Lately, a couple of folks have asked me if they should go to grad school for an MA instead of an MS. Like just about everyone else, I'd say no. If there’s anything else you’d be happy doing, you should do it, particularly if it pays well and isn’t all-consuming. If you’re still thoroughly convinced an MA or PhD is what you want, then my answer changes to maybe — but only if you have some practical frame of reference because you racked up a a few years of industry experience. There’s a big difference between “I don’t know what else to do” or “I don’t know what else is out there and am scared to find out” and “Dude, this is really where I want to be because it makes me happier than any of the alternatives.”

If, after all that, this is something you really do want to consider, then do your research. (And if the idea of doing this research repulses or merely bores you, that’s a pretty solid clue that this isn’t your line of work.) Make sure there aren’t going to be surprises — especially about the job market. I know some very smart people who still, in this day and age, are surprised that their English PhDs haven’t resulted in a tenure-track Literature job. Nobody told them and they didn’t go looking for the answers before they started. I was lucky in this regard: the second I said out loud that I wanted a Lit PhD, someone sat me down and asked me if I ever wanted a job or an income. Look up the average student loan debt in your field and the average number of years until you might achieve a decent income. Read a bunch of academic blogs and get a solid understanding of the general work load of a grad student or professor. Find out what will be expected of your teaching and your research, and where you think you might fit in the university hierarchy. Consider whether or not you really care where you live. Begin to build some sort of vision of who you think you might want to be and who you might be able to be as an academic, and what the actual day-to-day reality of that life might look like. Consider the worst-case scenario as well as your romantic ideal, and figure out if you can live with both of them or something in-between.

I am happy being a grad student, but part of the reason for that is because I tried to minimize the surprises as much as possible. (Which doesn't mean there haven’t been some unavoidable ones anyway.) The books above were helpful for me. I started with Getting What You Came For, which I still recommend to the occasional student who tells me they really, no kidding, want a graduate degree. If you get through it and still want to sign up, then read the others to get an idea of what might be expected of your teaching and what you’ll go through when you’re looking for a job. Keep reading academic blogs as well, because there’s really no substitute for real-world commentary (although you’ll also find a ton of negativity there; nobody wants to write about the good stuff very often.)

Grad school can be a lovely thing, full of mind-blowing revelations and smart conversations and interesting students. It’s also late nights and low pay and each of those revelations comes with the attendant realization that what you thought before was probably wrong. It demands a certain sort of personality, occasionally insane drive, the willingness to delay gratification, and a modicum of luck. Best to educate yourself in order to minimize your reliance on the luck part of that equation.