The Bachelor’s degree may have slowed down as a a way for a candidate to stand out. With over 30% of adults now holding a Bachelor’s degree, ‘standing-out’ with respect to education may require job applicants to have more sophisticated training. This may be true both at the beginning of a career and as you climb in an organization. In some job environments, experience can only take you so far. To be considered for executive level positions, you may need an advanced degree.
Graduate school has many advantages. It can spark your passion and creativity, potentially making you a more valuable and more marketable employee. Grad school may multiply your contact base exponentially, through the contacts you make with students and faculty. A graduate degree can also add to your resource stock-pile.
Online graduate education has a special role in the development of men and women hoping to enhance their careers. With the rise of online education, students now have the option to complete their degrees even while working demanding jobs. It’s all about choice; you can choose your pace, both in the volume of courses you take and when you want to complete assignments. You get to choose where you want to do your work, at home, in the office, at a coffee shop, wherever. Students also get to choose from a host of programs and certificate programs from varying institutions across the country. You can attend an elite school that may not have a physical location where you live.
Online graduate degrees range from philosophy and religion—or humanities in general—to physics, computer engineering, international relations, and business management. Where computer engineering and business management may land you higher paying jobs, humanities graduate degrees may be quite profitable as well. The type of people hiring for higher paying jobs are going to be looking for higher qualifications.
Online graduate school is a significant investment, both in time and money. Some degrees can be extremely demanding. But in the end, online graduate education has all the advantages of in-house graduate school (marketability, stimulation, learning, etc.) as well as all the advantages of stopping by the convenience store on the way home to pick up milk. If you have a career path in mind, and you find yourself on the road, you can work to earn a graduate degree en route. Or, if you prefer to get a start on your journey and work for a while, you can still start online graduate courses that let you set a slower pace, enhancing both your education and your career simultaneously.
Written by Kevin Hughes and edited by Laura Morrison, the Content Manager of GradSchools.com. If you want to learn more about online programs, click here.
(1). http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/24/education/census-finds-bachelors-degrees-at-record-level.html?_r=0
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