Hello beautiful people. I am a European NLP master student (not doing the master in my country) about to start a 6-month research internship in a research lab in the realm of applied AI for politics and economics. I was hoping to get an industry internship but I couldn’t land any, which was rather disappointing. I think the primary reason was that I come from a linguistics background (BA + Technical Translation MA) and my internships are linguist positions. That being said, I am among the top of my class, I have started a CS Degree part-time (I really liked my CS classes and I LOVE programming) and I have two personal projects (continuation and improvements of research projects I had to do for class) that are lowkey interesting. I don’t have any publications or any prior research experience.
This has left me a bit disheartened in terms of my future prospects: I was hoping to start working shortly after finishing the programme but if the internship search is anything to go by, I am rather COOKED. My ultimate goal would be to get a dynamic, interesting job in DA/DS/Applied Research outside of my country in a city with an international community. I am basically willing to go anywhere as long as I can afford a 1-bedroom apartment and not go broke or live paycheck to paycheck (not possible in my country).
Now, I know that the lab and my thesis supervisor are going to open up a PhD position that will be a sequel of my internship topic and he has all but offered it if the internship goes well. There is also a ERC project going on with another one of my supervisors which is nice. While it was not my initial plan, I am very tempted to try to take it if all goes well given that the alternative may be not finding a job, having to go back to my country (which I want to avoid at all costs) and probably having to get a low paying language-related job until I finish my CS Degree at least.
Pros:
– I have liked working on the toy-research projects and I enjoy working in interdisciplinary teams (did a supervised project with an external department).
– The research topic is a pretty good fit for me.
– The PhD grant would allow me to live more or less comfortably and maybe even save up a little bit (based on my current budget in a slightly more expensive city).
– The city I would be moving to is majestic, I truly think I’d love it there.
– Obviously a PhD is a step up from a Master’s.
Cons:
– I don’t know how prestigious/not prestigious the lab is.
– Delaying entering the workforce by 3 years would not be ideal as my end goal is not going into academia.
– If the stars aligned and I could start working right away, I would.
Would doing a PhD be worth it in my situation to achieve my goal eventually? Would it be valued by future employers? Would it give me an edge compared to potential candidates for a future DS job? Are there any PhD/lab red flags that I should specially look at while doing my internship? Do you see any other alternatives? Any other tips?
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk :).
submitted by /u/ThrowRa1919191
[link] [comments]
r/cscareerquestions Hello beautiful people. I am a European NLP master student (not doing the master in my country) about to start a 6-month research internship in a research lab in the realm of applied AI for politics and economics. I was hoping to get an industry internship but I couldn’t land any, which was rather disappointing. I think the primary reason was that I come from a linguistics background (BA + Technical Translation MA) and my internships are linguist positions. That being said, I am among the top of my class, I have started a CS Degree part-time (I really liked my CS classes and I LOVE programming) and I have two personal projects (continuation and improvements of research projects I had to do for class) that are lowkey interesting. I don’t have any publications or any prior research experience. This has left me a bit disheartened in terms of my future prospects: I was hoping to start working shortly after finishing the programme but if the internship search is anything to go by, I am rather COOKED. My ultimate goal would be to get a dynamic, interesting job in DA/DS/Applied Research outside of my country in a city with an international community. I am basically willing to go anywhere as long as I can afford a 1-bedroom apartment and not go broke or live paycheck to paycheck (not possible in my country). Now, I know that the lab and my thesis supervisor are going to open up a PhD position that will be a sequel of my internship topic and he has all but offered it if the internship goes well. There is also a ERC project going on with another one of my supervisors which is nice. While it was not my initial plan, I am very tempted to try to take it if all goes well given that the alternative may be not finding a job, having to go back to my country (which I want to avoid at all costs) and probably having to get a low paying language-related job until I finish my CS Degree at least. Pros: – I have liked working on the toy-research projects and I enjoy working in interdisciplinary teams (did a supervised project with an external department). – The research topic is a pretty good fit for me. – The PhD grant would allow me to live more or less comfortably and maybe even save up a little bit (based on my current budget in a slightly more expensive city). – The city I would be moving to is majestic, I truly think I’d love it there. – Obviously a PhD is a step up from a Master’s. Cons: – I don’t know how prestigious/not prestigious the lab is. – Delaying entering the workforce by 3 years would not be ideal as my end goal is not going into academia. – If the stars aligned and I could start working right away, I would. Would doing a PhD be worth it in my situation to achieve my goal eventually? Would it be valued by future employers? Would it give me an edge compared to potential candidates for a future DS job? Are there any PhD/lab red flags that I should specially look at while doing my internship? Do you see any other alternatives? Any other tips? Thank you for coming to my TED Talk :). submitted by /u/ThrowRa1919191 [link] [comments]
Hello beautiful people. I am a European NLP master student (not doing the master in my country) about to start a 6-month research internship in a research lab in the realm of applied AI for politics and economics. I was hoping to get an industry internship but I couldn’t land any, which was rather disappointing. I think the primary reason was that I come from a linguistics background (BA + Technical Translation MA) and my internships are linguist positions. That being said, I am among the top of my class, I have started a CS Degree part-time (I really liked my CS classes and I LOVE programming) and I have two personal projects (continuation and improvements of research projects I had to do for class) that are lowkey interesting. I don’t have any publications or any prior research experience.
This has left me a bit disheartened in terms of my future prospects: I was hoping to start working shortly after finishing the programme but if the internship search is anything to go by, I am rather COOKED. My ultimate goal would be to get a dynamic, interesting job in DA/DS/Applied Research outside of my country in a city with an international community. I am basically willing to go anywhere as long as I can afford a 1-bedroom apartment and not go broke or live paycheck to paycheck (not possible in my country).
Now, I know that the lab and my thesis supervisor are going to open up a PhD position that will be a sequel of my internship topic and he has all but offered it if the internship goes well. There is also a ERC project going on with another one of my supervisors which is nice. While it was not my initial plan, I am very tempted to try to take it if all goes well given that the alternative may be not finding a job, having to go back to my country (which I want to avoid at all costs) and probably having to get a low paying language-related job until I finish my CS Degree at least.
Pros:
– I have liked working on the toy-research projects and I enjoy working in interdisciplinary teams (did a supervised project with an external department).
– The research topic is a pretty good fit for me.
– The PhD grant would allow me to live more or less comfortably and maybe even save up a little bit (based on my current budget in a slightly more expensive city).
– The city I would be moving to is majestic, I truly think I’d love it there.
– Obviously a PhD is a step up from a Master’s.
Cons:
– I don’t know how prestigious/not prestigious the lab is.
– Delaying entering the workforce by 3 years would not be ideal as my end goal is not going into academia.
– If the stars aligned and I could start working right away, I would.
Would doing a PhD be worth it in my situation to achieve my goal eventually? Would it be valued by future employers? Would it give me an edge compared to potential candidates for a future DS job? Are there any PhD/lab red flags that I should specially look at while doing my internship? Do you see any other alternatives? Any other tips?
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk :).
submitted by /u/ThrowRa1919191
[link] [comments]