Two degrees: any real benefit?

tkm256
Tue, 14 Oct 2008 19:26:10 +0000

Think about it: you’re planning to go to grad school anyway. If you pay the tuition for an extra year, you’ll get a behavioral neuroscience BS (assuming this is #2, since it is more specialized than the first). You’ll then go on to grad school and get a doctorate in the same discipline. Will anyone give a tinker’s dam about a second BS then? Will the universities you interview at look at a pool of CV’s and say “Hm. All these people wrote spectacular dissertations and have great experience researching and teaching. But /this/ person took a couple of extra classes eight years ago to fill a second line on their diploma…automatic hire!”

If you have solid lab experience and a good academic record from the biochem degree, you can easily get into a neuroscience graduate program. Think of all the better things you could be doing with that year that will help a lot more down the road than a single line on a resume saying you have a second bachelors would: an internship at a biopharm company, a year working as a lab tech for a researcher in your field, or getting tons of research experience and invaluable knowledge as a master’s student.