Graduate school life: a whole different world!

By Michael L. McManus

Graduate School changed my life forever. I was lucky, though. Many, like me, find themselves and truly start their careers, yet some still finish the graduate degree and continue to struggle to find their destiny or lifework.

Let me share what I think you may need to know if you are even contemplating an advanced degree at a graduate school in your home country or especially abroad. This is for prospective students and parents as well, since it is often a family matter.

The undergraduate degree has now become throughout the world a finishing school. Think of what the world would be like if we did not have university education at the undergraduate level!

We would have millions of drifting, largely unemployed people roaming their world for work or worse, for survival. Some would as teens work, some would stay at home and just wait, and others would be lost.

The undergraduate program is a gift to the world from heaven! It relieves society and parents from hoards of wandering teens! It serves the function of a bridge from upbringing to real world life. A safe place where young people can get more knowledge, wisdom, and maybe figure out a career.

Yet the majority of the students I have seen on three continents of teaching for about 40 years still are not sure of themselves at graduation. Most take until halfway through life (age 40 for most developed countries) to really settle in and discover their career fate. I always found it interesting that so much of humanity takes half the life to discover true direction. We were born to experiment and explore, I have concluded.

Most undergraduates everywhere are doing it for Mom and Dad. They will admit they have no clue what to do otherwise.

Most moms and dads around the world are so proud to send their daughters and sons off to college; it has become the family mission for most. The daughter and son must fulfill other people’s wishes for them.

So college becomes a place to transition, learn and grow up, hopefully! In most cases it works, and then son and daughter are in a mad scramble worldwide for a job or to discover their next step.

Some go straight to graduate school. I don’t advise this unless the student is passionate about it and has a clear idea of where they are going. Rather, work for a few years in your first choice of employment and use this to test whether you are happy with what you may think is your first choice of career.

I went into international banking, thinking that was what I wanted and my destiny. Within one year I found out it was not the corporate world I was really seeking. But the experience was quintessential to discovery that I need graduate school to break through to a destiny.

I was lucky. My professor from Wharton undergraduate, Richard Rowan, made all the difference, counseling me two years after graduation to try for Cornell graduate school.

I am convinced this was a life turning point. He wrote a recommendation I never saw, but it was, I am quite sure, the deciding factor in my acceptance. I was accepted and within three years I discovered my career destiny. It was to become a great professor at the global level.

That was at age 26, early somewhat, to discover the shining path that lays ahead for your whole life. The rest is history. I became a professor at age 28 and have fulfilled the dream of becoming a bridge-builder and global educator. Graduate school was the place, it was the time, and I was also lucky.

So, graduate school is the true place where students get enlightenment after the finishing school of undergraduate life. They find their true life values there. They find their mentors there.

In my case, my professor mentor at Cornell became like my second father all my life. I was so lucky, but I find for so many this pattern is common. You see, maybe the key is that graduate school is the student’s choice.

Most parents worldwide back off and let the son or daughter decide that this is what they want and where to go. Some parents support their child in a continuing manner, paying for everything, sometimes, even spoiling them with cars and travel.

I recommend the idea that this is truly up to the son or daughter’s choice and financial responsibility. They will make the choice more carefully, the timing and will appreciate it more. In many cases students work several years before graduate school and can save enough money to start, or work on campus as a graduate assistant.

Finally leaving home and being on your own is a big aspect of this whole story. It reinforces good things. You cannot depend on your parents forever, and it would not be fair to anyone if you did.

Mine is a very lucky story. It all worked out in the end. I have come to believe that it is a great life if we can find a passion in our work and maybe something we could call our life work. We change the definitions a little as we go, but a central theme can be there.

After all, we want to accomplish something and leave a legacy if only for our family and ancestors. Grad school can be the big ice breaker and discovery time.

In my next article, I will share tips on getting into great graduate schools home and abroad. Think about it. To the best of my knowledge we have only one life. Unless, of course, you believe we will come back in another form. There are few universities I know that enroll horses or turtles…very few!

Michael L. McManus is founder and president emeritus of the California International Business University in San Diego and is currently serving as a visiting professor at Gachon University, Sookmyung Women’s University and Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul. He welcomes comments at mcmismism@aol.com.