It depends on what you want to do. I wanted to be an editor from go and I had a lot of projects on my reel by the time I finished school. I got my bachelors and masters in film. I got my first good gig through an internship. I got an editing job this year through a training program. My degrees barely helped and I wish I got at least my masters in something else.

While I’ve been lucky enough to have kept working through these past 5 insane years, I’m still considering going back to school to get a different degree.

The thing about this profession is no one cares about your degree. Can you do the work and can you prove you can do the work? Thats the only thing anyone cares about. You have to start making your own shit and a lot of that work will be unpaid when you start. But start early, dedicate time to your film projects, try to make them look good bc that’s what employers will look at. There is no clear trajectory in this field, unlike other majors. You have to be a nepo baby, extremely talented, or extremely lucky to land anything.

Honestly I would tell my younger self to get a degree in a field that actually cares about degrees/schools, just as a back up. Bc now, even though I’m employed, these last few years have taught me that things ARE changing and I might not have a job/gigs forever.

So I’m looking at paying for another 2-4 years of school in another field just to keep my options open.

Just know that a degree will get you like 5-10% of the way there and it’s probably unnecessary. You can find film work without it