Columbia Journalism School Grads?

What an incredible waste of money.

 

agree 1,000 percent. journalism ain't a schooling thang, it's a doing thang. the vast majority of the most successful journos i know of did not come close to entering any grad program. you get your undergrad education in journalism, acquire as much experience working at it as you can, then make the plunge into the marketplace.

to spend 60k for a master's in this field is just silly, imho. a waste of timr and money, imho.

 

While I wouldn't spend that kind of cash, what do you do if you decide you want to go into journalism after you already have your bachelor's in something else?

 

Hopefully, come to your senses.

 

what he said....

but seriously, if there are folks who neither received a journo degree nor worked for their college paper or radio station suddenly decide to go the journo route, god bless 'em and good luck. a bit late to get into the game, but if that's what you choose to drop your grad-school money on who am i to argue?

 

I'm not gonna hold myself up as some major success story since I work for a pretty small niche magazine and have only been doing this for about a year, but I got into journalism without a J-degree, without having worked for the school paper or radio, and without any ins or other benefits. I bugged local papers until I found a tiny community paper that let me freelance articles for chump change and do some copyediting, did that for a few months while working a full-time job with flexible hours that gave me time to still do the newspaper stuff, then just applied all over the place. I got lucky and found a job within a month of starting my real job search.

I thought about doing the grad school route, but now I'm glad I didn't. I work with a guy who just finished grad school and he's no better off than I am, plus he's got a pile of debt.

I sort of feel like grad school is a big scam right now, unless you're in a really scientific field and are planning on a career as an academic, or you're in an industry where a specific grad. degree is absolutely required for a particular job. It's an absolutely massive expense that's being sold to a lot of people as something to do instead of suffering in the job market, all while giving you the impression that you're advancing your career and accomplishing something, but at the end you're poor and no better off. You may as well just stay unemployed for a year, at least then you've still got good credit.

The only benefit I can see to j-school right now is that it might give you another chance to get access to temp jobs/internships that only accept students. But that's an awful lot of money to put on a "might".

If you really wanna blow $50k on something, my advice is to go buy a 2011 Mustang Shelby GT500. I'd definitely rather have one of those than go to j-school.

 

Well, that's why I think CUNY is worth considering. You're in the same neighborhood as Columbia for those temp jobs/internships at a fraction of the cost.

One of my former students is now at SI.

 

I've battled with this for the last few months, shockey. I don't even have my Bachelor's degree yet, and I know I've received more education working the locker room and going hands-on in the newsroom than I ever have in class.

I took a sports writing class and received A's with minimal effort, and then found myself writing long-winded introductions for my freelancing work. School crippled my style. But school also put me in position to advance my career from Internet-blogging sensation to fully-credentialed reporter.

It was school that arranged my internship at one of NY's biggest daily papers (where I now freelance), and a school assignment that introduced me to the editor of the magazine where one player interview paid me 10x more than I've ever earned on previous assignments.

But a $50,000 debt for a Master's -- simply for the connections and networking opportunities -- is outrageous.

Worst part for me is that my remaining courses for the Bachelor's are completely insignificant toward being a journalist. Science labs and introductory literature classes stand in the way, and make absolutely NO sense for me as I'm already in the field while working full-time.

 

you're exactly right. this scam isn't getting talked about enough out there. the number of people duped into incurring massive debt so they can allegedly ride out this recession for a few years is staggering. is that master's in political science really going to make you more hire-able after the recession.

and don't even get me started on the MBA scam. 98 percent of business schools are worthless.

 

People in DC laugh at me when I say there's an education bubble and it's gonna burst sooner than later. The writing is on the wall, you can't pick up any major paper without reading about crushing debt and once fail-safe degrees like MBAs and JDs being unemployed or working for peanuts compared do their monthly payments.

An MBA at UDC for $20k sounds like a better deal with each and every day compared to the $85k at GW.

 

I wouldn't say 98% of business schools are worthless, just the danger in overpaying is greater.

 

I'm fairly certain I know exactly who the former student is if he also spent some time at Men's Fitness.