Back in the early '90’s I helped run a Model Railroad program at our church camp in Prospect, Pennsylvania. We had several hours every day and put together a small layout, kids each assembled an Athern bluebox car, assembled and painted a simple kit (probably Tyco), learned basic skills of gluing, airbrushing, etc. They took their models home with them. I think eventually this camp program went away because model rocketry camp was more of a draw - smoke and fire and things that go “boom” make for more fun.
Luckily I don’t think we ever had any one complain about glue fumes and paint fumes, so we got lucky. I know I had fun! Not exactly university level but still something good.
Getting a degree is an interesting idea, but I much prefer to learn at my own pace; no need to make this hobby into another job.
Great idea about taking the wife to the train shows to avoid collateral damage and keep track of money. I often take my young kids (>5) to watch their eyes light up at the trains. Also, they provide legitimate justification for things.
The thing about a degree, speaking from experience (Bachelor of Science & Mastor of Science) is that it requires a curriculum generally of 120 units or credit hours of course work (bachelors degree), all completed and graded to the satisfaction of a credentialed institution usually taking a minimum of 4 years, averaging 15 credit hours per semester.
Hopefully that would shed some light on it - it isn’t something to be taken lightly - it requires a lot of time, committment and money - usually something a person isn’t willing to invest unless it is going to “pay off” with a job career that will allow us to be full-time gainfully employed for many years, with benefits, advancement and a salary that will grant us a good standard of living.
In light of the above, well, how many people could make a living at model railroading? What makes the most sense is to get a bachelors and possibly a masters in business and couple that with a good knowledge of the hobby industry so you could hopefully make a living at it. Possible career tracks:
working to produce model trains profitably with a manufacturer (existing or start your own company - aka Scale Trains etc.). or be a cottege industry making a living at some product level in the hobby.
be a professional model railroad builder - a few do that already - see the ads in MR magazine. Personally I don’t know how the pay is or return - it must work for some as long as there are well heeled customers.
Other than being able to make a living, the usual purpose of an accredited degree, I’m not sure what the purpose of a college degree in model railroading would be of value for? The traditional investment in time and money doesn’t make it something most would find worth it, unless you are independantly wealthy - then sure, you could spend your time doing whatever you wanted since money is of no concern.
Jim,Good points about units of credit hours. Even with a degree or MMR many would still not know the difference between a ALCO RS11 and a RS-36 or a PS boxcar from a FMC boxcar…
IMHO to have a Masters degree in Model Railroading would take hundreds of credit hours and still one may find their selves still lacking knowledge.
The problem with such an idea is accreditation. There are no credentialed faculty available to teach model railroading (in an academic sense). I doubt that there is any scholarly research or published papers on model railroading (there wasn’t 10 years ago when I was working on my mba, I looked).
Those things could easily be taught. In my minerology class I had to memorize all kinds or rock names such as hornblend, feldspars (and the subcategories) etc. and the chemical formulas for many major rocks. All those things could be taught but what application would there be in terms of a job or making money? Thats the thing about hobbies, be it trains, or TV shows or Movies, there are endless lists of minutea and trivia that could string to the moon and back, but how do you make money with it? Or to quote Han Solo - good against remotes is one thing, good against a living, thats something else! My bit of useless trivia!
Actually its the other way around. It’s at the Bachelors Degree level you learn tons about everything - then at the Masters Degree level, you concentrate more on a specific subject. Then at the Phd level, you put most of your time on something very very specific. It’s opposite of how many people think it is! My graduate professor tried to tempt me to staying on for a Phd but I wanted to get out and start earning some money so I declined and stopped at the masters level. Good thing as I’m in IT now and not earth science! =P It pays the bills better.
I added model railroading to a computer programming course that had academic credit. Our team had to find a company and write a usable program for that company. A formal presentation was made before instructors and a representative from that company using a mockup of the real program which had yet to be written.
At that time, I was selling trains and had a tax permit. Our team was permitted to use my company as it was legitimate. The sample item we used to show how the inventory program worked was Kadee #5’s. The company representative attending the presentation was my wife. The mockup we used was done on dBase and it actually worked and was really used in my business for several years.