Masters/Doctorate Question

[Sepukku]

I feel like I should know this but I know no one, friend or family, with a graduate degree and I'm currently post-bachelors and not enrolled anywhere so I have no counselor I have thats eager to sit down with me for even 10 minutes.

(1) Do you have to do a masters program and get a master's degree before doctorate? Or can you do Bachelors -> Doctorate? If you have to do one, then the other, can a masters and doctorate degree program run concurrently?

I've heard people generally get their doctorates from ~8 years of college, but I've also heard that Masters are generally 6~7 years - which leads me to believe they either run concurrently post-bacc or you can do Doctorate without Masters.

(2) Also, how related does my bacc have to be to any graduate program? Very strictly related, loosely related, or not at all? Or does it vary by program? I know with Education at my old college, you could come in with anything loosely related to any educational program (Athletic Therapy -> Physical Education, example) and they'd give you 2-3 years of coursework, you take the certification exams for my state (PA), and you'd have a masters in education with licensure to teach despite your BA being in something completely non-educational. Like can History BA go to Business Administration? Can Economics go to Literature? I'd imagine these loose ties only work with Masters programs and not Doctorates due to the level of prior knowledge needed to even begin working on a dissertation.

[Tyche]

Masters generally run 6 or 7 years total. 2-3 years after the bachelors. Your masters degree does not have to be related to your bachelors degree at all, sometimes, but it may make it easier to get into a grad program. There are physics majors that go to law school, I have a professor who got his bachelors is microbiology and his masters in african anthropology lol. With that said, some masters programs require you to have a related bachelors and experience (example: Nurse anesthetist programs require a science or nursing bachelors plus a year of experience in a critical care unit). Your mileage may vary in that sense.

Oh, as far as bachelors to doctorates, I think it's largely irrelevant, because it's going to be around the same amount of time. If you get accepted to a graduate program out of undergrad like Law or Med school, you're still going to be going for four years before you graduate, or about the same amount of time from going to undergrad > grad > doctorate. It really depends on the program.

[Tyche]

Somewhat related, I know that Vanderbilt offers an associates degree to masters degree program for nurses. It's $1600 a credit hour though, so...yeah.

[Kooldachio]

I have a feeling based off of the verbage that I won't be of any help considering I am in engineering, but here it goes. Our programs in ASU for master's are 2 years - you can choose to do research and write a not-so-in-depth thesis (my choice) with a couple less credits required or do a couple more classes and take a comprehensive exam. I repeat, these are 2 year programs. Now, if you come in with the mindset of a PhD, you don't need to think about master's stuff and technically you won't ever get that degree. You'll spend 5-8 years working on it, typically. Some people don't know if they want PhD and work on masters. They end up doing two thesis(s).

[Restrat]

It's very field dependent. You could be a biology major and go into English to do a dissertation on the rhetorical ecology of scientific writing, but you can't be an English major and go to a biology PhD program. What are you specifically looking at?

Also, some fields basically require a masters before applying for a PhD program, whereas many others consider the "masters" to be the first two years of the PhD program

[Darus Grey]

You do not need a masters to apply for a PHD program(most).

Infact, in my experience, it's significantly easier to get into a PHD program than a masters program.


If you have actual work experience in the field you're applying for, you are on the fast track in terms of acceptance and your bachelors is significantly less meaningful. If you have no undergrad AND no experience in the degree field, than it will be harder(especially engineer/sciences) to get accepted AND they may require that you basically do the core requisites of the bachleors as part of your acceptance.

[Sepukku]

I have a degree in Secondary Education: History so I could get an Educational Doctorate (but would not want a Masters in Education, cause all you can do with that is teach still), History Doctorate (Professor'ing, fuck yeah), or go into another field... I'm really good in Math (770 SAT, aced Calculus in HS, just took the GRE last week and the PC gave me an estimate at the end what my score would've been on their old 200-800 scoring system of 750-800 but expecting a near perfect/perfect score on my math portion when I get my scores for their new, official system next month.) Also have leadership experience (by 23 year old never made a salary yet in my life standards) as a camp counselor and frankly, my mindset is an education degree holder.... if you can manage/motivate a classroom of 35 students at a time, 180 students a day, who just eyeball each others goodies 8 hours a day... you can manage adults who have a financial incentive to be there and on task.

The reason the time issue is so critical is I have a health condition that I NEED health insurance for at all times and I get kicked off my parents on my 26th birthday. I can COBRA that shit for another year or so I think and CROSS MY FINGERS HOPE NOT TO DIE that I don't get any complications or severe issues for maybe a semester, two TOPS to finish whatever education I have beyond that while I free clinic things once a month or two for what I need. Masters I could night school while holding down a job that provides benefits, but Doctoratal programs will likely be too intensive to dedicate time to a benefits-providing job (aka not shit at the local mall).

[Restrat]

I'm pretty sure any real school will offer you a student health plan for around $1700 a year (you can even pay for it with loloans)

[Tyche]

I can't speak for every field, but just about every CRNA to DNP that I know worked while doing their doctorate (and pretty much all through graduate school). I know one of them worked, taught, and precepted. A ton of graduate students work while going to school, a lot of graduate programs are mostly night/weekend/online for that reason. I have a friend getting his MBA and he only goes to school on the weekends and does accounting 40+ hours a week.

[Sepukku]

Yeah I don't doubt Masters I could get it down while working, Doctorates Im less confident as the dissertation/research/field work necessary for some degrees is very demanding, EX: History dissertation typically requires field research, which means traveling - at the very least to a Civil War site in USA or as far away as Siberia if you're writing a dissertation on something Siberia-related lol

Im glad to hear through that you can go BA -> Doctorate program though, that would make things a lot easier.

As for health issues - I've seen student health insurance stuff, IDK if I'd qualify. I always had to sign waivers during Bacc coursework stating I have some already (and prove it), IDK even know when "no pre-existing conditions" kicks in, some of that Obamacare stuff kicked in immediately, some kicked in at 2011's start, some kick in January 1, 2012, and some kicks in January 2014, IIRC.

[Tyche]

DNP is a doctorate. Hell, John Hopkins DNP program (which is as good as it gets) is built for working students. Completely online save 2 weeks out of the year (or semester, I forgot) you have to be on campus. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong as I don't know a lot about other fields such as history and whatnot, but being employed while working toward your doctorate is fairly common and many of the programs are built for working around it.

[Darus Grey]

Yeah, graduate programs tend to cater to "Adults" instead of "College Kids"

[Sepukku]

Yeah, graduate programs tend to cater to "Adults" instead of "College Kids"

Part of me kinda clings to the stubborn idea that I can be a college kid forever, although thats not why I want to go to graduate school. I just don't want to be a teacher so now I need to transform my undergraduate work into something much more useful to me.

[Darus Grey]

Also just advice since you mentioned it, aiming for being a professor is a waste of time.

[Tyche]

I was in your boat for awhile. Social Science secondary ed. I pulled out when I remembered that I fucking hate high school kids. It was easy to get into with the pre-law background though. Ultimately, I just said fuck it and went in a completely different direction. Figuring out what you want to do should probably be your number one priority. If you're young, don't be afraid to start over, although I know the insurance can be problematic. It's better to finish with a degree when your 30 years old that you enjoy than to work for the next 30 years in a job you hate.

[Not Kuno]

Getting a masters was pretty much what I thought being in college would be like when I was younger. Undergrad is basically HS II: Electric Boogaloo. Pretty sure you can't just jump to doctorate though. Getting a doctorate fucking sucks ass though, ung.

[Teorem]

The length of time for your Master's is going to depend on the subject, how close the Master's is to your undergraduate work, and where you go. I was able to complete mine in three years, part-time, taking one class a semester for all but two semesters. Some schools even have programs where you can walk out with a Master's a year after getting your Bachelor's (4+1 or 5+1), but you usually start out on that track as an undergraduate.

Your Master's work doesn't necessarily have to be in line with your undergraduate field of study, but you're still subject to whatever screening the department makes on your application. Most people that I know with a MBA or in the program weren't undergraduate business majors (a few I know were CS, another was Music, and another History, etc.). But obviously you're not going to be able to jump into something like medicine without some kind of background, whether it's academic or experience.

Programs will also vary on whether you need a Master's to get into a Doctoral program; sometimes you have to have a certain amount of post-undergraduate work accumulated. However, that's more a prerequisite thing; the most important part of the Ph.D. application is that you can prove that you're going to be good at research and that you're going to be able to make a concerted effort to finish your dissertation in a reasonable amount of time.

[Sepukku]

Also just advice since you mentioned it, aiming for being a professor is a waste of time.

Out of curiousity, why? Mostly all of my professors, except 1 or 2 in 4.5 years of college seemed really happy with their lives. Its a decent pay, although you'll never drive a sick car. Tenure after like 8-9 years, benefits garunteed. Get to talk about what you have an interest in for a living, some of the education feel-goodness that I wanted as a HS teacher, but a lot less parental/administration bullshit, a lot less accountability in your class/assessment structure, grading, and your discourse with students.

[Darus Grey]

Out of curiousity, why? Mostly all of my professors, except 1 or 2 in 4.5 years of college seemed really happy with their lives. Its a decent pay, although you'll never drive a sick car. Tenure after like 8-9 years, benefits garunteed. Get to talk about what you have an interest in for a living, some of the education feel-goodness that I wanted as a HS teacher, but a lot less parental/administration bullshit, a lot less accountability in your class/assessment structure, grading, and your discourse with students.

The problem is you talked to people who were actually professors. People who already had the job.

There's been a big rise in the number of graduate program graduates and thus, a huge spike in the number of people qualified to teach university. Many universities are moving away from even offering any tenured positions at all, and even then, there's 500-5000 applicants for every ONE position.

If you're not a world class researcher you will not get a permanent professorship, it's as simple as that.

[Prim]

Out of curiousity, why? Mostly all of my professors, except 1 or 2 in 4.5 years of college seemed really happy with their lives. Its a decent pay, although you'll never drive a sick car. Tenure after like 8-9 years, benefits garunteed. Get to talk about what you have an interest in for a living, some of the education feel-goodness that I wanted as a HS teacher, but a lot less parental/administration bullshit, a lot less accountability in your class/assessment structure, grading, and your discourse with students.

That's all the fun stuff about being a professor. Depending where you are (assuming you want a decent pay and respectable position), you'll likely have to do research, be published, and do social service all on a regular basis to be considered for full professorship.