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Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

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Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#101

Post by prewett »

aquova wrote: post #32
wharvle wrote: post #7

> The Census Bureau reported in 2021 that a paltry 28% of STEM grads are working in these supposedly in-demand, highly paid and important STEM jobs. These include diverse sectors such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals and energy, but about half of STEM jobs are in computers, and tech firms typically complain the loudest of STEM shortages. I’ve long suspected that the whole “STEM” education movement is a way for big tech…

I had this experience. Got a degree in physics and heard throughout my time about how awful this STEM shortage was. Went to graduate and couldn't get a job in my field at all (granted, I don't think I knew how to market myself nor was I well educated on how to do so). Ended up working towards a CS degree instead and getting a job in that field. All of my friend group in high school ended up with a diverse range of ST…

I read "STEM shortage" as "shortage of excellent software developers". The STEM shortage was after my time in uni, but what jobs actually need physics? I studied physics, too, and as far as I could tell my options were get a Ph.D. and then postdoc until a professor died, become a quant (might require a Ph.D., since it was the math that was attractive), teach high school physics, or do software.

As it turned out, I ended up with a job doing high-level tech support at a company selling measurement equipment to engineers, so they wanted people with a science/engineering background. I think physics is great to study, but more like another poster said, like studying classics if you want to write literature.

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#102

Post by throwaway2646 »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #74
bluetomcat wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, probably. Not predominantly in the US.

No, I meant which mechanical engineers are, to quote you, "driving and sustaining user engagement in online services of some kind"? Those guys are also STEM grads/workers.

[dead]

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#103

Post by ordinarypuddle »

troupe wrote: post #37
mp05 wrote: post #22

I say this with 90% sincerity: I thought this was STEAM now? But with all seriousness... I went to university out of high school in 2005 to get a mech engineering degree but never finished because I liked to party too hard and web dev was easy and paid better than most people I knew with entry-level engineering jobs. Flash forward to now as a non-trad student and I'm in my 400-level coursework. It's all easier than i…

So you think the classes are much easier? Might it be related to your life experience and focus you have now? Or are there things that simply aren't are rigorous as it used to be?

Obv this is anecdotal, but I graduated in 2023 from a T10 CS school and it was not very challenging. Most of my friends in college agreed that besides 1 or 2 classes, we never had to work late nights or seriously stress about passing a class. I wasn't a 4.0 student, but I got a 3.7 with very little studying. University is getting a lot easier, and I genuinely think that as long as you are trying to ask the professor questions and for help, you cannot fail a class.

https://gradeinflation.com/

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#104

Post by albrewer »

NanoYohaneTSU wrote: post #83

Extremely poor journalism. Very misleading and a misunderstanding of what's actually going on. Example: "The Census Bureau reported in 2021 that a paltry 28% of STEM grads are working in these supposedly in-demand, highly paid and important STEM jobs." It's not 28% of all STEM grads, it's 28% of physical science STEM grads. https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/06/does-majoring... I'm going to do a better job t…

I exited a traditional mechanical engineering role because 90% of my job was not engineering. I loved what I covered in undergrad, but most "engineering" jobs were 80% project management / paper shuffling / oversight, with a bit of engineering tacked on.

My last job was BA/QA work at an engineering software company, and it was by far the most "engineering" I'd done at any job. Even there, though, it was only about 1/3 of my responsibilities. I got good enough at the software stuff that I qualified for a 25% pay bump by moving industries. Year for year, my software experience pays more than my engineering experience.

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#106

Post by lurking15 »

torginus wrote: post #90
hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw getting my bachelor's in electrical engineering as similar to when an aspiring writer gets a degree in classics instead of English lit. I always knew I'd end up a software engineer, I just also knew I really wanted to know how things worked on the physical level and wouldn't be able to muster up the energy to touch enough differential equations and vector calculus to actually grok it for myself ever again after…

I kinda find this relatable - in HS, I did some summer work writing software (amateurishly doing what felt right instead of being taught how to do it properly - if only I'd have known), and went for EE, because I felt like "wait this cannot be it"

I chose EE cause it was harder (for me at least) and everyone would drop out into CS. Wound up doing software development, which I loved as a hobby and wanted to avoid ruining, so to speak.

Fast forward to today, I've ended up coming to the conclusion that the whole university system (much like the tech, banking & finance industry) subsidizes foreign nationals to the detriment of anyone who's native & pays taxes to support these institutions of "learning".

I didn't really see a straightforward way to do anything interesting with EE, which seems to entail going for a phd and navigating all the financial costs along with that.

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#107

Post by albrewer »

netbioserror wrote: post #33
wharvle wrote: post #7

> The Census Bureau reported in 2021 that a paltry 28% of STEM grads are working in these supposedly in-demand, highly paid and important STEM jobs. These include diverse sectors such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals and energy, but about half of STEM jobs are in computers, and tech firms typically complain the loudest of STEM shortages. I’ve long suspected that the whole “STEM” education movement is a way for big tech…

I must be really lucky. I work at a smaller engineering company, working for engineering clients, making software that analyses engineering data, and I get to use the languages and tools I want. I must be a unicorn at this point given how miserable most programmers seem to be.

I have a mechanical engineering degree and work as a software developer. I tried for a long time to find a company like this but they all seem to only want people who very narrowly fit a senior engineer role in either specialization, never someone who can do both.

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#108

Post by bhattid »

aquova wrote: post #32
wharvle wrote: post #7

> The Census Bureau reported in 2021 that a paltry 28% of STEM grads are working in these supposedly in-demand, highly paid and important STEM jobs. These include diverse sectors such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals and energy, but about half of STEM jobs are in computers, and tech firms typically complain the loudest of STEM shortages. I’ve long suspected that the whole “STEM” education movement is a way for big tech…

I had this experience. Got a degree in physics and heard throughout my time about how awful this STEM shortage was. Went to graduate and couldn't get a job in my field at all (granted, I don't think I knew how to market myself nor was I well educated on how to do so). Ended up working towards a CS degree instead and getting a job in that field. All of my friend group in high school ended up with a diverse range of ST…

I had a similar experience when I was doing physics in undergraduate as well. I read online and was often told that a physics degree opened a lot of doors - academia, government/industry research, engineering, high school teacher, software development. But during my senior year when applying for jobs, I was hard-pressed finding any place that was interested in me. I was fortunate enough to find a job as a laser engineer immediately after graduating, but the specific role was leading to a deadend career.

I self-studied from my alma mater's computer science program (fortunately, many of the resources were all online) and was able to pivot into a career in software development, but it was a colossal amount of work and energy. I may as well have just done the computer science degree originally. A lot of my peers who had studied physics/math also took the same route, transitioning into data science or software development.

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#109

Post by Animats »

mp05 wrote: post #22

I say this with 90% sincerity: I thought this was STEAM now? But with all seriousness... I went to university out of high school in 2005 to get a mech engineering degree but never finished because I liked to party too hard and web dev was easy and paid better than most people I knew with entry-level engineering jobs. Flash forward to now as a non-trad student and I'm in my 400-level coursework. It's all easier than i…

I thought this was STEAM now?

The "STEAM" thing was invented by a guy at the Rhode Island School of Design.[1] It hasn't had much effect on education or hiring, but it transformed the maker movement into a branch of arts and crafts. Newer "maker spaces" tend to be heavy on construction paper and hot glue, light on milling machines and drill presses.

[1] https://www.risd.edu/steam

Re: Most STEM grads don't work in STEM jobs

#110

Post by syntaxing »

albrewer wrote: post #104
NanoYohaneTSU wrote: post #83

Extremely poor journalism. Very misleading and a misunderstanding of what's actually going on. Example: "The Census Bureau reported in 2021 that a paltry 28% of STEM grads are working in these supposedly in-demand, highly paid and important STEM jobs." It's not 28% of all STEM grads, it's 28% of physical science STEM grads. https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/06/does-majoring... I'm going to do a better job t…

I exited a traditional mechanical engineering role because 90% of my job was not engineering. I loved what I covered in undergrad, but most "engineering" jobs were 80% project management / paper shuffling / oversight, with a bit of engineering tacked on. My last job was BA/QA work at an engineering software company, and it was by far the most "engineering" I'd done at any job. Even there, though, it was only about 1/…

I was a mechanical design engineer for a decade before switching to a software based role. The biggest thing to keep in mind is MechE is the paintbrush with the broadest stroke in engineering. You can work in a lot of different roles or industries. But I experience a lot of what you said but not to that extreme. I would say I did 50/50 fun stuff (engineering) vs boring stuff (project management and documentation).
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