I love the category listed as business. Every position listed is a business.
Finance. Banking. Investment management. Asset management at the institutional or fund level. Marketing at Fortune 500. Brand management. Human Resources and talent management. Sales. Consulting. Etc. all can be had from many angles from English and Econ to business degrees or communications. It all depends.
I need more details. Had she been there long, was this her end goal? Or perhaps it was a stop-gap while she was applying for other gigs. In some cases, the gift shop is the foot in the door. I know a couple of museum studies kids that took the gift shop gig and then were well-placed when a more career-like position opened up.
I had the same thought about a foot-in-the-door employment choice. There are many types of employment where there arenât a lot of openings and positions tend to be filled by inside hires. Working at a museum seems to be one of these: https://www.museumsassociation.org/workforce/getting-a-first-job
However, when the entry level job is low paid (or an unpaid internship), that may make it more difficult to enter the career path without some parental financial support or subsidy.
The cashier at my local Staples is a graduate of an HYP with honors everything out the wazoo and in a much maligned field (on CC). He was diagnosed with a serious chronic illness in his first year of a competitive grad school. His parents are THRILLED that he has a full-time job with medical benefits and a stable prognosis (for now). I also realize that they know that random strangers who chat with their kid for two minutes in the store must walk away thinking that their kid is a loser, or that they were insane losers to âallowâ him to major in a âstudiesâ field.
Nice to judge a total stranger from a brief encounter in a museum gift shop. You have no idea if the nice young lady is bipolar, struggling to get to a stable state with Lupus, undergoing chemotherapy which has impeded her ability to hold down a career track job, or in recovery from addiction. Must be nice to be so confident in oneâs own good luck in life.
No doubt there are some parents who are thrilled their children are cashiers. It is an honest job, and apparently comes with benefits. Likewise, there are people satisfied with low wage gift store jobs in museums, or other minimum wage jobs, either temporarily or permanently. Nonetheless, some have other hopes for their own kids, and are more sensitive to return on investment for expensive colleges.
No doubt most parents want their kids to launch into a career track role. My point was that without knowing specifics, you donât know if a kid has taken a cashiers job because itâs the best option while the kid learns to manage a chronic disease, or is working through recovery from substance abuse, etc. vs not being able to get a better job in his or her field.
You donât know. So presuming that the young lady at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston has âwastedâ her degrees with no ROI may or may not be accurate. Perhaps she has aged off of her parents health insurance, and she, her medical team, and her parents have agreed that a cashierâs job at a museum is the best path for her right now. Especially if her employer offers generous sick days (which many not-for-profits do) and/or allows employees to carry over unused vacation days year to year. And offers a relatively stress free environment which for now- is needed.
My friends in their 60âs who are now doing chemo/immunotherapy etc. for the various ailments that hit you in your 60âs have often commented that they donât know what theyâd have done if theyâd had to juggle a stressful career with treatment if theyâd been diagnosed in their 20âs. And yet it happens- and people do it. More power to them.
Namaste.
We dont know additional details because the cashier did not volunteer them, whereas she must have volunteered the information about her degrees. I would never make assumptions about her physical or mental health or addictions from her job.
You donât have to hypothesize major health problems. Maybe the young woman has a spouse and a kid and purposely sought out part-time, shift work in a place that she enjoys spending time. (Sometimes the demands of a full-time position donât mesh well with family life). Or maybe itâs the other way around, and she has a lot of student loans and the museum store cashier work is her second job, on top of a job more suited to her educational credentials, given that most museum curators donât get huge salaries in any case. (Glassdoor reports the national average salary for âMuseum Curatorâ is under $47K â Boston is somewhat better with an average salary of $52K - but maybe itâs still nice to supplement an entry-level curatorâs salary, especially if the opportunity for earning more can be found on-premises).
In addition to museum curating, many people deliberately choose to pursue advanced educational credentials which are tied to lower-paying careers, such as teaching and social work. And there are plenty of young people with PhDs who earn low-end salaries with post-doc lab positions or working as adjuncts.
On the flip side, there are many people who follow the money and end up unhappy and feeling trapped because they find their chosen careers unfulfilling or unduly stressful.
Back to the young woman with the masterâs in museum sciences - here is a page with a list of job titles and salaries at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston - https://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Museum-of-Fine-Arts-Boston-Salaries-E25008.htm
Youâll note that the âstore managerâ earns pretty good money compared to, say, the âassistant curatorsâ â and just about everyone else except for the uppermost positions, for that matter. Obviously one probably doesnât get to be âstore managerâ until they have put in a lot of time first at the registers â but given the low pay all around I can see the benefit working two positions rather than one.
For those lower paying careers which require or prefer advanced educational credentials other than PhDs (i.e. advanced educational credentials that cost money/debt, unlike funded PhDs), wouldnât they only realistically be open to those who have generous parents with money?
Agree, although some people may have felt that they were forced to chase the money to pay off heavy student loan debt (for some, even the lowest cost college option requires heavy student loan debt).
No, but there are a lot of teachers and social workers who are carrying large amounts of debt. They may get some debt relief in the form of income-based repayment options.
Keep in mind that one does not have to opt for full-time enrollment a private university or high-end public to get these degrees. Plenty of people hold down full-time employment while also pursuing masterâs degrees on a part-time basis. Tuition costs are still quite manageable at many public universities. In some cases if they have full-time jobs at a university they will qualify for reduced or waived tuition for part-time enrollment at the university where they work â it doesnât have to be a teaching position.
Obviously young people who are funded by their parents have an easier time of it, but my kids are both walking around with masterâs degrees that they earned on their own dime, after being in the workforce for a few years. My daughter opted for the full-time employment / part-time masterâs track; whereas my son took advantage of a recession-related lapse in employment to attend an in-state public, full time. Both took on loans but nothing compared to the loan debt of their peers who pursued professional degrees (such as law or medicine).
Museum jobs are notoriously low paying. A really big deal in 2019 that got a lot of traction in the industry and attention from the press was a crowd sourced salary spreadsheet started by a group of museum workers in Philly that went viral.
Google âmuseum salary transparency spreadsheetâ and youâll find gobs of articles about it including the spreadsheet.
Silly to judge someone based on their current job without knowing all the details. I personally have studied many areas which people would say did not pay well (but they did for me). Having a plan and being a lifelong learner with good interpersonal skills beats any specific degree and no plan. Kids need to have a plan. Any field can be highly lucrative. I have had so many people make stupid assumptions about what I studied based on their own limited bias ( usually based on narrow minded thinking). No one ever guessed my path. And few even had enough focus to listen. Many people IMHO are narrow minded so they can only see an engineer being an engineer or a history major, teaching history. The world is varied and we need all types of skills but the most important are interpersonal.
Very few people end up in a career that doesnât change over 40 years. My spouse is the only person I know who started in a field and remains there over decades. Yet, even then companies, and the world have changed a lot.
The museum curator may work there for benefits and be doing personal installations and curation work freelance or may be doing any number of things.
Oh BrotherâŠ
Now I remember why I quit CC two years agoâŠsoâŠmuchâŠjudgement
I didnât think when I originally posted that I would need to provide transcripts of my 45 minute conversation with this gal but apparently I do.
We were at this museum with a lot of family members who purchased a lot of stuff and were have the items shipped all over the country both for themselves and for gifts. This young lady spent about 45 minutes with us which is how this whole conversation started and I got to speak with her at length.
She finished her masters last year. She is 25, single, no children, trying to gain full time employment in her field. Why would anyone jump to the conclusion that she may have mental health or addiction problems? Good lord, she majored in something with not tons of available positions and doesnât pay well. She sent many many resumes before graduating and got nothing, so she took this job. She has continued to apply, but the Available jobs have been few and far between. She said that her hiring manager told her that they receive hundreds of resumes for every opening and applicants have much more experience than her or are in many cases overqualified.
Museum studies jobs must be a sellers market here.
I assure you I donât know ANYTHING about this major and job market here in Boston besides what she told me.
She is bummed that she canât work in her field in a job that pays a living wage. She was a super cute girl with a bubbly personality and said she and a few friends are considering moving to a lower COL area and to a warmer climate. She said something to the effect of âif Iâm going to be poor I might as well be in a bikiniâ. I donât remember her exact words, but she had a great attitude and was trying to figure out her next steps.
@blossom
Your comments to me were way out of line. You donât know me or what my kids have gone through in their life. I have a kid with brain damage from Lyme disease who has had an IEP since he was 3. This is the first year his only accommodation is extended test time.i just posted about this a couple of days ago. You tell me Iâm judging?
Iâm sort of kicking myself for even responding to these hateful comments. I stand by what I said I personally would not allow my kids to major in something where the job prospects are what this girl is facing. I didnât tell other people not to major in it and I didnât tell anyone else that my opinion is the only opinion. Itâs just what my family would do. Are we not allowed to have a difference of opinion on here?
Thank you to all of the very kind CCâers who responded to my other post I made this week asking for help with my S22âs college search. You all exemplify what this site should be about.
And with thatâŠ, my next hiatus will be much longer than 2 years.
Iâm sorry you feel the responses to your post are âhatefulâ but you opened the door with a post that many felt fit the exact category you now decry (âso much judgmentâ.) You are the parent who said you wouldnât allow your kid to major in something that you donât perceive as tied to a financially lucrative career path. (And I am a parent who never even considered trying to influence what my kids majored in).
Iâd point out that you havenât reported the undergraduate major of the young woman with a masterâs degree in museum studies â people often get advanced degrees that are not directly related to their undergrad major.
Youâve now also posted that she is only a year out from getting her masterâs. When people do get an advanced degree, they may find that it takes awhile to get the position they trained for. So it does sound like a foot-in-the-door thing â after all, sheâs now in a position to be having face-to-face conversations with the museumâs hiring manager.
@LTmomof2 I think that when you post in a public forum you have to be open to receiving feedback. Sounds as though you stand by your opinion which is great and donât want to take the feedback that you might not have the whole picture regarding the MFA girl. Thatâs fine too. I think itâs a bit unfair to play the victim and accuse folks of hateful comments because you donât like the comments. Itâs a give and take. CC can get a bit tough here and there. I posted a thread once which went sideways and I was unhappy then someone posted that you have to be open to feedback. Iâm happy they did. I had shut down because I didnât like the direction. But I could also just not agree with the comments.
Best of luck to you. I mean that sincerely. I honestly think CC is filled with lots of folks and good information.
I have learned that CC posters can be counted on to assume mental illness, drug addiction, ADHD and/or executive function issues regardless of the question presented or context.
Whether this young woman is happy or not isnât really the point. The point is, those who major in tremendously oversubscribed fields may end up underemployed and incapable of servicing student debt acquired at expensive colleges. Proceed accordingly. Seems like we all should be able to agree on that.
@roycroftmom
I could not have said that better myself⊠thank you.
I tried to say that same thing but was not politically correct enough I guess. lol!
When I worked in admin at a HYPSM university many of my Lower level co-workers were doctoral students, writers or other people for whom the job was just a side gig. My job was in a museum building. The woman who worked the gift shop was a photographer and this was her work-study job.
One long-term temp in my office, a playwright herself, was married to a man who worked for a while part time at the Uâs fine arts museum as a night security guard. One of his coworkers once noticed that he had the same name as an artist with work in the museumâs collection. Thatâs because he was the artist. ? He found wandering the collections to be inspiring and the job gave him access to excellent health insurance for his entire family.
Not an endorsement or knock.
However, I know of a fairly recent BU grad, who prior to her current role of national prominence was a bartender somewhere in NYC.
Which probably did a good job to pay the bills and developed some speaking skills too.
I would suggest the story isnât fully told for the young woman in the museum one year out of the gate.
Art curation and private collections turning into museums is starting to pay some more experienced folks some beaucoup dâargent.
Google Art Basel Miami for one.
But I also agree with @roycroftmom last post as well.
There are many paths on this journey. And many of us get to choose and define success on our own terms, which is truly a great freedom in our society.