spektor

If you have some mobility, I'd recommend a few things- Apply for positions in Student Health Centers/ Campus Wellness and the like - my institution values an MPH degree for those type of student affairs positions. Also if there are student affairs programs you are interested apply to those campuses - I went to a Master's program where about half the students were employees using their tuition benefit and the other half were full time students with GAs. To answer your questions- I worked two years before applying and it made me much more competitive. I even took two classes in the Master's program before applying. Depending on where you'll end up (region, institution type, etc) the pay after a master's can be pretty crappy. While my alma mater values the master's in student affairs, many of the positions were around 35k right out of the program. (My undergraduate major had a higher starting average salary than my masters). As far as in demand- it's good if you want to work in higher education but depending on the role an MPH may be sufficient. You could always do a higher Ed/student affairs phd down the road. To be honest, I tend to recommend people do an MPA and specialize in higher Ed if possible as the degree is more transferable across industries.