Math is key

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JHZR2

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Ive said it once, Ill say it again, a keen understanding of the underlying maths pertaining to any observable phenomena is key to truly understanding the world around you... And it pays.

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Math majors don't always get much respect on college campuses, but fat post-grad wallets should be enough to give them a boost.

The top 15 highest-earning college degrees all have one thing in common -- math skills. That's according to a recent survey from the National Association of Colleges and Employers, which tracks college graduates' job offers.

"Math is at the crux of who gets paid," said Ed Koc, director of research at NACE. "If you have those skills, you are an extremely valuable asset. We don't generate enough people like that in this country."



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What happened to well-rounded? There are far fewer people graduating with math-based majors, compared to their liberal-arts counterparts, which is why they are paid at such a premium. The fields of engineering and computer science each make up about 4% of all college graduates, while social science and history each comprise 16%, Koc noted.

As a result, salaries for graduates who studied fields like social work command tiny paychecks, somewhere in the vicinity of $29,000. English, foreign language and communications majors make about $35,000, Koc said.



http://finance.yahoo.com/college-educati...edu-collegeprep
 
Yeah, but they see the liberal-arts courses as an easy path to being able to tell everyone, "I've got a degree!"

Yippee!!!
 
Ben Affleck from Good Will Hunting..."Re-TAIN-er"
LOL.gif
 
Originally Posted By: rshunter
Yeah, but they see the liberal-arts courses as an easy path to being able to tell everyone, "I've got a degree!"

Yippee!!!


One of my first semester engineering courses was a general introduction to engineering as a career as well as to what engineering school was all about.

One useful bit of advice we got was "If you are going into engineering for the money, leave now because there isn't enough money in it to keep you motivated enough to do the work required to succeed."
 
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I just read this story and said to my wife that a second Bachelors in Math/Engineering wouldn't be a bad idea.

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One useful bit of advice we got was "If you are going into engineering for the money, leave now because there isn't enough money in it to keep you motivated enough to do the work required to succeed."


My main concern.
 
Math skills (which I possess few of) is the fundamental format to critical thinking.

"Why doesn't this add up?" ..and it crosses into every other thing you can think of.

My AlgI teacher (a grad associate instructor at Villanova U doing his CO) just kept insisting that the main product of the learning was how it trained your mind to evaluate your surroundings.

That said, I'm still working with a SOMA for "puzzles" ..while many here are up to the Rubik's Polyhedra
 
Ive never been very good at math. I got a passable grade in algabra 101 at a community collage, and that was 2 years ago. I wanted to go into engineering for awhile there.. Oh well.
 
All you need is enough money to repeat all the courses a few times. Higher education is at a fixed pace of delivery. People aren't so constructed.
 
Math plays into every critical field. I deal with behaviors and risk reduction through behvioral influence and policies standards and procedures. I find that I can not always quantify human actions. But I have to understand the trends and probable outcomes to "sell" ideas to the descisionmakers and managers.
 
Originally Posted By: Gary Allan
All you need is enough money to repeat all the courses a few times. Higher education is at a fixed pace of delivery. People aren't so constructed.
Yeah! Ha!
 
If you have an excellent command of a symbol system you're much better off than most of the population. Math is a very visible and complicated symbol system that shows off your skill at thinking symbolically to others who have mastered the same system. You can do the same thing with English. More people with education will understand your mathematical proof than your soaring soliloquy since math is the closest we humans have to a "universal" language. Math is also how we express the underlying natural phenomena that bite everybody in the rear, not just the subset of the English-speaking population you happen to be reaching.

Studies have shown that kids with poor language skills (be it English, Russian, or Chinese) have more trouble with math than with kids with normal/above-average language skills. Two types of symbol systems, one underlying order to each system.

If you can't learn that underlying order, you're permanently behind all those who could, and no amount of remediation will ever catch you up since you are still learning one symbol system while your peers have moved onto learning the second.
 
Originally Posted By: XS650
One useful bit of advice we got was "If you are going into engineering for the money, leave now because there isn't enough money in it to keep you motivated enough to do the work required to succeed."


Greatest engineer that I ever worked with told me once that engineers were their own worst enemy when it came to remuneration..."You'd do this stuff for nothing in reality...it's just fun"

He's right, I've knocked back jobs due to lack of complexity.
 
Purely math related work isn't well paid, unless somehow you get into Goldman Sack and do financial analysis for those big time MBA who market the junk bonds to the buyer, when you work on figuring out the odds of losing vs the odds of winning.

Engineering, however, provide a relatively reliable living for the amount of work you put in (a lot of work, decent living but not great). But like my professors said, if you put in the same amount of effort and are in the business field, you are going to make a lot more money than being a starving engineer. There aren't that much Math in engineering (only complex math with real and imaginary, and some Laplace and Fourier transformation, not the scary stuff that Physics and Math majors have to deal with).

There is no better bang for the buck in education over a law degree. You can either be a crook which makes lots of money (criminal defense, politicians, class action lawyers) if you are lucky, or a saint which makes less than lots of money if you are not (judge).
 
Engineering pays a perfectly good living that is better than 98% of everyone else. The fraction of people who make lots more money in business comprise less than half of one percent.

Doctors, lawyers and some businesspeople make more money. However lawyers and doctors are all crooks who set up their own monopolies that one cannot penetrate even if the person on the outside is smarter or more well informed, and the true level of knowledge required for all but the tiniest fraction of doctors and lawyers is nothing special, at best.

Independent businesspeople may make more, but the level of risk is so high, and the chance of true reward so low, that the opportunity for most everyone is nil. Plus, to make money, you still need the strong math and engineering skills to make things work logically.
 
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However lawyers and doctors are all crooks who set up their own monopolies that one cannot penetrate even if the person on the outside is smarter or more well informed, and the true level of knowledge required for all but the tiniest fraction of doctors and lawyers is nothing special, at best.


That isn't true. I agree with everything you said, but to lump all doctors and lawyers as crooks is silly.
 
The engineering major says "how does it work?" at their first job
The science major says "why does it work?" at their first job
The liberal arts major says "would you like to supersize that?" at their first job
LOL.gif
 
Originally Posted By: buster


That isn't true. I agree with everything you said, but to lump all doctors and lawyers as crooks is silly.


Not really trying to lump the doctor or lawyer themself as a crook (though IMO many area), but rather their systems. The legal system is a great example. I tried to use it for a situation a few years back. Effectively could not use it due to the requirements for the lawyers to produce the right forms, in the right formats, etc. Using the legal libraries is so inconvenient that one cannot do it without giving up their day job. Yet, get the lawyer on the job and any chance of being made whole went out the window. Their system that they have put together is exclusive to their profession, yet holds little to no real value. You just have to use them, or else not function.

In medical, at least they are trying to get smart and let nurse practitioners do some prescriptions, etc. Who needs to see a doctor, get charged $90-100 for less than 15 minutes of face-time, in which most everything was done by the (likely underpaid) nurse? I could self-medicate 9 times out of 10, and a trained monkey could search for symptoms and treat the symptoms 9 times out of 10... why pay more? Oh yeah, their system makes it so you have to see them to get the medications required for most ailments. Convenient, eh?

Any other profession where there is an effective monopoly we can call crooked. Why not doctors and lawyers?
 
Math was and still is my nightmare in school. I took AP Calc in high school and got my first D and two Calc courses in college getting a C and a D. I barely understood what I was being taught and I don't remember much of it now either. My last Calc course was only two years ago too.

I don't know if Stats is real math, but I did well with that. Maybe I took the dumbed down version.
 
i am considering becoming a math and science teacher. because I enjoy math and science, and maybe could be of more benefit to the engineering profession (in encouraging people that way) by teaching than actually working in it.

also, engineering pay SUCKS, and you (as a consultant) are your client's and sub-contractors sleaze. they say jump you say how high... sick of it! the stuff i have to suck up is IN NO WAY made up by my mediocre pay. And the irony is, society thinks, wow you're an engineer, you must be raking the big bucks in. when i first told my in laws what i make, they were aghast, couldn't believe how little an engineer makes...
 
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