Master's in Computer Science for Industry Professionals
Motivations to enroll in a Master's program:
Alice is a diligent programmer who excels at her back-end Java development gig and is now an informal leader in her team. She has helped a few junior developers get onboarded onto her project and now asks to herself what's next on my horizon. Although she feels comfortable at her current job, she doesn't want complacency to set in and wants to explore a new challenge. Hmm .. what's next?
Master's program v/s a specialization course:
Alice could choose a formal university education or take a course that specializes in a certain topic such as data science which is often marketed as a "Micro Master's" program on many of the popular online learning portals.
Formal University Master's degree:
Pros:
- Access to top faculty (depending on the university) and campus infrastructure
- Access to the campus placement specialists if you plan to switch careers
- Opportunity to pivot to academia or a career in research
Cons:
- Constrained by the university's timelines
- ROI may be low for someone who is already earning well in the industry if higher pay is a motivation
- You may not have all the specialized courses you are interested in at a university
Online Courses:
Pros:
- You can curate your own set of specialized courses from top universities/tutors across the world
- ROI on time and spend is high
- Flexible course completion options
Cons:
- Support is limited for coursework and personal attention for queries, advisory functions, etc.
- Course completion rates are historically low for online courses
- Industry acceptance of online degrees/certification is lower at present (but is improving).
What are some of the options available for industry professionals to gain a Master's degree in Computer Science?
- Most university Master's programs have evening/online classes to accommodate industry professionals.
- Exclusively online courses are available on sites like Coursera and Edx
- Many online portals have specialized courses such as data science, security, dev-ops etc.