[Closed] WWSTWD - Work/university/life balance

It doesn’t sound unmanageable to me but obviously I don’t know your personal circumstances.

If it’s any help, I jacked in a 12 yr career in IT to return to uni full time for 4 years, spend 3 hrs a day in the car, every spare minute studying and have a 2 and a 5 yr old.

I guess it depends how much you want the degree, how long it’ll take and whether your happy to make sacrifices for that period of time?

Degree study can be a very hard slog, it’s a lot easier if you are engaged with the subject. To pile it on top of family commitments, work commitments etc I would only consider it (and am currently doing it) for the perfect course that would enhance my career, and benefit my family after graduation.

the courses on offer aren’t exactly what I’d want to do

This would concern me.

I have a full time job and am doing an Msc day release at uni. I also have 2 young kids, 6 and 9,.
It's a lot of work, i reckon about 12-16 hours a week on top of the day at uni rising to about 30 when exams and coursework are coming near. My kids and mrs750 are currently on holiday and I am at home doing coursework and studying and will be pretty much doing this for all of April

If you are interested in web development just do lots of web development.

I would suggest not doing a part time degree to become a web developer. There are people running accelerated training programmes for aspiring developers. However if I had an employer offering to pay me a day a week to learn new skills and wanted to move to web dev - then I’d look to agree with them 1. Doing udemy or similar courses to learn; 2. Implimenting what I learn on a real project (it might just be a tool for displaying things you and a few colleagues currently use). IMHO you will learn more actually doing than in a classroom and if it is something of interest. As an employer I’d much rather support short blocks of training and directly linking to your job than a long term degree in a vaguely related area.

Also The course I am on is three trimesters rather than the normal two semesters so that means it runs over summer as well.

I think you've got to ask yourself what you're doing it for? One thing I know is that it is a hell of a lot of work and there is not 'balance'..it's just a case of constant hard slog, long days and nights and sacrifice etc. That is what has prevented me from doing anything like this and there are no guarantees at the end of it that it will enhance any opportunities in your current job/career especially if you were to compare it to investing half the additional effort in just working harder and more in your current job - which I think would deliver better results.

If you really want to do it, then go for it, but if you're trying to make a balanced decision as to whether its a worthwhile 'investment' of your time, then i'd say be a bit more cautious and make sure you do your homework before committing.

my employer offers a day release to University, all paid for, I can do one of a choice of degrees.

Take the opportunity.

Most university classes are really easy, if you can read and type, you can get a passing grade. Focus your study on stuff your employer approves of, but take some other stuff just for fun (literature, history, philosophy, etc. all count as credits towards your degree, so take the opportunity to explore stuff beyond your vocational interests}. Christ, I wish someone had made me that offer back in the day.

It differs for different people depending upon factors like mental energy, my better half did an Open Uni degree over ~5 years and it left her absolutely drained most weeks during it, with very little energy left to do anything else.

I got a day release to do an MSc. You’ll find you spend surprisingly little time at uni doing uni work, as a large proportion of it is self learning.

I’m glad I did it when I didn’t have a girlfriend/wife and kids, as I can imagine it’ll be tough. I know a few people dedicated evenings and weekends to doing uni work when the kids were asleep.

I’d recommend only doing it if you think you’ll benefit from getting a degree

I find it pretty brutal.

Balancing

Work
Uni
House renovation...

Goodbye life!

I quite like it though. One is a break from the others most weeks.

I'm guessing its a graduate apprenticeship.
My wife is doing IT management, which is very similar to the software course. We run our own business, so the workload can be variable, but the hours flexible. It does take up approx 10-15 hours a week, for the next 4 years.

Some employers allow students some time during the working day, also having a mentor who can actually help you would be really useful.

Its a big commitment, but she is enjoying learning & it is benefiting the business.

Not sure where you are, but in Scotland GA's are fully funded, regardless of your employer.

However, if you have a few years life experience and are serious about a career change to coding, look at CodeClan or similar. Its very intensive, but over much quicker. CodeClan grad's have a very good reputation.

It's a fantastic opportunity, even if the courses aren't exactly what you'd like to do it will still give you extra earning potential and it will provide you with more transferable skills. However, have you really got the time at the moment?

I tried studying when my kids were younger, I absolutely loved it but I found that it was about 10pm before I could settle down to do my homework. I was only getting 3 hrs of sleep a night so that I could fit it all in, even then it was a struggle to keep up as the workload increased.

Could you ask to defer it this year whilst you and the wee one settle into the school routine?

I would jump at the chance. After f*cking up my degree 1st time round due to illness I did OU while working full time. I didn't get any time off and as it was an undergraduate engineering degree I already knew the vast majority from my 1st attempt and work. Yes, it did dominate some of my evenings around coursework submission times, but generally didn't interfere with life too much. I've just started a follow-on MSc which is likely to be a bit more of a challenge, but as work are willing to fund it, it again seems like a no-brainer. For me this is the route towards getting a CEng.

If work were both paying for it and giving you time off, I would certainly do it. You'll probably find that you know a large chunk from work already and won't need to study very hard.

I'm going to expand my answer.

I am in my first year (starting in second) of a graduate apprenticeship in civil engineering. Its the first year its been run at the university and i've been with the company for 3 years doing a very specific job but with limited space to grow without sone kind of shift and getting very fed up of monotony of being lumbered with the same work day in day out essentially providing underappreciated* support.

It was my employers suggestion as they were investigating taking on a fresh schooly as an apprenticeship. My team leader has made a significant change to my work to provide mire varied work.

I've almist got a whole maths degree under my belt which has helped no end in partial and full exemptions and in general understanding of the technical side. I can apply alit of what i do and generally find the learning easy as i generally always have.

HOWEVER what i am not is a great student. I freeze when it comes to writing, i hate deadlines and do anything to put starting off. While i know the subject converting that genuine and used knowledge into an academic report is hardwork. Its not just a turn up and write what you know. And deadlines at uni have a habit of aligning nicely with epic deadlines at work.

Do i regret starting it... Sometimes.
Do i intend to pass and do well... Definitely.
Has it added a layer of stress.... Very much.
Will it be worth it... Time will tell, the personal achievement of completing sonething after getting it badly wrong will be i am sure. Nit sure about from a career perspective but i'd never do it for that alone.

If you think you can do it, do it. Its only three years (unless you are in scotland) and if you have prior learning you may be able to get that shortened. But don't do it for work alone or you'll hate it.

Also if there are more appropriate ways to learning your subject don't dismiss them because they aren't a degree.

Tl:dr? Yes, no, maybe.

*Underappreciated in what me and my software can do and essential redoing other peoples manual work to check it rather than getting it at the start.

Take the opportunity, I know nothing about IT though so cannot comment on that. I did a part time professional course sponsored by an employer, had no life for a year. I soon got a much better job as you should stand out a mile making that commitment.

My new employer bought out the costs from the previous one. One of the best things i have ever done, I was mid 20s though so eager to learn.

I was in a similar-ish situation a while back at work.

I wanted to do some kind of course that was related to the work I am currently doing, via the OU; ideally it would have been either an electro-mechanical course or a more design-based course. But on the OU there is very little available.

My boss suggested a physics degree via the OU. I thought about it for a long time. My boss has done the course a while back, so lent me some of his 1st year documentation to see what i would be letting myself in for.
And, while I could have done it, I don't think it would have left me any free time at all and I know it would have stressed me out too much what with a full time job, a 2hr commute, a young daughter & a house that needs a lot doing to it, to get it to how we want it to be.

I decided to not proceed for the moment & see where I am in 3 or so years time. I am hoping to drop down to a 4-day week in the next few years if the boss accepts it & would perhaps then have more time to pursue some kind of part-time learning.

I think it's a very personal thing though and depends a lot on your current situation, your ability to deal with stress, how disciplined you are at getting work done without getting distracted etc. etc...

Most university classes are really easy,

IMHO If they're worth doing then they stretch you and are quite hard............

I think it all depends on your motivation. If you really want to do the degree, because you think it will directly benefit your career, or simply for itself, then go for it. It will likely be very demanding to fit the studying in with everything else, though, which is why your motivation is key.
My wife is doing an OU French degree in her spare time, purely out of her own interest, and finds it hard to keep up with the work, but she's sticking at it because she enjoys the learning.
I'm not sure if a degree in software development is necessarily useful if you want to get into that field professionally, especially if you are already working as an IT analyst. I'd be looking at self study and on the job opportunities with your employer, if that is possible. I worked as a developer without a software engineering background, and know lots of other people who did the same.

Only worth doing if it going to provide something useful.

I did my PhD with a young child, wrote my thesis while looking after a small child and a school aged child. I’m going back to uni to do a PGDE in biology while we have 3 kids and I’ll be working part time. I’m going to have 36 weeks of stress and more than one heated argument with the wife. It’s worth it in the end for me. No way I would do it otherwise.

I upgraded my non degree nursing qualification to a degree which involved basically doing the academic part of 3rd year twice. ( differnt modules thos)

It was a course set up for distance / part time learning and took me2.5 years. One of the hardest things I have ever done. MY advice would be do it if yo have a stong want to do it, do something that really intersts you or has a direct relevance to your work adn accept its going to be hard and take up a lot of time and energy.

I graduated from a 'normal' full time degree almost 9 years ago, and I still have the odd recurring nightmare where I've forgotten to study for my finals...

I'd need to be very, very sure it was something I wanted to do and I was going to get significant benefit out of it before doing another course, never mind doing it on top of a full time job.