I’ve met some people whose lives followed the ivory tower track: undergraduate degree in X, graduate degree in X, research position in X.
I’ve also met plenty of people whose lives diverged wildly after graduating from college: English majors who went on to be lighting designers, psychology majors who went on to be online marketing gurus, etc.
I’m curious to know how the life paths went for Dopers. In case there is any ambiguity, “undergraduate degree” refers to Associate’s and Bachelor’s degrees. “Graduate degree” refers to Master’s and PhDs.
I double majored - I have BAs in French Language and Literature/Political Science. I currently manage a team that develops online training for a major consumer electronics company. I have been in training material development for 12+ years. I don’t use French/Political Science, but I do a ton of writing and I gained that skill as a result of pounding out reams of term papers in college.
Yes it’s still relevant, but rather boringly I did a vocational degree which directly trained me for my profession (graphic design). I could not have got into my profession in any meaningful way without it - a few do, but the lack of a relevant degree hampers their career opportunities.
I have 2 undergraduate degrees. BS in Biochemistry and BA in Philosophy. Currently I’m a business teacher (based on work experience) in China. I voted No, but the skills are still helpful - especially the math. I sometimes joke that I can teach any subject here because I can read the textbooks faster than the students.
I don’t know how to answer. I have two jobs. For one of them, the answer is yes, absolutely: the only way my degree be any more relevent is if I actually taught children. For the other my job its requirements only rely a little on skills I learned while getting a degree and the rest is all about my techological skills that didn’t come from anything I studied for my major. So I’m torn between “Yes, but I would be able to do this job just as well without the degree” and “Eh, sorta related.”
My undergraduate degree was in political science and history. I work in computer support. No connection, but I think the degree was useful to me, both in my job and in my life.
My undergrad was in Comparative Literature, and then I went and got an MLIS, so I’m a librarian now. You can really do an MLIS after almost any undergrad, so I voted ‘sorta,’ but it is handy to be able to read Russian titles and to know something about world literature. You wind up picking up a little bit of everything in the library world, though.
I have a BS in electrical engineering and almost another BS in computer science (I was planning on doing a master’s in CS but abandoned it). I work as a hardware and software designer for a company that makes industrial control systems. I definitely followed a straight line in my education and career.
I voted “no, but the skills I learned in school are still helpful”. This applies both to my most recent job, which didn’t have much to do with undergrad degrees (though they led to my grad degree, which was highly relevant), and to what I’m doing now–staying home with my baby daughter. My bachelor’s degrees are animal physiology and English literature. Both are coming in very handy in this SAHM scene.
My undergraduate degree is in Physics, but I am now a software engineer. The thing is, I ended up getting a Ph.D. in Physics, but my thesis was a computational theoretical thesis. So I needed to learn how to program for my graduate degree. That in turn led to my career which otherwise has very little to do with physics.
I never finished my degree but if I had it would have no relevance to any of my past employment. My plan was Lib. Arts-History/Eng. Lit-Teach but I’ve worked as a electronics tech, computer repairman and professional bar bouncer/doorman.
I’m going to respond to this about my most-of-the-year job, not the off-season stuff I’m doing at the moment.
Yes, very much so. I have a theatre degree and I work in a large repertory theater. However, I did not get the job because of my college degree but through contacts, and I doubt my boss knows whether I have a degree or not. I know he’s never seen my resume.
Like Dangermom, I’m a librarian and voted sorta - my undergrad degree is in history, an that comes up on the desk at times, but my subject specialty is business. Just about any undergrad would do though.