Theoretical question about changing engineering fields mid career

College Majors Engineering Majors
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<p>Let’s say a person graduates with a Mechanical Engineering Degree then joins the military doing Civil Engineering work. After the completion of his service, he decides that he wants to go back to college to get a Masters of Ph.D in Biomedical Engineering with the goal of eventually entering the Biomedical Engineering industry.</p>

<p>What sort of difficulties would this person face?</p>

<p>Would such a person be limited to a post-military career in civil engineering?</p>

<p>How would future biomed. employers view this?</p>

<p>I’m asking because I’m considering joining the military doing civil engineering work but don’t want to be limited to civil engineering for the rest of my life.</p>

<p>Personally, the structure of things interests me so buildings and civil engineering can be interesting while the human body’s structure is just as fascinating. In the future, I’m interested in doing work with prosthetics. Civil Engineering may have nothing to do with Biomedical Engineering but the aspects of structure and strength are interesting to me.</p>

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<p>If not civil engineering, nuclear reactor engineering is also possible in the Navy and that could potentially lead to a future career in biomedical engineering related to radiology and nuclear medicine.</p>

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<p>This should not be a problem for either Biomedical or Nuclear Engineering since many people in these fields start out with different undergraduate degrees.</p>

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<p>Ok. Thanks</p>

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<p>Right now, I think what I want to do is complete college with an Engineering degree and a high GPA then apply to the Navy’s Officer Candidate School or the Air Force’s Officer Training School. Since both branches maintain graduate schools, Naval Postgraduate School and the Air Force institute of Technology respectively, active duty officers can also work to get a Masters or Ph.D degree. </p>

<p>So far, this is among the most attractive options as it allows me to get into the service while still advancing academically and intellectually.</p>

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<p>Why not just contract with ROTC now?</p>

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<p>Well, I’m not 100% certain about joining the military. I’ll have to think about it more. I’ll give it some more time before I decide on that. I also want the opportunity to be able to get a Masters degree right after undergrad first and going the ROTC route prevents that.</p>

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<p>As long as you can afford the cost of college, there is no real advantage to ROTC. In fact, for doing civil engineering work, it is advantageous to not be in ROTC. This allows you to negotiate your assignment with the military before you enter. With ROTC, they already have you and the military might decide that they want you to do something other than civil engineering work.</p>

<p>Both the Navy and the Army have outstanding civil engineering organizations. The Navy has the “Seabees” or Construction Battalion units, while the Army has the Corps of Engineers. In fact, the Corps of Engineers also has extensive career opportunities for civilians. In other words, you would be a civilian employee of the Army. You might consider that, instead of pure military.</p>

<p>Mechanical Engineering is the ideal major for what you want to do. A mechanical engineer can easily understand almost anything that a civil engineer does. It is also good preparation for any other type of engineering, especially for gaining a masters degree. However, your concern about switching careers is valid. It takes a lot of work to gain employment outside of your experience. I recommend getting that masters degree after military service, not before it.</p>

<p>Nuclear engineering is a bad idea if you want to go with the Navy. They will put you on a submarine. Period. They might even break a promise to put you in the “Seabees.” Nuclear power officers are in very high demand with the Navy. Besides that, what you learn in nuclear engineering is of limited value in the medical field. Not useless, but not particularly useful either. If you want to learn something about nuclear engineering, just take a couple of nuke electives during your mechanical engineering studies.</p>

<p>Finally, the military will not send you to a masters program until you have been in the service for at least ten years. For example, the Naval Postgraduate School is for career officers – not for anyone fresh out of college. If you get that far, you might as well stay for 20 years.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the informative reply NROTCgrad.</p>

<p>In that case, I’ll eliminate “graduate school studies during service” as a plus. However, I’m still very much considering joining the military even if I don’t do much if at all engineering work. I would only be reluctant to join the military if it would ruin any chances of getting into the Biomedical Engineering industry but as of yet, I don’t see any reason for that to happen.</p>

<p>Also, you mentioned that going the ROTC route gives me little chance to negotiate my assignment but going the ROTC route would give me a better chance of getting into an officer position as I hear that getting into Officer Candidate (or Training in the Case of the Air Force) School is extremely tough. Specifically, I’m most interested in AFROTC (Partly because they have a fancy website haha) then NROTC. My university does not have detachments for either one but it does have Army ROTC. However, it partners with two different crosstown universities in the region that have AFROTC and NROTC but to participate, I’d have to visit them to attend classes and I’m not sure I’d be willing to do so unless the training was on a Friday or Weekend. Those two crosstown universities are far from being cross the town as they are 3 hours away by train. </p>

<p>On the other hand, OCS or OTS lets me maintain a more regular college lifestyle and gives me more flexibility to what branch I choose though it is much tougher to get into especially for Air Force OTS.</p>

<p>Do you know when the once a week classes take place?</p>

<p>I’ve heard that Civil Engineering in the military is just a glorified term for construction workers (much akin to the term sanitation engineer to refer to the garbage man as some point out. Is this really the case?</p>

<p>Also, if I do join the military, I intend to get a graduate degree in Biomedical Engineering after wards with the intent of entering the Biomedical Engineering industry in the field of prosthetics which could surely involved dealing with people such as veterans. I’d be really happy if I could help develop prosthetics to help out veterans as well as others who are in need of one for what ever reason.</p>

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<p>Mechanical engineers may understand most parts of civil engineering, but we have found they’re pretty clueless when it comes to structural engineering. They can be frustrating to work with as we design buildings and work on mill buildings.</p>

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<p>ROTC vs. OCS/OTS – Here is how I see it. If you are good enough to get an ROTC scholarship then you probably are good enough to get offered OCS or OTS. After all, those scholarships are only offered to the best students. On the other hand, if you take ROTC but not on scholarship you are not guaranteed an active duty assignment. So, basically taking ROTC without the scholarship is not a better choice than OCS or OTS. This is why I think that if you do not need the money then ROTC is not the way to go. Of course my logic might be flawed, and also situtations do change. Indeed, right now the military is downsizing, and thus it is harder to become an officer no matter what. In sum, nothing is guaranteed but if you are truly officer material then they will take you for OCS or OTS. Only the marginal people get weeded out.</p>

<p>Truth is, I do not know much about the Air Force or AFROTC. So have no advice on that.</p>

<p>Also, regarding ROTC classes at a crosstown college… different colleges have different arrangements. Normally, on the home campus, classes are actually three days a week plus one day for “drill” (which means wearing the uniform and marching around, etc…) However, with crosstown students, it appears that at least some colleges allow you to only show up one day a week; typically Tuesday or Thursday, but again this depends on the college. For all I know, some of the classes are online these days. So, my advice is to directly contact the units which you are looking at and ask them. Every ROTC unit has a website, and they almost always list the officers on their staff (often called “cadre”). Send an email the “Executive Officer” and address him or her by their title and name (example, Major Jones). I have done this several times, even as a civilian now. They are happy to respond.</p>

<p>Are Civil Engineers actually construction workers? Well, the officers are not laborers. The supervise, regardless of the situation. However, as you can tell the “Seabees” are called the Construction Battalion. So, yes, Naval officers in the Civil Engineering Corps might often be engaged in supervising construction projects. If you want to do something more along the lines of design, that could be difficult; especially with the Navy. The Army Corps of Engineers is so huge, that I presume that design work is among the possible duties, but I do not know the odds.</p>

<p>See this about the Navy Civil Engineering Corps:
<a href=“U.S. Navy Civil Engineering Careers | Navy.com”>U.S. Navy Civil Engineering Careers | Navy.com;

<p>See this about the Army Corps of Engineers:
<a href=“Careers -- Headquarters U.S. Army Corps of Engineers”>http://www.usace.army.mil/careers.aspx&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>See this about Air Force Civil Engineers:
<a href=“Civil Engineer - Requirements and Benefits - U.S. Air Force”>http://www.airforce.com/careers/detail/civil-engineer/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Maybe even see this about engineering with the Coast Guard:
<a href=“http://www.uscg.mil/hq/cg4/engineering_career.asp”>http://www.uscg.mil/hq/cg4/engineering_career.asp&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I think that in all three branches, during peacetime, you could end up in “facilities management” which is kind of like being a civilian city engineer. You make sure roads, and airstrips, and docks, etc… are maintained properly. Even construction projects, during peacetime, are kind of rare. </p>

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<p>Changing fields mid-career can be done (I’ve seen it done) but it can be somewhat problematic. Depends on how radial a change you are making. </p>

<p>You need to demonstrate to your new employer that you have the minimum skills to perform work in your new field. This may require additional classes. Do you go nights while doing your old job or full time and therefore have little or no income during that time?</p>

<p>You also won’t have the experience in your new field so you new employer will either have to overpay you or you will have to accept a pay cut to bring you in line with your skill level.</p>

<p>The people who I have seen that have done the best at a mid-career field change are ones that made small changes to their field of specialty.</p>

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<p>HPuck35. I am currently pursuing a mechanical engineering degree and hope to get a masters degree in Mechanical Engineering as part of the 4+1 program offered at my university (In some cases, I’ve read that students were able to defer commissioning by a year so that they can participate in an extra year for a master’s degree. After service, I plan to go back to college for a Biomedical Engineering graduate degree so while I won’t have the experience, I would have some of the knowledge to get started.</p>

<p>Additionally, from what I’ve read, many people in the Biomedical Engineering industry got non-BioMed engineering degrees or have experience in other fields that are not immediately related to Biomedical Engineering or even Biology or Medicine.</p>

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<p>One additional comment; Don’t confuse “field” with “industry”. The biomedical industry may employ, in a singe company, many different fields. Depending on what type of device you are making you will need people in electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, material engineering, optics, manufacturing, etc. It is your experience in your field that you will bring to the table when working as part of a team in your chosen industry. </p>

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<p>Solely from an objective standpoint, how does 4 years experience as a military officer compare with 4 years entry level engineering industry experience?</p>

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<p>"Solely from an objective standpoint, how does 4 years experience as a military officer compare with 4 years entry level engineering industry experience? "</p>

<p>Depends on what you were doing as a military officer. If you were doing engineering work, then it’s engineering work and it doesn’t matter whether it was in the military or industry.</p>

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<p>This might not count as “objective” but my personal experience in the military is that the military has significantly higher performance standards than civilian industry (I have worked for two Fortune 500 companies, plus a couple of sole proprietorships). So, except for special circumstances, such as working for Apple Computer or Amazon, I believe that having your first job in the military will give you a much better perspective on high performance which will inform your decisions for the rest of your career. It will also give you additional training (not masters degree, remember) which could be very helpful in a civilian career. It is also likely to give you a wider perspective. You will continue to draw on your military experience for the rest of your life in a way that is rare for most civilians.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the advice everyone. For me, the main question now is whether the 3 hour commute from my university by train is worth being in the AFROTC program.</p>

<p>I’m not sure how much work I could get done on a train.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the advice everyone. Right now, the main thing keeping me from AFROTC is probably the 3 hour train commute.</p>

<p>To test my time management abilities, i’ve decided to try to “simulate” AFROTC tiem commitment by spending all day Saturday and part of the day Sunday either exercising or studying things other than content for my current coursework. If things go sufficiently well and reflect an ability to manage such time commitments, I may just sign up for AFROTC.</p>