University/Grad school usefulness

[Jon Miller]

Intel would only hire a specific type of physics PhD (experimental hard condensed matter?)

I have a nuclear physics friend who intends to work there.

I expect that experimental condensed matter (silicon/wafers/etc) are the ones who get paid 100k right out of graduate school.

JM

[Jon Miller]

IDA or somewhere else? That's where 3 of the 4 work.

Booz Allen and Northrop Grumman are where two close friends got jobs.

JM

[KrazyHorse]

Yeah, I was going to talk to Booz Allen, and then I realized that the only physicists they hire are on defence work, and I don't qualify...

[flash9286]

How much of what is learned in a physics PHD program is useful as a quant? I'm not trying to ask a leading question, I just don't know.

[KrazyHorse]

For my new job I'd say that about half of what I learned in undergrad + grad school will prove useful.

All the calculus, DEQs, linear algebra, real+complex analysis, statistical stuff, numerical stuff and programming will prove usable to one degree or another. Other stuff less so.

[KrazyHorse]

Detailed knowledge of physics beyond SM will probably be one of those things that goes out the window...

[Jon Miller]

While it isn't a direct item of knowledge, I expect your ability to produce/etc is some of the reason why you were hired.

No amount of classes would show this.

JM

[Asher]

For my new job I'd say that about half of what I learned in undergrad + grad school will prove useful.

I think that's well above average for most science/math grads, and certainly NaN% higher than Liberal Arts grads.

[Asher]

While it isn't a direct item of knowledge, I expect your ability to produce/etc is some of the reason why you were hired.

No amount of classes would show this.

JM

This is usually the case for any reasonably serious degree, is it not?

A huge chunk of engineers never do any engineering once they've graduated as well.

[KrazyHorse]

Asher, there's a giant difference between the type of work ethic necessary to do undergrad and to do a PhD.

Independent research is far more demanding in terms of self-motivation.

[Asher]

Asher, there's a giant difference between the type of work ethic necessary to do undergrad and to do a PhD.

Independent research is far more demanding in terms of self-motivation.

Yeah, I get that.

Was just pointing out that for many degrees, they don't care what classes you took so much as what type of degree you have (which I suppose makes the classes implicit). They're buying people with the capacity for analytical thought more often than not, and the degrees just show that to varying levels.

[KrazyHorse]

Yes, but Jon's point in his post was that the signaling of the PhD was substantially different from that of coursework.

[Asher]

Yes, but Jon's point in his post was that the signaling of the PhD was substantially different from that of coursework.

To be honest I would probably have an easier time doing a PhD than coursework. If I'm not interested in something I have to really struggle to pay any attention to it at all.

Focused research into a field of interest, even if it's in excruciating detail over a long period of time, would serve me better than taking endless mindless classes of things I can't be bothered to study 'cause I hate them...

[KrazyHorse]

That's fine. I don't think that there's a strict ordering; merely that they are different things.

[Asher]

Mind you, the ability to wing stuff and make **** up and figure it out as I go along is easily the #1 skill I got from undergrad.