I considered that. My BA is in Poli-Sci but minored in IT and had some background in it from the military.
I know a few lawyers, including my roommate from undergrad, and they strongly advised me no, with the caveat that you'd better go in and treat it like the priesthood -- whole-soul into it.
I suffered burn out from the Y2K and dot-com bubble. Left CS and worked at a winery for a year and a half. I went to grad school for Chemistry and then did a post doc in Cancer Biology... 20-some years later, somehow that all looped back around to Data Science. I guess I left CS, but not really STEM fields.
Not me but a friend. PhD in Physics and programming, he did a ton of modeling with R. He had/has chronic health issues, so used that to get a teaching job in a country with socialized medicine.
Once he got citizenship he'd had enough of the academia and coding... dude changed to cheese making. Like, he is a full-time cheese consultant now, and travels around the world to assist in cheese making efforts, setting up cheese caves, etc. Does a bit of other culinary stuff too, occasional pop-up restaurants, etc.
I think about that a lot, especially when I have to sit through change control meetings that go nowhere...
Several years back I left software for about 3 years to achieve required professional military education for an officer and two military deployments. Being deployed in the middle of the Covid lockdowns was not fun and the combination of these events were too much time away from the family.
I have already abandoned a software development career for data science and enterprise API management, which is much better. I still super enjoy writing JavaScript, but not for work. In the corporate world of JavaScript your leadership is often shit and your peers are entitled children drowning in insecurity looking out for themselves on a sinking raft. After my next my next military promotion my children will be out of the house and I will make just as much in the military as I do as a senior developer. Something to think about.
I went for a Master's in Education and became a teacher. Teaching computer science and math so still STEM adjacent. I'm still teaching a decade later and I've moved abroad to teach at international schools, currently in Bangkok.
If I ever win the lottery I'm dropping software engineering to do music somehow. I play guitar and learn music theory as a hobby, but only at a beginner/intermediate level with not enough time to practice and get to the next level.
You can get to the next level without needing to change careers. I just hit a new plateau on the guitar last month and I’ve got a full time job that sometimes requires weekend work, two young kids, and a wife getter her PhD. The trick is that I don’t do anything much other than play guitar in the 2-3 hours a week that I have to myself!
It is also very focused and goal oriented practice as I don’t have the time to otherwise mess around.
FYI, it seems to me like all your comments might be automatically "dead"? I don't know if there is some auto moderation process in the background or if they're all getting organically downvoted or something? But every time I see one of your posts, in any topic, it's gray and dead.
I vouched for this one because it seemed reasonable. I know I struggle with making time for practice.
I did not leave SE (yet), but I'm currently studying sustainability / waste management / etc. It's going great so far, I can recommend going a different or additional route, if you are able to.
Readit News
My day job was writing cpp and elixir, although I kept my job and returned to it. I've been thinking about leaving software completely though.
I know a few lawyers, including my roommate from undergrad, and they strongly advised me no, with the caveat that you'd better go in and treat it like the priesthood -- whole-soul into it.
Once he got citizenship he'd had enough of the academia and coding... dude changed to cheese making. Like, he is a full-time cheese consultant now, and travels around the world to assist in cheese making efforts, setting up cheese caves, etc. Does a bit of other culinary stuff too, occasional pop-up restaurants, etc.
I think about that a lot, especially when I have to sit through change control meetings that go nowhere...
The world is a whole lot more dangerous and confusing for everyone else
I have already abandoned a software development career for data science and enterprise API management, which is much better. I still super enjoy writing JavaScript, but not for work. In the corporate world of JavaScript your leadership is often shit and your peers are entitled children drowning in insecurity looking out for themselves on a sinking raft. After my next my next military promotion my children will be out of the house and I will make just as much in the military as I do as a senior developer. Something to think about.
Deleted Comment
What do you think the biggest mistake that people who don't last as a teacher make?
It is also very focused and goal oriented practice as I don’t have the time to otherwise mess around.
I vouched for this one because it seemed reasonable. I know I struggle with making time for practice.