When he first brought up the idea, I thought about whether I could see myself going after a master’s degree, being that I already got my bachelor’s in CS from Virgina Tech. However, I was pretty quick to dismiss the possibility. I already have the skills I need. I have a bunch of successful online businesses. And, even while I was in school, I crammed my 4 year program into 3 years to get out into the working world…Why would I go back to dealing with classes and course work?

The other day, however, he sent me the program information for the online master’s program at North Carolina State. I took a quick look at it and realized that I’d be able to skip both the GRE’s and the prerequisites, because I graduated above a 3.5 GPA with a bachelor’s in CS. That means that all I’d really need to do for the master’s would be to take 10 CS courses (30 credits) online… Suddenly this idea is becoming tempting.

Logically, it’s not a great move. Will I be improving my skills? Not likely. I might gain some knowledge in theory, but it probably won’t be beneficial to my day to day work. Will I make more money with a masters? I doubt it. Hypothetically, it could come into play down the line at some point, but as a self employed developer, it’s not going to help me out much. In fact, I’ll probably lose money overall in both paying for the program and in sacrificing time for the courses… But despite all this, I still have a slight urge to take on the challenge, just to say I did it.

Anyway, we’ll see what happens. I won’t be applying anytime soon, but maybe in another year or two… you know, after I get rich and retire.