No. College is severely overpriced. Unless you go to a public school for SE or CS (or something related) you're better off just learning on your own.
Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
11–20 of 33 posts
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#12Not necessary, but hugely helpful for a number of reasons. Shoot me an email (address in my profile) and I'm happy to talk you through them.
I can't seem to find an email address, but I'd love to ask some more specific questions.
It may be because I just made my account, so my apologies in that case.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#13Computer programming is one class of a computer science degree. Just about everyone else in a computer science program will have been programming for years just like you. A lot of them will be better than you. It's rarely irrational to graduate from any serious program at the best public university in your state. So, please take time to do the math for yourself. ($80k for a degree is a lot, but so is $150k of annual…
Sorry I 'shotgunned' comma's.
Thank you for your critical attitude. I enjoy reading from different perspectives and it is helpful when making these life changing decisions.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#14I have a degree! Well, a political science degree. So in my experience the answer is no.
I would caution you, however, about this:
> I've been programming for about 4 years now, and in that time I've been able to learn a lot about programming. Obviously not everything, but still a very in depth technical knowledge. I know that if I went to college, a lot of what I know would be repeated
To paraphrase Hamlet (which is the kind of thing poli sci majors are required by law to do), "there are more things in a good CS program, tanishalfelven, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
No matter how much you've learned in four years of self-directed learning, I can almost guarantee there's a lot more stuff you haven't learned. I've been programming since the mid-1980s, and I'm still learning stuff every day. And the stuff that a good CS program would expose you to is precisely the stuff that you don't know you don't know. Fundamental stuff that goes beyond the latest hip framework.
There's been several times in my career where I've found that not having that kind of grounding has made my work harder. Times where I had to sweat and struggle to figure things out that someone with a good CS education could solve just by pulling an algorithm out of their bag of tricks. If I'd learned those things in school, I'd almost certainly be a better -- and better-paid! -- programmer than I am today.
So yeah, you can be a programmer without a CS degree. But if you know you want to be a programmer, and you have a chance to get one from a good school? Grab that chance with both hands.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#15My first boss at my current company made 200k+ as a Director, and he didn't have a college degree. But he was really smart, an SQL wizard (relative to a lot of others), had worked at a hedge fund, and was brought in to fix a really big problem he was well suited to fix. That said, a CS degree makes it a lot easier for someone to justify hiring you for an important job, and important jobs tend to pay the best. A degre…
That makes sense. I like how you phrased it "low-risk, safe hires."
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#16I have a degree! Well, a political science degree. So in my experience the answer is no. I would caution you, however, about this: > I've been programming for about 4 years now, and in that time I've been able to learn a lot about programming. Obviously not everything, but still a very in depth technical knowledge. I know that if I went to college, a lot of what I know would be repeated To paraphrase Hamlet (which is…
Is it important where I go? Or can I just try to cross it off the list and soak up the new stuff?
Sorry if I sounded to arrogant. I understand that my mighty 4 years is nothing compared to a lot of people here. Thank you for considerations.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#17I have a degree! Well, a political science degree. So in my experience the answer is no. I would caution you, however, about this: > I've been programming for about 4 years now, and in that time I've been able to learn a lot about programming. Obviously not everything, but still a very in depth technical knowledge. I know that if I went to college, a lot of what I know would be repeated To paraphrase Hamlet (which is…
Is it important where I go? Or can I just try to cross it off the list and soak up the new stuff? Sorry if I sounded to arrogant. I understand that my mighty 4 years is nothing compared to a lot of people here. Thank you for considerations.
Oh, no worries. You sound like me when I was 18 :-D
As to your question... well, you'd be spending a lot of money. Like, a whole lot of money. So you should be thinking carefully about which school you'd go to no matter what.
The biggest thing, of course, would be the quality of the CS program. Don't assume that just because a school is famous or has a high overall reputation that the CS program specifically is any good. Ask around places like HN for the experiences of alumni. Ask the admissions office if there are local alumni in your area you could talk to. Things like that.
And look beyond the CS program as well; if you're gonna be stuck somewhere for four years, it's important it not be someplace you hate. Do you like the town/city it's in? Do they have extracurricular groups that match your interests? Does the emphasis they put on things like fraternity/sorority life line up with your own interest in such things? Etc.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#18You need a degree to get better jobs.
Without a degree means that you were poor and think nearsighted.
That was me.
I have learned all the college lessons in high school and think that I could skip college.
Maybe you could get some good paying jobs now. But that's not sustainable. There is no career path.
You could out performance but still underachieve.
However, I suggest that you learn something else in college rather than computer.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#19I agree with what aaronchall said. I'll add that you should consider the cost of college. If you're going to take out burdensome student loans and/or put your parents in debt (that they can't handle), it might make more sense to skip college, or to consider community college (it's cheap), state schools (if yours is cheap), or scholarships.
Finances aside... I don't see employers hiring a high school grad who also has no experience. During high school, start freelancing on projects that can be listed in a portfolio (not backend/proprietary apps), or convince someone to give you a part-time job (even if it's just installing printers), or do projects for charities.
Also there's nothing wrong with taking a year off after high school and seeing how things pan out.
Importantly, once you have a few good years of professional programming experience, the difference in not having a degree is a lot less. But some companies will still not hire you because of red tape, and some mega corps will put you in a lower pay bracket.
Keep in mind that hiring patterns vary by geography. Take a look at degree requirements in job ads where you want to work and note the in-demand skills. Also remember that many jobs are not posted on job boards. Start networking too (find a local hackerspace or look around on meetup.com).
> I know that if I went to college, a lot of what I know would be repeated
Probably just the first year material. If you want to avoid this then take the AP comp sci exams. Or opt for the easy A's.
Re: Ask HN: Do I have to have a degree to be a developer?
#20In short, no, you don't need a degree to have a good paying job. But this does not mean its the 'best' thing to do. The reason you can get away with stuff like that is because the demand for programming jobs in general is so much more than the supply of labor in that market.
Having said that I personally would recommend some sort of teaching of Software Engineering. This is because a lot of the developers out there (as you can tell from this thread) do not have formal education and hence CAN resort to in bad practices.
The importance of understanding the software product behind simply writing code and the importance of designing instead of hacking and fixing - and the importance of testing and having a process methodology behind creating software is higher level education IMO.