Why more education? – adamtcroft.com

In my last post, I mentioned that I’m considering pursuing a Master’s degree and a Ph.D. Today I wanted to elaborate a little bit on exactly why.

To give you some background, I earned a Bachelor of Arts in Theatrical Arts about 8-9 years ago. This degree – humorously – has been both a blessing and a curse. I have been able to do a lot with it – more than my family and likely my teachers would have imagined. But it also limits me and forces me to jump through hoops in normal life and a normal job environment.

So why the education upgrade, and why now?

What’s in it for me, why a Master’s degree makes sense

It’s the first stepping stone to what I really want – a Ph.D
In 2009 I joked with some friends that when we were all rich and famous one day, we would pay a small town University to give us honorary doctorates and walk around greeting each other as doctors.

While I’m a little less of an asshole now – I do think it would be neat to actually get a Ph.D. With all the recent advancements in technology, there are some super intriguing fields to do research in with companies that I think would be awesome to work for. Fortunately, I live in a very future-thinking tech town, and would probably be able to apply said education pretty quickly.

But right now I have a theatre degree from a small town in southwest Virginia. I’ve done great with that, mind you, but if I want to go any further – the extra papers from more well-known institutions wouldn’t hurt. But to get to the Ph.D. level, I need to have some sort of Master’s first.
I live and die for challenges
Part of this is that it’s just another challenge. Before recently I’d never thought of entertaining a Master’s degree. After looking into it due to the requirements for a Ph.D. – it seems like another difficult task to take on and be able to say that I’ve done it.

My end goal is pretty audacious too:
Get a Master’s degree online while working full time and having the tuition fully paid for.

Shit. Right?
I’m a bit of a narcissist
Not going to lie, having an MA or eventually Ph.D. attached to my name would be pretty damn cool.
The potential for more money/a better job
So this seems to be why most people get a Master’s right? The promise of more money.

Personally, I don’t think it works quite like that in my situation. I tend to work in specialized entertainment or engineering related fields. In these areas, I may start to look too expensive, rather than having prospective employers put me on the top of the list.

I certainly hope I’m wrong, though. I do think regardless, job prospects will open up where they didn’t exist before.
I’m interested to see how I hold up in school again
The older I get, the more I fall in love with learning and spend most of my time actually trying to learn things I missed out on or didn’t pay enough attention to in school

Now that I really enjoy learning every day – I’m interested to see how that motivation holds up in a school environment. Will I want to flake out again? Or will I end up at the top of my class because of all the extra effort I’m willing to put in?

My hope for the future

I’ve planned – by next Wednesday (2/15/17) to call TTU and talk with someone about potentially starting the program later in the year. Again it depends on funding (I’m not taking out student loans again – I paid those off as a birthday present to myself this year), but I’m aiming to start this process by year’s end.