Which degree should I choose?

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I have a background in straight Science, but I love animals and animal handling (re Animal and Vet BioScience). would love to put the boots and overalls on, dissect dogs and do projects on wildlife. However, I think I might get bored with the applied science in the degree. They'll give me credit for the chemistry I've already done though, which would be a gift.

I was good at most things (except social studies) at school, and was extended a lot in mathematics, which I think is my forte. I loved Quantum Physics, which relies largely on abstract maths and I see myself as an 'abstract' sort of person. Not so concerned with everyday details.

Engineering wouldn't have been my first choice but starting salaries in this country are higher than straight Science degrees and I do really like biomolecular science and biochemistry. Couldn't see myself in a chemical factory but this degree would have apps in nanotechnology which sounds great to me.

Do you already have a BS degree? The veterinary thing is SUPER expensive, and you have to think about if, at 32, you want to end up $100,000 to $150K in debt (or more) and not have any income at all for 4 years. Seven girls I went to college with are now vets, and although they love it, they barely have time for their families and hobbies because they work so much to pay off loans and then worry about house and car on top of that.

I do know quite a few engineers, chemists, and pharmacists, and they all seem to have things more-or-less figured out. They can leave work at work, they work a pretty normal schedule, and they make plenty of money.

Talk to some advisors at your school. See what they would recommend. You could even go to a career counselor. The people who actually do that for a living tend to be really good at it.

Thanks for your reply, I appreciate it.

I've started in the Engineering degree, just this week actually.

It's going to have Forensics in it, which I'm mad keen on personally. And, no, I had too many problems dealing with life when I was younger to finish my BSc. Hopefully they'll give me some credit for what I've done (waiting to hear about that at the moment).

You are right, a Vet degree is expensive. Here in Australia I think they're about $120,000 all up. It depends on how you manage money & budget, I'm sure, but .. the general idea isnot to be too burdened.
Melbourne Uni here now has Veterinarian as a postgrad 3 year qual which may be more reasonable I'm not sure.

I like Engineering so far though & for the time being it's great to be in a streamed school - much better for me to start off with than possibly getting lost in the wider Science stream; getting lost, sidetracked, distracted being my wont ....

i don't know if you have that but materials science and engineering has some chemistry/physics and is fun and applicable however not very abstract. imo more abstract less money though lots of math/physics phds end up doing analysis for financial market=lots of money. i can also tell you that in us although bioengineering is "hot" topic bio-people have more troubles finding jobs and are payed less that corresponding physics/chemistry graduates.

also imo (and i do work in nano research) nano is useless if you don't want to go into research and anyway nano is just a subset of chemistry.

Yeh, I mean I figured nano is one of the logical follow-ons from chemistry/chemical engineering; although -

in our Uni the nanoscience major is listed in the Physics department. Basically you do Phys, Maths & some computing/programming & that's your nanoscience major.

I'm guessing the nano scale is really on the border between what chemists are typically studying & what physicists are typically studying; we're doing nuclear chemistry in Chem at the moment & sometimes the lecturer will qualify his notes by stating that really to go any deeper would be to go into the field of physics.

Funny rivalry between the two fields incidentally.

Not sure where you are, but I'm a veterinary student in the US if you have any specific questions about things here.

You can't go wrong with engineering. Math and physics are also good fields to get into; my sister's boyfriend is getting a BA in Physics and will be starting grad school in August.

Veterinary science is interesting, but as someone pointed out, it's expensive. Take it from someone who is already over $100k in debt from student loans - Choose carefully! I don't want to tell you not do to animal science, but make sure it's something you're willing to be in debt for.

Veternary science. Maybe I'm biased because that's what I'm going to go into.

Hopefully, if you stick with ChE, you get to do a Senior project similar to mine. We built a mobile scanning electron cart for one of the professors, complete with a sputter coater, that we used in our project of using the exoskeletons of microorganisms to etch nano-scale patterns in thin films. This could have been continued on with growing the microorganisms into patterns instead of having to use things like photolithography with SU-8.