Grad School: Is it Worth it?

Michael Wolman

A few weeks ago, I used my Chinese New Year vacation to visit my best friend and his girlfriend in Cambodia. My friend – let’s call him John, because that’s his name – graduated from one of the premier Master’s programs in international affairs in 2009, but has yet to land a permanent full-time job. He’s currently doing an internship in Phnom Penh.

One night at the beach, over beers and Khmer food, I asked him whether he regretted his decision to attend grad school at all. He hesitated, as if pondering the question for the first time, then started thinking out loud, weighing both sides of the ledger. On the one hand: great new contacts, great new friends, engaging classes taught by world-renowned professors and an unforgettable two years in a fun, vibrant city. On the other hand: no job to show for all that, plus US$100,000 in student loans that remain unpaid and continue to accumulate interest, weighing on him both financially and emotionally.

“Um,” John’s girlfriend chimed in. “Also, you wouldn’t have met me if it weren’t for grad school.”

Oops. Busted.

“Well, yeah,” John said. “That, too. Of course.”

I’ve been teaching the GRE for almost a decade now. At the beginning of the first day of class, when students introduce themselves, I always ask them why they’re taking the GRE – why, in other words, they want to go to grad school. Most have a specific program they’re interested in, of course, but you might be surprised by the number who don’t. Especially during these past few years, with jobs tough to come by and grad school an increasingly popular alternative, it hasn’t been uncommon for a student to say, “I don’t know yet. I’m just exploring my options.”

If these undecideds were my friends, not people I’ve just met, I would urge them to develop more of a plan before even going so far as committing to a test prep class. Graduate school is a major investment in terms of both time and money, and not just once you get in. I’ve lost count of the number of friends who have dropped thousands of dollars on prep classes, tutors and materials – not to mention hours of study time on nights and weekends – only to decide in the end not to apply after all. I know others who went even further, spending additional time and money on the applications themselves, before landing a job that they preferred all along. I couldn’t help but think they would have been better off if they’d committed more to their job hunts instead of “exploring options”.

Then there’s grad school itself – an enormous commitment. Unlike college, which is often financially subsidised (or flat-out paid for) by parents and scholarships, graduate programs, especially pre-professional ones (law school, med school and so on), can carry a financial burden that rests entirely upon the student. The resultant loans usually take decades to pay off, even for those who go on to rake in six figures as lawyers, doctors, or business executives. Unless you’re independently wealthy and want to attend grad school purely for personal growth in the spirit of continuing education, it’s worth dedicating an afternoon to thoroughly analysing the financial risks and rewards, in terms of both actual costs and opportunity costs. How much will the program cost over the long haul, once interest on the loans is figured in? How much will this degree realistically increase your earning power? If your current job is going well, might it be better to wait another year or two and save more money before returning to school?

I returned to school five years ago to get a Master’s in fiction-writing. I joked – half-joked, actually – when I was there that the only degree more worthless than an MFA in fiction was an MFA in poetry. (My poet friends were not amused.) I still have a few regrets. I wish I’d tried harder to get into a program that offered fellowships and TA opportunities. I wish I’d earned more money on the side while I was there. Most of all, though, I wish I could go back and do it all over again now. That’s how much I appreciate what I learned during those two years, and how big a part of me that degree remains.

The strangest part? The MFA, which was for me mostly an exercise in decadent self-improvement, actually ended up paying off in the literal sense. I’ve had two full-time jobs since finishing my Master’s, and, in both cases, the people who hired me later told me my MFA was a major factor in their decision. I was shocked each time I learned – it really is little more than an art-school degree – but I certainly wasn’t complaining. The final lesson, apparently, was what it so often is in life: Go for it – you never know what can result.

Michael Wolman is a course-developer and instructor at New Horizons Test Preparation, Shanghai’s largest English-language test prep company. Wolman is also a writer and editor and has been published in The Huffington Post, The New York Observer and more than a dozen other websites and literary journals. You can follow his adventures in China at shang-hi.tumblr.com.