So I'm a graduate student for Electrical Engineering at a university, and I went straight to grad school after I finished my bachelors (same field) at my local university. I'm a PhD student to be more specific, and I passed my paper to qualify my as an official PhD student last year. The more I get into the reading, the more I feel like I can't do it. I keep looking up supplementary materials to understand how to do the proofs for the equation, but I can't find much material that goes into depth for the proofs, and I spend several hours a day just trying to do them. I'm so afraid of asking for help from my advisor cause I've had bad experiences asking for help from previous professors in being belittled or yelled at. The thought of dropping out has came to my mind a lot lately, but it feels like I've wasted a lot of time (3 years) just trying to do this and at the same time, I don't know how the job market would look at me for trying to do graduate school for 3 years and dropping out. This whole situation has been making me feel hopeless and really depressed because I don't know what to do, and I've just been hating myself a lot for continuing, but I have no safety net to go to if I drop out.
Graduated BSEE, here. I'd say swallow your pride and ask your advisers. They may be harsh, but I expect they at least want you to be successful if you're putting in the work.
Just be sure when you do talk to them to lay out exactly what you're looking to figure out and make it clear that you're putting in the necessary effort. Don't waste their time be being unprepared about it.
In the event that you plan on dropping out, start applying and interviewing for a position immediately.
My university has a program where you can go from Bachelors to PhD so technically I don't have my Masters which is why I'm afraid of dropping out because I have nothing to show for the three years I've been here.
Dude, your advisors are there to help. Use them as much as possible, don't suffer in silence. Why should you feel belittled, you're doing a PHD ffs, thats a great privelage to be able to do that. once you succeed, you will forget the nonsense of your professors and be your own person.
I'd recommend speaking to someone there who can help you. I can relate with bad advisors, but perhaps if you get specific questions together ahead of time and lead with a brief summary as to why you're apprehensive, it might help kickstart it in the right direction.
If you're not comfortable with an in-person one-on-one, maybe email someone?
Have you ever sought after any other websites or math communities that could help explain a specific proof for you, like math exchange?
I think there's an actual megathread here too where people help each-other with maths, though I'm not sure to what high of a level is done there.
Talk to professors who are less shit or if none exist consider transferring schools or dropping out. Your PhD is going to be miserable if the departmental culture for advisors is belittling students.
Can you apply to get a Master's? A lot of programs let you get one somehow once you qualify if you're a PhD student.
Weren't you JohnnyMo1?
Let me tell you something about Electrical Engineering advisors that is always true: they are looking to help you, but are very blunt with things. They are used to people who are looking to get an easy grade through cheating or kissing ass. The major is one of the hardest up there, so the people teaching it don't have any time for bullshit. If you are struggling and putting in the work, just go to them and push your question. Fear is going to prevent you from reaching your potential in an environment like this. You'll be surprised how many professors are holding themselves back, and how refreshing it'll be for them to see a student who's actually interested in what they're doing. Even if you are walking in and getting things ass wrong but are showing the bleed time for it, they will help.
Source: Bachelors of EE, tutor for various courses, working with professors on small scale electronics, consumer products, and bio-mechatronic applications
You can probably ask them for career advice too. I remember sitting with one of my professors from a class I'm passionate about TWO YEARS AFTER HAVING HIM and asked for advice on how the hell I can get to where I want to be. He not only told me what positions, but even suggested some companies I can apply to and tactics to getting them to reply to me.
Also, you can still apply for jobs and say you're in progress of a PhD. I sincerely doubt a company is going to turn down a prospective PhD student. You'll find the company might even have some senior members help you with questions. The industry is STARVING for young people to fill senior slots, you just might get locked into the company for an equal duration of the "help".
How are your grades?
My field of research is in battery/energy storage so while I was searching for internships through my school's career website. I became really disheartened when I could barely find any positions looking for PhD students, or if they accepted any year of student, it'd require programming experience that I do not have. Just searching has really made me wonder as to whether I'll be able to find anything after graduation if I don't have any experience.
I want to ask this, but I don't know who in the department to ask. My department is a mess when it comes to organization so I don't want to go to multiple people and have multiple people know about me wanting to call it quits for a Master's.
In both departments I've been it I think the position is called graduate coordinator. Perhaps you could also talk to the college and go over the department? At least if you don't know they could tell you who in the department handles that hopefully, and you wouldn't have to talk to professors in your actual department.
You're not obligated to tell them that specific thing, but even if you were it's not a big issue. You'll have to swallow your pride on this one if you want to get some help.
The 1 implied there could be others, and we all know JohnnyMo is unique.
The graduate coordinator didn't give me a concrete answer on if I went from PhD to Master's degree, but when I checked the non-thesis route for Master's, the report that they write and present is similar to the report that I had to write and present to be considered a PhD student so I don't know if that report I wrote previously would be able to qualify me for it.
I haven't been able to find any luck at finding companies wanting to take PhD students. All the ones that I've seen are looking for undergrad or Master's at most.
you have reached the point in education where you can't really find answers on google anymore. I am there now in my undergrad degree, it sucks.
At this point, what you should do is either ask professors/advisors questions directly, or if you feel that you are messing a broad segment of knowledge, ask them what books/references they use
good luck
I'll be blunt. If you want to work in the private sector, PhD may not be the best route. I suspect most companies looking for PhD graduates are heavily involved in research and may be very selective in choosing their candidates, even then.
If you're looking for jobs, I'd look more in Silicon Valley, Seattle, or some other area that's got a big tech industry.
Honestly if a PhD holder applied to a master's position they'd probably be drooling. Most companies convert the education time into equivalent years of work experience. If you excel at what they look for, it's basically a guaranteed job. But what Splash Attack said here is relevant:
Although I will add that depending on the scale of energy storage you prefer to work with, you can probably look around major cities and their power distribution companies. For example, General Electric in New York is looking for PhD electrical engineers for their infrastructure. Texas/Cali probably have some small scale needs. The defense industry is also an option, but that's an ethical choice you have to make
BSEE grad, MSCSE student here.
You might be at a point where re-evaluating what you want from a PhD is necessary. PhDs qualify you for (and pigeonhole you into) research positions in both industry and academia. From what you've mentioned it doesn't sounds like you're enjoying your research experience. While grad school sucks a disproportionate amount of ass and is not a good reflection of life outside the wire, your future with a PhD will be more research unless you decide to teach. So some questions:
Do you enjoy the research process? If not, is this lack of enjoyment a product of your surrounding circumstances or because it really just isn't something you enjoy?
If you were to leave your academic institution right now and pick a dream job, what would that be? Is a PhD necessary to attain that position?
To the point of finding work after pulling out of the program: you don't have nothing to show for your time in graduate studies just because you don't have a sheet of paper. Being a grad student is a job like anything else, and through your studies you have been adding value, not pouring it down the drain. Your additional time in school has given you a broader perspective and tools that people competing for jobs probably won't have. Please view it as an asset instead of a liability.
So I talked to someone that's been in the PhD program a lot longer than me, and he told me that dropping from PhD to Masters would be considered suicide. I think it's because I've been in the university for 3 years, but I'm not too sure how strict schools are on timelines for graduation. What can schools even do if you take too long?
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