[lcvw]

Intel (and similar fab companies as well) is famous for even treating it’s phds as menial process engineers. When I graduated the only Intel fab jobs I was qualified for were in Indonesia or some other SE Asian country, and descriptions were basically “you are the SEM person, you do SEM all day.”

I know a surprising amount of people who came out of CNSE (without following up with grad school) and are now landscapers, waiters, or similar. The skillset is so specialized as to be almost worthless unless you can find the right role imo. Also the program there CNSE/SUNY Poly is absolute hot garbage, I advise active looking at this field to go into conventional EE, ChemE, or Materials.

[hackernews1134]

What is SEM? What does doing SEM all day entail?

[namibj]

Scanning electron microscope, I assume. And it's basically getting samples prepped and operating the microscope stage and image controls (focus, contrast, etc.). Sounds like it quickly gets boring. I expect in less than one week.