I previously expressed interest in the accelerated/combined B.Asc/M.ASc program at UW. After some thinking, I no longer believe it is a good option.
Academic InbreedingDoing a grad degree at the same institution as the undergrad is bad form, due to the perception of recycling ideas and general intellectual circlejerking. I should go and study somewhere nice. Since universities care (marginally) more about grad students than undergrad maggots, there are more options this go around.
Thoreau: "Simplify, simplify."
This term, I seriously considered sticking in a social psych into my lonely schedule. I later discovered I was too lazy to print out and fax out the course override form.
Being Overqualified
One accelerated program later, I will have approximately one year of relevant work experience and a masters degree. That will make me overqualified for entry level jobs and underqualified for anything that actually needs experience. The overqualification stems from the idea that adding a masters degree means it's harder for the employer to pump relevant work information into a brain afterwards. Like adding more coffee to a full cup.
I don't think they really give a crap, as long there's a bit of experience in there.
Research Ideas
My only brush with independent research projects have been with science fair projects.
Grade 4 - It was optional and my mom did it. End of story.
Grade 7 - Gum disease, because my dentist told me I had gingivitis. Yay.
Grade 8 - Parachute height, area, weight vs time. No equations involved, except for manually fitting a reciprocal function to the data. My brother got a parachute man from the dentist
Grade 9 - Size of a hole in a tinfoil ship, location of hole, mass of ship, vs time taken for it to sink in a fish tank. This was around the point I watched Titanic. It was good.
Grade 11 - Magnetospheric dissipation. I watched The Core a few weeks before. Sorry, 221. It was good enough that I didn't even notice the bad science going on. A more charitable phrase might be "willfully ignored".
Research-based degree is a BAD IDEA, especially after PHd comics. Eh, maybe after a few courses I'll have a burning question in the relevant field.
Or whatever
If I take any extra courses, it'll be so I can take an option in physical sciences. Most of the reqd courses for that option will count as technical electives, except PHYS 125, the second half of AP physics C.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}