Grad School & General Resources Assistance

[alexiarnps]

I think your lack of focus should be a much more troubling concern right now. Figure out what you want to do and decide on a Masters degree later, seeing as you're not graduating until next year anyway. With the possible exception of hard science fields, a Masters degree doesn't get you out of a menial job, so you're really going to have to figure out what you want to do before you commit to anything. Undergrad is the time to not know what you're doing, it's expected that you know what you want before you start any Masters programme.

My track was very clearly set on an MPH with laser focus on developmental psychology pertaining to early intervention programs. These are programs here in the States - I am assuming with the "programme" that you are in a Common Wealth - that focus on what health education programs are provided to new mothers, in hopes of reducing the effects of neglect and poor nutrition in children during that first three years of crucial brain development. My track was to be completed at University of Washington in Seattle where I was living, but my father-in-law pasted away suddenly last summer and my husband and I made a choice to return to our home state to be closer to my husband's family. Now I am in a state where the MPH program is an hour and a half drive each way, so I am looking at what my options are.

Working for Department of Health here means that I can have a range of different degrees, since the different levels of jobs require different levels of degrees to meet job requirements. A masters allows me to allows me to apply for director positions, but any of the ones I mentioned meet that criteria as all of those degrees indicate that you are proficient in working with families, and all of the positions that I would be pursing are working with families. My personal "work smarter not harder" about working with at-risk populations is that those critical first three years creates a foundation that will break the cycle, or it will perpetuate it. All evidence indicates that support and education of the caregivers for these children makes for a healthier and smarter child, all things that reduce a person's likelihood of future reliance on public assistance, future criminal activity, poor academic performance, or possibility of teen pregnancy.

Whoops! Tangent! No, focus for me is not an issue. Funding and time, on the other hand, are. :-)