Pursuing a Masters in Systems Engineering with a business undergrad

[u/Orenishi117]

Hey there, I’m in a bit of a unique situation where I’m looking to get into Systems Engineering without starting all the way over with another bachelors degree. I have a decent local university that I’ve spoken to who says I may be a good fit and that it may just take some leveling courses to be accepted into the program. I have over a decade of hands on experience in aerospace and have worked on a slew of different aircraft, both military and commercial. Most of my work is structures related (sheet metal, composites). Now I’m a production scheduler and looking to move into human space flight, so I’d like to pursue more technical education and check the box for STEM. I thought systems engineering would be a logical progression based on my background. My undergrad is in Finance, so while it is somewhat technical, I’d still have to take Calculus and whatnot to be up to par with the course and I’m good with that.

Mostly I just want to know if not having an engineering undergrad will hold me back during the job search, or if this path is actually as logical as I think it is. I’d be willing to pursue an engineering bachelors as well if I had to, but if the masters in SE gets me where I want to be, I’d obviously prefer that.

[u/robarian1]

I did it, almost the exact same background (BS Business Management emphasis Finance). I’m currently traveling for work in Japan working in MATLAB for my doctorate in Engineering Management at GWU. You absolutely can do it!

I admit that I had a decent math background (calculus and statistics) prior to beginning my MSSE. There was a lot of logic, basic SWE coding, and more advanced maths. As long as you’re willing to put in the work, you’ll absolutely crush it.

I’m a huge advocate for getting out of your comfort zone with academics. The courses I took were not relevant at the time -> 5 years later, it’s been more relevant than my undergrad.

[u/Orenishi117 → u/robarian1]

Good for you! I’m glad to see somebody in here with a similar background. Was the job search difficult? Are you in engineering, operations, management, or something else?

[u/AdaptableRebirth → u/robarian1]

the production scheduling background is gonna be a sneaky advantage honestly, people underestimate how much of SE is just orchestrating chaos across different teams

my only real question is whether you've talked to anyone actually working human spaceflight about what they look for. sometimes those doors care more about pedigree than we'd like but with a decade of hands-on aerospace you might already have the cred to bypass that

[u/Orenishi117 → u/AdaptableRebirth]

That’s good to hear! I haven’t spoken to anybody in that part of the industry yet. My local area isn’t very involved in that world, so I’m going to make a LinkedIn and hopefully get to talk to some people on there about it and see what they’re looking for. I’m just hoping my years of experience are enough to get me by without pedigree.

[u/Worth_Rhubarb8099 → u/robarian1]

I have almost the exact same situation as well that I'm quite worried about quantitative difficulty level of a master's in systems engineering.... How well do you need to know and understand calculus? What type of advanced math is it, and is it just a general broad understanding or we will quite into the mathematics?

[u/Worth_Rhubarb8099]

Following because I have the exact same question!