Post History

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/16997
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Why not test the hypothesis, starting with the negative test?

You are unhappy in your current career. You have some background but nothing official. A BA in English might or might not be a meaningful credential (in my experience it depends on the school and the program's focus -- literature is probably a "no" but actual writing is more significant). So what happens if you apply for entry-level technical-writing positions _now_? Unless you're facing a deadline on deciding about the master's (it doesn't sound like you are), you have time to try finding a position without it. So why not do that first, before you spend money and commit to a year or two of study?

In order to find a position you will need to organize some of your past work and maybe even do some new work (contract, open-source, personal projects that you actually finish and publish). Prospective employers are going to want to see writing samples. So, I suspect, will the admissions committee for that master's program. So either way you need to move from "I can write" to "I can _demonstrate_ that I can write", so you may as well get started on that. Once you've made a start there you can try to answer the question "can I get a tech-writing job with my current background?". If you can, then you'll need to decide if the master's degree would help you get _better_ jobs; if you can't get a job now, that suggests considering the degree program more seriously.

If you can't get jobs with your current skills that doesn't automatically mean that the degree will help, of course; you don't have enough evidence to support that theory yet. When investigating the master's program be sure to ask not just about coursework but about their success rate -- how have their past students done? Don't let them cherry-pick -- "so-and-so successful tech writer is one of our graduates". You want all the data you can get -- how many students from each recent year got suitable positions within what period of time.

Some employers care more about the degree than others, but _all_ of them care about whether you can _understand the technical domain_ that they're in and whether you can _write clearly_. If you can demonstrate the skills, then at least for many employers the degree won't matter all that much. On the other hand, a master's program might help you gain skills that strengthen your position, so you need a clear understanding of what they offer and what you need.

Original score: 1