Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Bachelors Degree

websitead - 9-12-2010 at 12:02

Hello people
I am a little confused about my degree and this forum pretty much has one of the largest communities of chemists/chemistry enthusiasts.
I am currently pursuing a Bachelors in Chemistry (It has a large focus on Biochemistry and Organic Chemistry). I love my course and find it incredibly fascinating. But graduate study is not something that I am planning to pursue. Over the past few weeks I have been hearing from people about how undergraduates in chemistry can never really get a "proper" job after graduation and that there is a dearth of jobs for a person holding just a Bachelors.
Now I'd like to hear from you guys what you think are the opportunities available for a fresh graduate. And does it make sense in these current conditions to continue pursuing a degree in chemistry?
I'm studying in Europe, don't know if this makes any difference.

psychokinetic - 9-12-2010 at 12:13

Hello and welcome to our dungeon
I mean, uh, lovely forum.

Great you're doing chemistry :D. In terms of what you can do with a Bachelor's degree, I suppose it really depends on what you want to do with it. If you want to do jobs that require the knowledge of a Bachelor, then awesome - and if you do well there may be chances to learn on the job and get into more stuff.

If you want to skip straight to the heavy stuff, you need to take a detour via grad school, really.

There are always opportunities, and it depends on what you do with them.

entropy51 - 9-12-2010 at 12:24

A lot of members gave advice about this in a recent thread.

BromicAcid spoke with the voice of experience:
Quote: Originally posted by BromicAcid  
A bachelors degree in chemistry entitles you to a job. A crappy job. A bachelors degree and honest to goodness skill will let you go anywhere. Just make sure you know where you want to go before hand so you can put forth the pointed effort necessary to advance.
You might want to follow that link to his post and read the rest of the thread.

DDTea - 9-12-2010 at 15:27

I wouldn't call a year-old thread "recent."

Here's something to consider though. There is an overall dearth of jobs for chemists right now, so it's a total employer's market. They can get a B.S. to do work that only requires a high school diploma, and they do just that! So at just the Bachelor's level, you may find yourself working the night shift in some production job or doing wholly unfulfilling work at first. Once you have 1-2 years of experience on top of your B.S. though, people will start taking you seriously.

If you want a good career, though, definitely go for a graduate degree--especially if you enjoy what you do. However, be warned: nothing is more pathetic than a Ph.D without a job and with zero experience.

smuv - 10-12-2010 at 15:09

If you don't get a PhD or at least a masters, focusing on Organic and Biochemistry will not put you in a very good position to get a job. With a BS in chemistry expect to get a job as a glorified technician. I am not saying, everyone gets these jobs, but it is the norm. Remember, starting salary of BS chemists is $37K on average (aka ~ $17/hr), companies don't expect much from BS chemists.

For the record, the starting salary for Masters chemists is about 50K, and 70K for PhD. IMO it is definitely worth it to go to school for the ~1.5 years it takes to get a masters. Remember, just about every extra month you spend in school working on your masters will be equivalent to increasing your salary for the rest of your working life by at least $1000.

Good luck.

[Edited on 12-10-2010 by smuv]

psychokinetic - 10-12-2010 at 22:37

37k/a is a lot more than I already earn ;)

undead_alchemist - 11-12-2010 at 04:16

Off topic I know:
10 years ago I was doing tech support at the cable company and it worked out to $18 per hour.
Lasted only 6 months before they started to downsize in a big way. Still in the end I collected around 30K after EI.

websitead - 11-12-2010 at 16:25

Helpful advice.
What I think I will be doing most probably is that I will try to get some sort of job for a while after my undergraduate degree and gain some experience and money (Cause I will need it if I plan to go for my graduate degree).
This blog post has some really interesting comments about Chemistry PhD's.
http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2010/08/11/if_youre_not...

DDTea - 11-12-2010 at 21:53

That might be a wise choice. A lot of companies will pay for you to get a graduate degree.

ADP - 3-1-2011 at 19:23

Three years ago I was seriously on path to pursuing a bachelor's degree in chemistry. For reasons discussed above I chose the route of chemical engineering so that I could still study the interesting stuff that I've always loved, but also get a solid job with good pay.

cnidocyte - 4-1-2011 at 05:39

I'm half way into getting a bachelors too but I don't really care what job I get out of it, I'm in it for the skills. When I become a skilled chemist then god help us all.

Cuauhtemoc - 4-1-2011 at 06:21

Quote: Originally posted by ADP  
Three years ago I was seriously on path to pursuing a bachelor's degree in chemistry. For reasons discussed above I chose the route of chemical engineering so that I could still study the interesting stuff that I've always loved, but also get a solid job with good pay.


I choose the same path, atleast here in Brazil pure chemists get no respect or decent jobs.
I'm more of an engineer than a scientist anyway.

Saerynide - 4-1-2011 at 09:18

Chemical engineering is a wise choice (me's a cheme), but be warned! It's not chemistry... Its more physics and mathematical modeling than anything. It will get you a job though, and you will see and analyze the world in a different way after :D

Magpie - 4-1-2011 at 10:47

Speaking as a retired chemical engineer I think Saerynide has summarized academic ChE well.

Although a BS in ChE will probably open more doors to employment, and more diverse employment, than any other degree I have always felt that the job of "process engineer" is most representative. Here's two current job openings for same:

https://board.recruitmilitary.com/jobs/530546?utm_source=Ind...

and:

https://cop.taleo.net/careersection/10000/jobdetail.ftl?job=...

And don't worry about the salary & benefits. They're almost always quite good.