/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.11648025]

What were/are your feelings about undergrad?

[Anonymous No.11648037]

When I was undergrad I used to hate how much fucking work/studying I had and how little free time I had
then I went into grad school
fuck I'm such a retard

[Anonymous No.11648039]

>>11648037
Explain.

[Anonymous No.11648044]

>>11648039
Grad school is way way way worse in terms of workload
I should've appreciated undergrad while I had the chance

[Anonymous No.11648049]

>>11648025
I dropped out of community college. I felt inferior to a lot of my friends and jealous I didn't have the experiences they did as undergrads in real universities.

Then I got a great union job that required a high school diploma and they're still paying off debt.

[Anonymous No.11648051]

>>11648039
He’s a masochist who, with disdain towards the undergraduate workload, applied and consequently attended graduate school.

[Anonymous No.11648054]

>>11648044
Is it all worth the effort?

[Anonymous No.11648056]

>>11648025
The workload was crazy.
Now i work in the industry (for 3 years now) it feels like a permanent summer break with a lot of money.

[Anonymous No.11648058]

>>11648049
unions are based
>>11648025
they cheat too much

[Anonymous No.11648061]

>>11648056
Share more, industryanon

[Anonymous No.11648065]

>>11648061
what do you want to know?

[Anonymous No.11648073]

>>11648054
yes only because I'm too stubborn to quit and do this shit out of spite

[Anonymous No.11648075]

>>11648065
What did you major in?
How much did you like it?
What was your favorite/least favorite part about your area of study?
Did you choose your major because you had genuine interest?
What industry do you work in?
What does your job consist of?
What are your coworkers like?
How fulfilling is the job?
Do you have a main interest aside from work? If so, are you able to pursue it?

[Anonymous No.11648080]

>>11648065
Masters or PhD?
Research or logistics?
Does industry care how much you published?
Do you know anyone like you that didn't make it?

[Anonymous No.11648083]

>>11648065
>>11648065
what degree and what industry?

[Anonymous No.11648087]

>>11648073
What are you studying?

[Anonymous No.11648113]

>>11648075
>What did you major in?
EE

>How much did you like it?
it was okay, science interested me more but i wanted to earn money

>What was your favorite/least favorite part about your area of study?
favorite: math was good, and i learned the basics of programming and i found out how cool coding is actually
least: when i had to memorize bullshit i never will use (like soldering techniques, microelectronic stuff)

>Did you choose your major because you had genuine interest?
kinda, it was like: i have talent in math and physics which is the hardest course i can choose and earn the most money

>What industry do you work in?
car industry, everything is about automatic driving functions right now

>What does your job consist of?
writing embedded software: writing OS-es, drivers for OS-es, sensor data processors, image processing, getting the most use out of some chips etc

>What are your coworkers like?
normies really, of nerdy but wholesome version

>How fulfilling is the job?
not really, but it is fun to do if you are interested in it

>Do you have a main interest aside from work? If so, are you able to pursue it?
yes, i have some home projects and i want to participate in a AI study in the future, i have the time to pursue these even in work time when we have nothing important on our hands

[Anonymous No.11648124]

>>11648080
>Masters or PhD?
masters

>Research or logistics?
im not sure what you mean

>Does industry care how much you published?
not at all

>Do you know anyone like you that didn't make it?
yes a lot, like 75% of my classmates form the first year of my BA

[Anonymous No.11648125]

>>11648087
EE

[Anonymous No.11648176]

CS major

Undergrad was a complete waste of time. Only needed to get a diploma so you can get a job.

[Anonymous No.11648222]

>>11648113
>car industry, everything is about automatic driving functions right now
Oh great, you're working on the infantilization of humans. Thank you based centralized algorithm for allowing me to go places, without you I would be completely helpless!

[Anonymous No.11648235]

I did computer engineering. I really excel at project work and was expecting undergrad to be fun times coding and building things in an electronics lab. In reality there was only one project course per year and 90% of my time was spent cramming calculus textbook. I graduated years ago and my ability to manage projects and get shit done in a lab is a thousand times more useful than having a table of inverse Laplace transforms committed to memory.

[Anonymous No.11648278]

>>11648113
Based low-level anon
Have you made any hobby OS yet?

[Anonymous No.11648298]

>>11648278
not really, working on OS-es n work is enough OS-es for me .
my hobby interests lay with accelerated computation, fpga programing, and low level security stuff

[Anonymous No.11648303]

>>11648222
>Oh great, you're working on the infantilization of humans.
yes, that is technology in a nutshell

[Anonymous No.11648334]

>did CS
>mediocre B student at mediocre uni
>constant wondering if i could have been a good researcher or something
>still have shadows of thoughts of going back for physics or chemistry
>know i'm probably too dumb and burnt out to try again
at least i make like 160k a year now until the bubble bursts

>>11648298
>fpga programing
based, do you do any of it for work? it's rapidly becoming a new buzzword in tech

[Anonymous No.11648380]

>>11648334
sadly, no
up to this point its not part of the work i do at least, maybe in the future i will switch fields

really? i didnt notice it as a buzzword yet, im mostly interested in fpga-s as secondary processors to boost certain activities of the main processors
although i started to read more and more about self re-configuring (in run time) fpgas lately, and combining this tech with AI-s seems pretty new and inserting

[Anonymous No.11648427]

>>11648380
>really? i didnt notice it as a buzzword yet, im mostly interested in fpga-s as secondary processors to boost certain activities of the main processors
same, working on some form of hardware acceleration is a job i'd want to pursue myself, but i'm looking more on the GPU level. my lack of low level knowledge and the general academic stiffness of many of those sectors seems to gatekeep me out

nobody's seriously considering giving up their software job for an fpga programming job right now, but it gets a bit of talk here and there because high frequency trading likes using them instead of gpus for certain critical paths in their code, or to build crazy network cards that are specific for their algorithm. google is looking at designing custom hardware for some of their AI stuff
also because lmao crypto

[Anonymous No.11648518]

>>11648049
How the fuck did you get a union application?

[Anonymous No.11648576]

>>11648518
Family. Wasn't supposed to be a long-term thing, but I got very, very lucky.

[Anonymous No.11648614]

>>11648518
can burgers not just join a trade union?

[Anonymous No.11648634]

>>11648614
depends on the field i think. for some trades you have to like apply to get into one and get certified i think
also our corporate overlords hate unions and therefore you should too

[Anonymous No.11649195]

>>11648056
>permanent summer break
Really? How many hours are you working a week?

[Anonymous No.11649280]

>>11648334
Literally me from what you described.
Care to share what field of coding did you choose? I chose machine learning and am currently loving it. It puts my cognitive abilities and math knowledge to good use and the bubble will likely burst a lot later than usual monkey coding.

[Anonymous No.11649755]

>>11649195
40 on paper, but in actuality i do like 2-3 hours of actual hard work a day (mon-friday) the rest is coffeebreaks bullship meetings, chatting with colleges and reading stuff online

[Anonymous No.11649764]

>>11648025
Very biased because in the place i went to everyone cheated.
I only found out about it after my second year.
How you ask,well thats because I was only leaving my apartment to buy food and go to lectures.
The rest of the time I was reading textbooks front to back like the naive retard i was.

[Anonymous No.11650399]

Undergrad is indoctrination. You receive the dogma of humanism. This was a revelation to me. My family is typical American middle class. My parents watch TV and live in a box.

Learning and studying are the center of my life after undergrad. I have a framework for solving the problems in my life by understanding them. My parents have a hard time relating to me or understanding me now. They take for granted what they like and ignore what they don't. They never went to college.

I spent a lot of college skipping classes I didn't like to read Marx, Freud, Nietzsche, or experiment with drugs, or go on benders, or writing toy programs, or reading Mexican novels in Spanish. Only a few semesters I thought my time would be best served getting straight As. I spent most of my time experimenting with myself.

I started undergrad feeling worthless and helpless. When I finished I felt like anything is possible with enough time and energy. I had too much mental disorder to be able to focus solely on my curriculum and continue to graduate work. That's life.

[Anonymous No.11650427]

>>11648025
Undergrad abroad here. I quickly became disillusioned because I never really found good friends like the ones I had back home.

[Anonymous No.11650429]

>>11648025
I liked it even though my alma mater was a shit tier university, pardon, it was academia, not even a university

[Anonymous No.11650513]

>>11650427
Pfft, I went to my state's flagship university and still couldn't make any real friends. I had a really tight knit group of friends in high school but they all went to better, smarter schools. I barely interacted with the acquaintances from hs that went to my uni, and I never met any people who I could connect with like my old hs friends.
Needless to say, I did not attend the graduation ceremony.

[Anonymous No.11650558]

Chemists and biologists have it harder than engineers and CS majors. Yes I said it.

[Anonymous No.11650583]

>>11649280
i just got a normal cs degree without any specialization and now i'm another grunt at faang. the pay is good and job is probably one of the more stable ones in the industry right now, but there's nothing that separates me from the masses. i want to work on something in research like scientific simulations or performance tuning but i'm too dumb and it would be a massive pay cut

>>11650558
most people would agree cs majors have it easy right now

[Anonymous No.11650602]

>>11650583
Is it not possible to do such thing on your own time while you work at faang?

[Anonymous No.11650610]

>>11648025

Total waste of time and money. Could have done more using that money to make my own lab and just read and watch all sorts of YouTube videos to learn what I actually wanted to fucking learn (biochem and synthbio stuff). Who knows, maybe the knowledge gain in such hacker fashion might have been enough to get a master's. Most of my class mates graduated as "professionals" of their field, but cannot fucking explain the basics of it.

College is fucking outdated like by 2 fucking centuries and I'm being optimistic. If you are not applying for a top renowned school where you can enter a quality professional nextwork, just don't bother and don't lose your time and money. And even getting into such schools is quite a risk already.

[Anonymous No.11650615]

>>11650602
i could but after hours on the job i just don't feel like doing anything programming related, especially learning something i'm so unfamiliar with and won't see meaningful results for a while

this weekend i'm thinking about making a small a game for fun but i've barely made a dent in my ODE and parallelism textbooks just cause it's hard to see the point after wageslaving

[Anonymous No.11650640]

>>11648037
you had free time in undergrad?

[Anonymous No.11650655]

>>11648025
mechanical engineering.
70 hours of work per week.
did nothing but work for some semesters.
really really painful.
somehow survived.

[Anonymous No.11650666]

>>11648025
Just finished. I didn't start school until I was 24. Going to college made me remember and recall how much I fucking hate school and I'm glad to be finished. I just want a job.I can't get a call back from any company, I don't know.

B.S. Physics with minor in Mathematics, but from a small no-name university. 3.84GPA, ubt I can't even get acknowledge by any employer and I've been applying since December. I have no fucking clue what I'm doing wrong. Other students from my department with worse grades and no real-world experience got offers, but I can't even get outright rejected. Of the like 40+ applications I have I have only heard from 3, rejections from positions I knew I was unqualified for in the first place.

[Anonymous No.11650678]

>>11650666
what kinds of jobs are you applying for?

[Anonymous No.11650690]

>>11650513
>forced to pretend I have friends abroad, when I return home
>also pretend that I really miss my friends, when I'm talking to acquaintances abroad
I'm sick of hiding my power level, lads.

[Anonymous No.11650692]

>>11648025
too many people go to college, I wish public universities were just STEM with exceptions to maybe history and lingusitics/languages, i guess that would kill public uni sports though. Lawyers should go straight to law school out of high school, no point in wasting 4 years with a worthless degree

[Anonymous No.11650694]

>>11650678
Mainly engineering, scientific, and data analysis. Mostly in government and government contractors as I live in the greater area around DC. I meet basic qualifications for basically any government GS 5-7 position, so in that frame I have played to many Engineering, Physicist, and Physical Scientist positions within the government at the level. Mostly in Airforce and Navy, but also with DoD at large, DoE, NSF, and some parts of the Intelligence community. On corporate/private side I have so far found it a lot more difficult to come by truly entry level open positions. Many minimum 2 years of experience in the industry/field already and/or require a current active Secret or Top Secret clearance. I've found a few entry level positions with contractors, though, that are made for out-of-college engineers and STEM grads and only require ability to obtain a clearance once hired as condition of employment. Those are also mostly in defense industry.

I focus mainly on defense and aerospace as that is what is huge around the capitol, but I'm open to other industries.I pretty much try to throw out a couple applications every week. I think it's only a matter of time and I know the process can be slow, but it's really irritating hearing absolutely nothing in return. Follow up emails to recruiters, HR, etc are usually not responded to or at best get an automated return message thanking me for interest in the organization.

[Anonymous No.11650704]

>>11650694
have you considered applying outside of the state as well? i know travel is extremely restricted right now
yeah, it was grueling. for me i couldn't find a job in my home state so i ended up moving to the west coast

[Anonymous No.11650727]

>>11650704
I haven't, no. Realistically there shouldn't be a "need" to. This is the fastest growing part of the country and it never slows down. The wealthiest cities and counties in the nation are all located here (though I'm a country kid from the boonies that commuted to university). I've lived in the same area for 30 years and it's pretty amazing. You'd almost never know there was a recession. The jobs and industry are here, it's just confounding. I feel like I've been wrapped in some kind of invisibility cloak.

That being said, if I have to move cross-country in order to find work then it is no longer financially feasible. I'd sooner take a job out of my field and make less money than move to the west coast or New England.

[Anonymous No.11650757]

I'm about to transfer from a community college to an awesome UC to complete my CS major. Is it a good idea to go for a masters in Computational Biology / Bioinformatics? It seems like really interesting and important work, though everyone talks shit about grad school.

[Anonymous No.11650795]

>>11650757
Generally speaking, I am of the opinion that is unwise to think of an M.S. immediately after undergrad. Find employment in your field, your employer will send you to get a master's later and foot the bill, meanwhile you get experience in your field. If you are interested in industry work, a M.S. is usually only equivalent to the same number of years work experience. Why would you pay through the nose to pad a couple years on your resume rather than BE paid for those same years experience? Again, most places can send you for a higher degree if/when you decide you want/need one.

If you are interested in academics you should be considering PhD programs. If you aren't interested in writing grant proposals and jacking off in your lab for pennies, then there's no reason to ever consider a PhD. It's a shit system that sucks up 6 years of your life where you sign up to be somebody else's bitch. It's worth it if you love nothing more than studying whatever your autistic niche obsession is, but the university and academic "culture" is shit. If you are interested in the field at large or working on cutting edge projects, then industry is where you should go and you should aim to get in with a bachelor's, only getting a master's if necessary later. You will gain the knowledge, experience, and skills of your discipline actually working in your field so mach faster than you will sitting in a classroom where half the program will probably be irrelevant to your specific goals.

[Anonymous No.11650807]

18. Any hope for a journalism major? Im going to BU. Im generally smart, I'm told I'm a good writer and I write for my school's paper. Im nervous about the future. I just want to know if I can live comfortably. Should I switch majors?

[Anonymous No.11650824]

>>11650795
Interesting, thanks Anon

[Anonymous No.11650856]

>>11650807
do you actually like journalism?

[Anonymous No.11650858]

>>11650824
Remember, colleges and universities are money-making institutions. They are going to try and sell themselves to you hard and a lot of people will buy into that line of thinking even if it is foolish. Think about what you actually want to accomplish. Your education is not your goal, your education is going to allow you to pursue the goal you actually want. It sounds cliche, but find a clear vision of what you want to be doing and let that inform what you aim for.

So, if you are interested in Computational Biology, but not interested in academics, start researching roughly local companies or parts of government that work in that field. Research what specific projects they are working on. Talk to recruiters and people from industry (they will come to your campus several times per year) and ask what they work on, what that company does, how you might fit into that picture. If you are dead set on doing something like research right out f the gate then you'll probably have to stay in school for longer. Most people don't start there, though, and the vast majority of roles you can perform don't warrant a higher degree to get in the door. You are far better of thinking carefully about what exactly you want to do and tailoring your experience to suit that in. That is, choose coursework and electives (or a minor/second major) as well as internships or research projects that will service your specific long-term goal.

[Anonymous No.11650873]

>>11650856
Yeah, I enjoy writing about things, especially if they are tangible and real. I feel that I have decent raw ability, I think Im just nervous about specializing in the wrong thing. I really don't need much to be happy, just a decent paying job.

[Anonymous No.11650891]

>>11650757
does it happen to be UCSD or cal UwU?
>Computational Biology
i kinda want to do comp bio, or anything in computational research, do you know what kinds of work you'd do?

>everyone talks shit about grad school.
going to CS for grad school has been a meme for the past 5 years. i do not know if it will change soon
for research and stuff i don't know how you'd get in without a phd, but with CS going to grad school was being stuck in the ivory tower while your peers are moving through their careers really fast

[Anonymous No.11650900]

>>11650873
>I really don't need much to be happy, just a decent paying job.
oh if you're just in it for the money fuck getting a phd

[Anonymous No.11650910]

>>11650900
Well I dont think its even possible to get a PHD in Journalism. Like I said im going into college as a 4 year Journalism major, and Im wondering if this is a viable career path. Asking advice here because I can't get a straight answer from anyone around me.

[Anonymous No.11650911]

>>11648037
same
then I got a job

[Anonymous No.11650927]

>>11650910
Seems like the state of modern journalism is either clickbait, blinkered partisanship, or status quo apologia. Expect to be bitter and underpaid.

[Anonymous No.11650935]

>>11650900
>>11650910
oh i'm retarded i thought you were the comp bio fag

>Asking advice here because I can't get a straight answer from anyone around me.
not science or math. you might be asking in the wrong place
literally all but one of my frens who majored in humanities work something completely unrelated to their degree. journalism is probably rife with nepotism and unpaid interns
BU is quite expensive. think about the amount of debt you'd be getting yourself in to if you did this and if it's seriously worth it

[Anonymous No.11650943]

>>11650935
>>11650927
Jesus this scares me.

[Anonymous No.11650965]

>>11650943
i can legitimately say after 3 years out of undergrad, a lot of people admit they kind of regret taking on a lot of debt for a soft degree
this isn't even reddit stemfag high horse, just consider that you'll very likely not find a job in your field unless you're turbo autistic

many of the stem fields are kind of like this as well though, college is a racket

[Anonymous No.11650972]

>>11650965
This is pretty much how it appears to me, I guess ther is a good chance ill end up switching to stem. I appreciate you being candid, the whole college system is disgusting.
...explain what you mean by turbo autistic

[Anonymous No.11650977]

>>11648037

You know sometimes i think about this
All of the work and stress that goes into getting a STEM degree and then graduate school and in the end you might end up miserable anyway and feel like it was all just for nothing
I can't help but wonder if it might actually be better to just work at a store or warehouse or something where you won't ever have to worry about anything and you just do an easy mindless job for the rest of your life

[Anonymous No.11651042]

>>11650977
A store/warehouse job is easy and predictable, but it is a different kind of misery. There is still stress from shit coworkers and shit bosses. You are going to worker much harder and much longer for far less money than you would as a STEMfag in a lab or behind a computer. All that doesn't matter too much, but it is not long term tenable. It can even be downright comfy when you are young, but as you age you start to see the true horror.

Those jobs take their toll on your body, even just working in a restaraunt and standing all day, let alone working in a warehouse lifting and packing. Your body will break down, you'll age prematurely, but you won't be able to stop working. If/when you do make it to retirement age you'll hardly be able to quit as you won't have enough money to retire on. Nevermind, your company can get rid of you at a moment's notice.

I am.
>>11650666
Before I started university I was doing those jobs. I had the exact mindset you described while I was in high school and I worked in those areas. I saw the writing on the wall, I knew I was going nowhere after several years stuck in a rut doing menial work. My body was already degrading, I've had chronic lower back and knee pain since I was 23. I've become sedentary and unhealthy now as doing any kind of vigorous exercise causes me a lot of pain and discomfort. I knew I couldn't keep doing what I was doing and that if I was still stuck in that work by the time I was 30 I'd probably eat a bullet.

Here I am now and I just want a job and enough to live. If I can get health insurance, go to physical therapy and get treated for my physical pain, get in shape again I'd be happy. That's all I really want. A job with enough money to live securely and not be in pain/be healthy and able.

[Anonymous No.11651049]

>>11650727
Just walk in and tell them you need a job bro

[Anonymous No.11651058]

>>11650972
stem is not free money. there's probably a reason i don't know many people in hard sciences. i know many in engineering and a couple of them are finding it hard to find a job as well, but they have the luxury of looking for engineering specific jobs

i just want a meaningful job, like i feel like i could be doing something impactful
sadly the delusions i have are unlikely to be practical irl

[Anonymous No.11651091]

>>11651049
Can't. All closed due to eh Flu Man Chu.
:^(

I have been tagging their social media like mad, though.

[Anonymous No.11651738]

Realized the grad students at my school did less work than the honors kids, realized my.professors were nepotists and just plain stupid. Realized how stupid people at other schools are because my school was top tier. Realized how stupid the average person is. Realized most PhDs are idiots, but ill never be taken seriously by anyone. Realized that my professors and others stole my work and ideas and parroted it off as their own. Would ask them questions about my stuff they couldn't answer just to embarrass them.

[Anonymous No.11651753]

>>11648025
So far everyone doing a physics major thinks they're going to work for NASA. Anyone else experience this?

[Anonymous No.11652498]

I'm finishing computer engineering undergrad this week and it honestly feels like I wasted my money. I barely learned anything useful in my classes and I'm struggling to find work now. For now I'm trying to actually learn skills that relate to my field, but I don't know how I'll be able to prove that to potential employers.

[Anonymous No.11652503]

>>11652498
what kind of jobs can you get out of CE besides defense? seems like every CE person goes to software

[Anonymous No.11652540]

>>11652503
Embedded systems, networks and some EE stuff depending on your background