Deciding Education/Career Path

Off Topic
1

Alright, so I have this dilemma where I’m interested in LITERALLY everything science and math related. As you can imagine, that makes it really difficult to decide on what exactly to concentrate on in school. I’m only a freshman in college, so obviously I don’t have to know this minute, but I would just like to have SOME direction. My current approach has been to just expose myself to anything and everything, but it prevents me from getting to deep in any of them.

Just to show you how much of a range I’ve had on career path ideas, here are a few:
-Computer scientist for a company like Apple, and perhaps go for an MBA so I can work towards having an executive position over time.
-Physician or surgeon. In particular, I very much enjoy endocrinology, but would also enjoy being any kind of surgeon from cardiac to cosmetic dermatology.
-Biomedical engineer. I would like to incorporate mechanical and materials/nanoengineering to work on medical devices.

What is most overwhelming is how all of this things both excite me and leave me with a hollow feeling, since they don’t apply to all my interests.

Some info about me: I’m very much an intuitive person that likes to think outside the box and connect ideas from seemingly unrelated topics; I’m really good at grasping difficult topics, but I often make careless mistakes because I am thinking ahead or making things overly involved.

I guess my principle conflict is that I love math, but I love the human body equally as much. Unfortunately, the only careers I’ve ever heard of incorporating the two are wacky (such as computational biology).

Anyways, if any of you have any input regarding my personal situation or anything related to future career fields, feel free to chime in. I don’t really expect anyone to give me THE answer, put I’d like to pick as many brains as possible.

2

If you are highly interested in all of these things, then it might make sense to choose from among them based on relative strenghts and weaknesses. For example: are you phenomenally strong at math and only moderately bright in biology; the other way around; roughly equal? Other outstanding strengths? Weaknesses? Or lesser strengths? Etc.

Also, I would think you should take advantage of any counseling/advisory assistance provided by your school in this matter.

3

Oh well, only consider becoming a medical doctor if you see yourself as a slave, you’re not afraid of being sued for BS and you’re willing to babysit adults who shouldn’t smoke, do IV drugs, eat KFC and coke and be so sedentary or have unprotected intercourse.

The bulk (pun intended)of your future clients:

4

Specialist doctors don’t have to babysit. They get to spend their lives serving humanity by helping people, improving their lives not just through drugs and surgery, but their advice as well. They have an incredibly interesting job that grows with them and they also make mad money doing it.
Not to mention the coolness of being able to see the world via short vacations for rich countries, and help people + experience volunteer missions such as with doctors without borders for poor countries.

5

What kind of a lifestyle are you looking to be able to live in the future? Are you looking to live comfortably or live very well? Do you want to work on your own terms or be part of a machine (so to speak)? Do you want to be a strict 9 - 5’er or are you willing to work weekends, holidays, and crazier, more erratic shifts?

What kind of sacrifices (e.g., social, monetary, educational and time investment) are you willing to make to achieve these goals?

7

I am currently doing my PhD. in Biomedical Engineering, and I can honestly say that if these are your interests, Biomedical engineering is the way to go.

I am currently working on a project an intervertebral disc replacement project as my thesis… I get paid to do this! And with all my squatting and deadlifting, its sort of my way of combining my interested in problems that plague athletes and lifters, with my interest in medical devices. Part of my education, in addition to the human body as a whole, focuses on tissues that plague all of us - musculoskeletal system, the meniscus, the ACL, MCL, the IVD, and spine as a whole - its actually stuff I care about.

Of course, undergrad biomed courses aren’t usually that interesting, but you’d be surprised and once you get to you junior-grad career, you get to learn the cool stuff.

Another cool thing is that you get to be involved with doctors toward real benefit, because although doctors do great work, they need engineers to keep improving their technology and treatment methods.

My final argument would be as a biomedical engineer, you could study a variety of fields. If mechanics becomes boring, switch to drug delivery, or polymer development (I have tried all of these, and decided tissue engineering is the sub field for me).

Of course, if you want to work IBM, this is not the path for you!, lol

Can you tell I’ve drank the Kool-Aid?

8

You might look into prosthetic design or becoming a prosthetician.

These careers require an extremely unique skill-set. You have to have an excellent grasp of everything biomechanical, a huge capacity to think on your feet, as well as some artistry (shaping the bucket of the prosthesis to the residuum is basically sculpting). Further on, you can move into design. Several new prosthesis have computer-controlled joints.

It’s a really exciting field and the evolution of the prosthesis is increasing exponentially. I forsee a time in the next 20-30 years where double amputees will be able to run faster than most champion sprinters.

The two biggest manufacturers of prosthesis are Otto Bock and Ossur. Check out their websites.

9

You see, the thing is I have such an interest in these things that it’s really not a “job” to me in the usual 9-5 slave sense. Obviously, it is work and there are sacrifices to be made, but I think that being in a career where I can meet people with similar interests or with varying perspectives, contribute to the field, go places to present my knowledge, etc. would be amazing. I just don’t ever see myself retiring like most people work towards. I guess if I went in the medical surgeon direction, I would eventually want to be liberated from 100 hour work weeks, so I would love to have a practice later on. I also know that later on in life I would LOVE to be a professor, do research, and to write books.

The great thing about science and math is just about any path can ultimately lead to the above things.

Money wise, I would like to live very well. I’m not talking having 10 mansions, but I primarily would really like to give my kids an awesome upbringing. I’d like to be able to not have to save up for a year to take my family on a cool vacation. So really, I want monetary freedom, but I’m not as concerned about spending money on material things.

[quote]anonym wrote:
What kind of a lifestyle are you looking to be able to live in the future? Are you looking to live comfortably or live very well? Do you want to work on your own terms or be part of a machine (so to speak)? Do you want to be a strict 9 - 5’er or are you willing to work weekends, holidays, and crazier, more erratic shifts?

What kind of sacrifices (e.g., social, monetary, educational and time investment) are you willing to make to achieve these goals?[/quote]

10

Renewable energy is an industry that is on the verge of exploding. I just started a company that is distributing solar water heaters and other renewable energy products. Awareness is reaching a tipping point. If you can use that drive and intelligence to possibly develop a new renewable energy technology, not only will you stand to make millions, you will be helping the planet and our country by reducing our dependence on foreign oil. the dot coms were the big thing in the 90’s, real estate was the big thing in the 00’s, renewable energy will be the next big thing. Ride that wave and build your wealth.

12

[quote]bushidobadboy wrote:

I’m actually ever so slightly envious. Normally I’m jealous of NO man, but you my friend are doing what I would be doing in a parallel universe - IF I wasn’t doing exactly what I love, already.
[/quote]

What do you do?

13

[quote]angry chicken wrote:
Renewable energy is an industry that is on the verge of exploding. I just started a company that is distributing solar water heaters and other renewable energy products. Awareness is reaching a tipping point. If you can use that drive and intelligence to possibly develop a new renewable energy technology, not only will you stand to make millions, you will be helping the planet and our country by reducing our dependence on foreign oil. the dot coms were the big thing in the 90’s, real estate was the big thing in the 00’s, renewable energy will be the next big thing. Ride that wave and build your wealth.[/quote]

So are you hiring salespersons?

14

[quote]

I’m actually ever so slightly envious. Normally I’m jealous of NO man, but you my friend are doing what I would be doing in a parallel universe - IF I wasn’t doing exactly what I love, already.

Kudos and respect to you.

BBB

EDIT: I may have to PM you (or if you don’t mind PMing me, that would be grand) for some insight into your artificial IVD. Nothing secret, just some general info. Cool?[/quote]

Yea, no problem. I actually very excited about my research, I can’t believe I get paid to do it sometimes. Our first breakthrough study is going well and hopefully we will publish sometime this year. I will not be on the paper, unfortunately, but, I am working on a generation of artificial discs we hope to be even better than what we are working on now.

15

[quote]SeanParent wrote:

[quote]angry chicken wrote:
Renewable energy is an industry that is on the verge of exploding. I just started a company that is distributing solar water heaters and other renewable energy products. Awareness is reaching a tipping point. If you can use that drive and intelligence to possibly develop a new renewable energy technology, not only will you stand to make millions, you will be helping the planet and our country by reducing our dependence on foreign oil. the dot coms were the big thing in the 90’s, real estate was the big thing in the 00’s, renewable energy will be the next big thing. Ride that wave and build your wealth.[/quote]

So are you hiring salespersons?[/quote]

I will be soon. So far, I’m focusing more on Gov’t bids (I won my first bid last month for yellowstone national park) and commercial. I am working on a residential sales plan at the moment. With all of the incentives out there this industry is going to grow at lightning speed. I’m trying nail down the model I think will accommodate the anticipated growth and the infrastructure needed to support it. The industry itself is so new that it is literally changing every day. It’s exciting!

16

Very cool stuff. I have definitely thought about going in that direction. I’m actually trying to get a lab job working for a professor at my school that is researching materials to improve on the efficiency of solar cells.

I’m also applying for some summer research internships. The one I’m most excited about is in nanotechnology. I applied for the centers at Stanford, Harvard, UT Austin, and D.C., all of which research different things in nanoengineering, from biomedical applications to materials to computing. Definitely exciting stuff.

[quote]angry chicken wrote:

[quote]SeanParent wrote:

[quote]angry chicken wrote:
Renewable energy is an industry that is on the verge of exploding. I just started a company that is distributing solar water heaters and other renewable energy products. Awareness is reaching a tipping point. If you can use that drive and intelligence to possibly develop a new renewable energy technology, not only will you stand to make millions, you will be helping the planet and our country by reducing our dependence on foreign oil. the dot coms were the big thing in the 90’s, real estate was the big thing in the 00’s, renewable energy will be the next big thing. Ride that wave and build your wealth.[/quote]

So are you hiring salespersons?[/quote]

I will be soon. So far, I’m focusing more on Gov’t bids (I won my first bid last month for yellowstone national park) and commercial. I am working on a residential sales plan at the moment. With all of the incentives out there this industry is going to grow at lightning speed. I’m trying nail down the model I think will accommodate the anticipated growth and the infrastructure needed to support it. The industry itself is so new that it is literally changing every day. It’s exciting![/quote]

17

Nanotech seems really interesting.

I’m kind of in the same position except mine has to do a little more with whether or not I want to get my phd after undergrad in math or if I want to just major in compsci and get a job(hopefully database related) right out of the gate. But, I suppose you already know that you want to do the education thing for the long haul so that’s not a prob for you. Any type of medical engineering or bioengineering would marry math and biology nicely, I think. The money and job prospects seem pretty good for those fields. Have you looked at the Bureau of Labor Statistics handbook? They could give you an idea for some of those professions. Job description, salary, qualifications, job outlook. Great information.

http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm

18

I’m not sure if you’re in the US or not, but if you are, this could work, and would give you time to really decide while letting you make progress:

  1. Recall that Med school is a post-grad program, and there’s no need to be “pre-med” to get in. Good grades and a solid MCAT score are all you really need. FWIW, I’ve heard that Chemical Engineering is considered the best preparatory program for the MCAT, though maybe not for Med school itself.

  2. Start an engineering program. Your call, but given your interests, the rundown is this:
    a) Mechanical: Allied with biomedical at some institutions, for the study of structural tissue mechanics and biomechanics. You wouldn’t regret a BS in this if you wanted to do prosthetic design. Caveat: Some schools prepare you well for the job market, some for further study, some are “buildy”, some are “mathy”. Not sure what your institution is like. These disclaimers could go for any program, probably, but ME is the one I know.
    b) Chemical: MCAT prep, good starting salary, if you go that route. Considered tougher than ME in my school, but YMMV. Sometimes this program is allied with Materials, or Materials is a subdiscipline.
    c) Materials: Looks like the best fit. Frequently requires that you take classes in both ME and ChE, or at least gives you the option.

The reason I’m recommending starting engineering rather than a pure science is that at an ABET accredited university, the engineering curricula will tend to have considerably more required classes, meaning that while you can audible into Chemistry or Math from ChE pretty easily, it’s a bastard to do it the other way.