Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 174 posts

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#151

Post by autotune »

netphobe wrote: post #91
autotune wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm like you except I skipped college and went straight into the working world. It's entirely possible to do without an education but you have to get creative with how you acquire that initial experience, in my case through volunteering to do basic IT work before landing the first job and then some minor open source contributions to move into the devops space. Sure I'm probably not making $300K/year at the Big 4 any…

How old are you, if you don't mind breaking some OPSEC? Making it quick, I'm a 20 year old native who's having a troubling time keeping optimistic and feeling 'locked out' from the job market around here. I've only been doing front-end engineering for a non profit for a few years now since High School, but everything still feels so far away and impossible to me, especially because I didn't go straight to college, so…

26, I was about your age when starting out full time. If you're feeling locked out locally you might consider moving if you can, I sent my resume to companies across the country until it finally landed somewhere decent which also helped with the search. Resulted in a move to Texas from California for a bit and was worth it.

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#152

Post by rdlecler1 »

I took a circuitous route to a Yale PhD as a high school dropout entering a community college as a ‘mature student’ (Canadian term). In general the teaching at CC was much better with smaller classes. Many of the instructors really enjoyed teaching and were not burdened by research. Of course university has it’s own magical appeal, but for me it was the perfect on ramp.

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#153

Post by [deleted] »

finaliteration wrote: post #2

I attended community college for a few years before transferring to a 4-year university. During that time I took a variety of technical and non-technical courses that I really enjoyed and felt I got a lot of value from due to the small class sizes and ability to connect with professors outside of class fairly easily. I would have stopped after getting my Associate’s degree as I felt like I had learned a lot and I had…

[deleted]

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#155

Post by jdeisenberg »

maxerickson wrote: post #14
chrisseaton wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't you need about 20 years of top tier papers to get to the rank of professor?

In the US, lay people don't care about whatever formal meaning it has as a title. It's often used for any instructor at a college level. (I guess not any instructors because there are TAs and the like, but people leading lectures or similar)

US community college instructor here. Students use the title professor as described here. I prefer either “Mr.” or my first name. I tell students, “Please don’t call me professor. Even my mom gave up on the idea of me ever getting a PhD.”

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#156

Post by jdeisenberg »

Eridrus wrote: post #55
mattkrause wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure that knowing about Æthelred the Unready is particularly useful for most jobs, but if you think of these classes as (covertly) teaching critical thinking and writing skills, then perhaps they make some sense even if you don’t value knowing about the world beyond your particular specialization.

But are they actually teaching critical thinking successfully? And why would you need to wait until college for those effects to show up? The humanities classes are taught throughout regular schooling.

The community college where I teach has English 001C: Critical Thinking/Composition -- “This course presents the elements of critical reasoning and logic. Students will learn to identify the basic structures of arguments and the ways people use language to fortify or to falsify arguments. Students will analyze and demonstrate these techniques by writing and critiquing essays and using research strategies.”

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#157

Post by Eridrus »

jdeisenberg wrote: post #156
Eridrus wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But are they actually teaching critical thinking successfully? And why would you need to wait until college for those effects to show up? The humanities classes are taught throughout regular schooling.

The community college where I teach has English 001C: Critical Thinking/Composition -- “This course presents the elements of critical reasoning and logic. Students will learn to identify the basic structures of arguments and the ways people use language to fortify or to falsify arguments. Students will analyze and demonstrate these techniques by writing and critiquing essays and using research strategies.”

So, does this course actually work at instilling critical thinking in students, outside the narrow classroom setting? Does this effect persist over the long term? Is it better or worse to teach this in the context of composition, or something more domain-specific, e.g. economics/government policy?

I feel like people making claims that education that students don't ask for is useful have the burden of showing that it is does what they say it will, empirically, and not get to hand wave about "critical thinking" or "well-roundedness".

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#158

Post by rapind »

skookumchuck wrote: post #88
rapind wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not advocating lying, but there’s no way this comes up, at least not at startups. Do you think we sit at the bar and discuss potential hires university degrees? If someone told me “watch out man, Stu lied about his uni education” my response is likely to be, “why would you tell me that and why would you think I cared?”. The gabber is going to look worse than the candidate by a long shot. Careful who you gab about…

Startups involve a lot of trust between the members of the initial group. I wouldn't have anything to do with trusting my future to a professional liar. It's like marrying someone who cheated on their spouse. They'll cheat on you, next.

I can see that I suppose. I'd avoid any negative conversation that named applicant's names with people external to the company though.

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#159

Post by srtjstjsj »

skookumchuck wrote: post #66
freehunter wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Community colleges really are underrated. In a world where increasingly a bachelor's degree does not guarantee a job, university education is super expensive, and especially in fields where a bachelor's degree is not necessary (I've never had an interview where they asked about my college education), vocational schools are the place to be. Four-year universities put big emphasis on well-rounded educations, so you're…

> math classes You really shouldn't avoid math if you want to be an educated person. Math is the key to the universe.

But if your goal is an undergrad business degree (looking for a marketing job at Dunder Mifflin), you've already set your educational goal well below unlocking the universe.

Re: Big Tech’s Hot New Talent Incubator: Community College

#160

Post by srtjstjsj »

barry-cotter wrote: post #21
jgh wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you're not required to do humanities/liberal arts at US universities?

Outside the USA and its cultural appendages, Canada, South Korea and the like, it is assumed that anyone who goes to university has studied the liberal arts at secondary/high school. Given the low quality of secondary education in the US in the formative period of its third level system this could not be assumed so what would in Europe be considered (grammar school) high school classes and subjects are taught at univ…

The US doesn't have "low standards", it has broader access to liberal arts education than Europe. It ends universal secondary education at grade 12, so the grade 13 (at college) completes the "liberal arts" foundation. European countries simply do grades 12 and 13 in a separate school between secondary school and university, for students that weren't forced out after grade 11.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth_form_college

Post reply on HN