Id move to the nordics or the US