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So, I saw this on a different forum and I thought it would be interesting to hear the posts from City-Data members. Given it is graduation season and many high schoolers are headed off to college with a particular career notion in mind, what do you think are some important details about YOUR career/area of study that are not always given to students who aspire to them?
I wish I had known how unappreciated teachers were before I became one. There are quite a few of us on here who have repeated ad nauseam to avoid entering the career right now, and I will never stop. Some might be disgusted, but I practically beg my seniors planning to go into education not to. Let someone else climb up onto the cross. My state has one of the lowest salaries, has taken away tenure, has zero protections for teachers, annual contracts that can be non-renewed on a whim, has taken away retirement benefits, class sizes so large that some children are forced to sit on the floor, and this is only the beginning.
On the positive side, I wish I had known just how fantastic some of the allied health sciences fields were. Prior to going into college I knew of nursing, physician assistants, MDs and the varying types of medicine, but I never gave much thought to the almost countless other careers available in medicine and primary care. Because so many of the "traditional" fields were not appealing and I loved the idea of teaching so much (and full scholarship didn't hurt), I didn't pursue these fields. I strongly urge anyone able to pursue careers in these fields.
By all means look up the 2030 problem. As much as we need healthcare professionals now, in just about a decade we are going to need them a whole lot more.
I graduated from high school thinking I would go into the Navy and make a career out of it. Along the way of not being in the Navy pipeline, heading toward the Army, being back in a Navy pipeline, being back in the primary Navy pipeline, changing majors but still struggling all the way to graduate and get my commission, I eventually was in........
............only to fail in sea service (whether or not that would have been avoided if I was more dedicated as a TAMU Corps of Cadets member is debatable) but to succeed in intel/security but the clock was up and I was out.
At least two things of life from that time that I rate as good things are that if I had had a career in the Navy, then I might not have been available when my parents needed help. My mother probably would have died sooner and not necessarily in a place she would want. Secondly, my attitudes, my beliefs would probably be harsher about things and I don't think I would like that about myself, at least from where I stand now.
I don't regret my life. I am honest, I have served my country, I am a continual contributor, and I keep on learning. When I was a young adult, something made me constantly say that when I left this world, I will have done many, many things......and I have. Just perhaps not in the way I saw them back then.
I probably would not recommend to the young, either way, whether to be a generalist or a specialist. I'm a generalist, as that I am a Renaissance Lady, in that I come from the walks of life that encourage such. Instead, I would encourage (or at least talk about) the jobs, the books, the history that may highlight the benefits of being one. A sea officer, Robert Ballard's books such as "Explorations" (where they discovered the hot vents and they were trying to theorize based on freshman biology knowledge since they had no one aboard in that area), or the history of US railroads (just what business is one in?).
There is, however, one thing about being a generalist. Even if one is not working in their degree, odds are they will still find a joy in it.
So two things. First, know that you must keep learning, there is never an end to that. Secondly, the world may not always be the way you pictured it. The trick is to find the interpretation that is most agreeable with your terms.
I wish I had known that I can never get social security, even though I am no longer teaching. All those years and the money I paid into SS are worth nothing. I can never get my husband's SS either.
In many states you can't get your teacher retirement(that you pay into...it's not free) and get Social Security. ( even if you have paid into SS)
My husband and I would have been better off for retirement if I had never worked as a teacher.
I've had a few different careers. There are upsides and downsides to all of them, but if you love what you do and are in the right field for you, the downsides are typically balanced out.
Journalism: I wish I'd really fully understood just how much writing under deadline can suck the pleasure from writing. I should have spoken to more people who'd been in the field longer to get a more realistic perspective on that.
Teaching: I wish I'd known how much the industry would shift from primary responsibilities being instructional to primary responsibilities being data collection. But that wasn't the case at the time.
Other than that, no real unpleasant surprises, thus far.
I don't regret my life. I am honest, I have served my country, I am a continual contributor, and I keep on learning. When I was a young adult, something made me constantly say that when I left this world, I will have done many, many things......and I have. Just perhaps not in the way I saw them back then.
I probably would not recommend to the young, either way, whether to be a generalist or a specialist. I'm a generalist, as that I am a Renaissance Lady, in that I come from the walks of life that encourage such. Instead, I would encourage (or at least talk about) the jobs, the books, the history that may highlight the benefits of being one. A sea officer, Robert Ballard's books such as "Explorations" (where they discovered the hot vents and they were trying to theorize based on freshman biology knowledge since they had no one aboard in that area), or the history of US railroads (just what business is one in?).
There is, however, one thing about being a generalist. Even if one is not working in their degree, odds are they will still find a joy in it.
So two things. First, know that you must keep learning, there is never an end to that. Secondly, the world may not always be the way you pictured it. The trick is to find the interpretation that is most agreeable with your terms.
Love what you said. Agree with it, including about being a generalist. I became one by accident, not intent, just the way things worked out.
What I wish I'd known? Well, for one just how difficult it would be to go back for a PhD when working full time. I now advise anyone who is thinking about it, to get it done before you start your life; much harder to go back.
The second thing I wish is how my military career would have turned out. Nothing bad happened, but rather the Iron Curtain came down, cold war ended, and suddenly faced finding a new career. I had always intended to serve 20 years and retire from the military to become a teacher. But with no military retirement to fall back on, teaching kind of fell out of the path.
Not to get me wrong. I loved my time in the service. It made me a lot of who I am. It's just that career wise I'd have been better off completing a doctorate first and getting a job at a small college somewhere.
Even though my career was in engineering I had to become a politician. Getting "buy in" from bosses and fellow engineers was at least 50% of my job. This was a completely unexpected job duty.
Also, working the details of a job was required to be a success in the profession. To many new engineers would say the same words to me "I don't like the details". Not one of them would make it more then a few years. The ones that worked the details were on the job for decades.
I wish I had known before I started teaching that the classroom is not the "ideal classroom" that I was given to believe in the teacher's certification program that I attended. I never had to "student teach" because my major was in demand at the time, so I had to learn from experience. Fortunately for me the students were still well-behaved; but as the schools demographics changed, teaching became more of a challenge. In my opinion teacher certification programs are a waste of time.
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