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

A Guide for Adults Going to College

npr.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 235 posts

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#161

Post by nostrademons »

munchbunny wrote: post #124
xyzzyz wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- there should be 4 semesters a year, not 2, people should graduate in 2 years, not 4+ At the onset of this journey, I was enthusiastic to learn, but along the way I've been beat down to just wanting to get "the piece of paper" and be done. It's been a long three years and each day forward is increasingly difficult to stomach since I realized I can learn all of what is being taught to me faster on my own. The fact th…

That really depends. If you're just trying to get trained for a vocation, then yeah, you don't need 4 years. However, I do think a 4-year degree is a unique opportunity, and it shouldn't be seen as a screen for people who can slog so much as a fit question of "do you need the other things that come with a 4-year degree?" I'd guess that a bit less than half of my 4 years was spent on academics, of which it was 2/3 CS…

The 4 years is supposed to change the way you look at the world, on an unconscious level.

I've found that every major personal change I've gone through - college, entering a career, moving cross-country, working at Google, being an entrepreneur, and even my relationship with my wife - took about 4-5 years before I was really comfortable on a gut level with my new life and could accept it as part of my identity. The actual technical material takes much less time to master - I found I was pretty competent at Javascript after 6 months, I could make major changes to Google at a year, I knew where most of the important things in the Bay Area were within a year, etc. But that's not really the point. The point is that when you go about your daily life, without thinking too much, have you internalized the value system and worldview that you're being educated into? It's the transition into unconscious competence.

Now, whether the university system teaches a worldview that correlates well with what you need for success in the rest of the world is another question. Just a couple months ago, the President of the U.S. was tweetstorming about academic brainwashing in universities. And depending how you squint, that may even be accurate - a worldview looks like brainwashing to people outside of that worldview. But the fact is that the vast majority of people in positions of wealth and power have been through those 4 years and have adopted that worldview, and doing so yourself will significantly reduce the friction as you interact with them.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#162

Post by zackmorris »

jgamman wrote: post #45
qubex wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t mean to be contentious here, but the reason for which student debt cannot be discharged by bankruptcy is pretty sound: it’s because education (theoretically) adds warning power to an individual and cannot be liquidated. (I’m not a lawyer and am not an American either.)

IIRC this was a policy decision change only 20 odd years ago. (also, not a lawyer or USAan)

You're correct, the George W. Bush administration banned student loans from bankruptcy in 2005:

https://bostonstudentloanlawyer.com/discharging-student-loan...

But you'll notice that it wasn't really talked about at the time in mainstream news (however, I knew about it as a progressive):

https://www.google.com/search?q=george+w+bush+student+loan+b...

For example, "student" is not mentioned on this page:

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/7575010/ns/business-personal_finan...

So many young people today think that this is how it always was, and don't realize that it's nonsense. Originally meant to decrease the deficit or whatnot, but having the opposite effect of raising the deficit as the US has become more uneducated and susceptible to ignorance.

Unfortunately a lot of other draconian legislation was passed at that time - see the DMCA, etc. Now that the truth is coming out though, there's hope that some of this can get reversed after 2020 if enough people learn about the true history of controversial issues like these.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#163

Post by wincy »

knicholes wrote: post #151
CalRobert wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you!!! I spent way too long getting a useless degree in physics at Cal Poly SLO. They wouldn't let you switch majors (because every 17 year old knows what they want to do with their life) but it turns out changing schools is tough when your grades show you've hated your major the last 2 years. The best thing I EVER did was sign up for classes at Santa Monica College after getting my Bachelor's. They're fantasti…

How did you and your wife take German from the same professor at the same time? Was he broadcasting his lesson, were you and your wife in the same location as the teacher, was the teacher able to duplicate himself, or is "at the same time" more of a "during the same semester" and not literally at the exact same time?

I can’t help but feel that clarification on any of these points is absolutely useless to the thrust of what he was trying to say.

If I had to guess I’d probably go with the duplication, though. That’s probably how he did it.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#164

Post by filmgirlcw »

I think about going back for my MBA sometimes (slightly different from the article, but still similar in other ways), but I'm at the mid point in my career and I'm not convinced the money and time I spend going back would actually help me further my career more than building connections and actually doing the work. Senior managers I've talked to have agreed with my assessment. At best, an MBA would get me back to where I've already managed to get myself, but with maybe more attention for certain recruiters.

I'm a big fan of anyone wanting to further their education for whatever the reason -- and I do wish I could sometimes just study really interesting subjects again -- but for a lot of working professionals, I sometimes wonder if the degree will really matter?

Obviously, some professions are different than others and really do require a certain degree to even get in the door (medicine, law, sciences), but by the time I was 34, I'd managed to successfully build two careers in different disciplines, and neither was the focus of my degree. (And I took forever to graduate.)

Every person and situation is different so I don't want to pretend my experiences are prescriptive for anyone else -- but what I value about my undergrad experience is much less "what I learned" and the experiences I had growing up, having time to explore things I care about, etc.

Frankly, I wish there was a collegiate equivalent of a GED that would cover undergrad required classes like a science, a math class, english lit, history, etc. Make people take the actual degree classes, but allow people to test out of all the basic requirements (I realize CLEP allows for some of this but CLEP isn't accepted everywhere and there can be CLEP caps for credits). I feel like for a lot of adult learners, this would greatly reduce the mental challenge of "going back."

What I wish this had touched on more is the pervasive and predatory nature of for-profit colleges and universities. I'm all for anyone going back to school, but it makes me sick when people pay tens of thousands of dollars for bad programs from fro-profit places that have a very small chance at even helping them get a better job.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#165

Post by learc83 »

ams6110 wrote: post #123
learc83 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also went back as an adult. I felt like the semesters were too short if anything. The types in-depth projects we did in upper division classes needed 15 week semesters. Even without the long projects, the vast majority of students in my CS and math classes couldn't have handled 2x the information. The shorter summer versions of hard classes always had a much higher fail rate. At my university you could also take up…

> I also didn't feel like my school treated me like a child It depends on the subject in my experience. At my school (major state university) undergraduate business school classes were run like high school. Attendance taken, assigned seats, pop quizes, etc. Science and Math courses were most "adult" in their treatment of students. Elective social sciences (100-level psych, sociology, history, political science, etc.)…

You're probably right. I took a few undergrad business courses when I went to college the first time. They were the most...regimented I guess is the best way to describe it. Every single section of the lower level business classes had their tests all together in a big 300 person auditorium on Saturdays. Upper level courses also required students to wear suits to class.

It's probably mostly a function of how much they feel the need to treat students like kids. Even though my university had a very highly ranked business school, business in general was kind of the refuge for people who wanted to go to college but weren't sure what they wanted to do.

>I completed all my English lit and writing requirements in high school so not sure how those classes worked things.

I took 1103 instead of 1101 and 1102 because that was a thing you could do if your SAT score was high enough. It was much less high school like than the business classes. World Lit was an elective and it was nothing like high school, no attendance requirements, and no grades except for a 2 papers.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#166

Post by leetcrew »

telchar wrote: post #158
leetcrew wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

mortgages and auto loans are secured with assets. the lender can take back the car or house if you default, greatly limiting the risk of lending. a better comparison for an unsecured loan would be a credit card. please let me know if you find a credit card with anything near a 10% interest rate. afaik, the best rates are around 14% and only go to people with very good credit.

I think student debt is the safest of all. It can't be discharged in bankruptcy anymore. Further, it's typically guaranteed by the government on top of that. Credit cards are a poor comparison I think.

it's important not to conflate federal loans with private loans. neither can be discharged during bankruptcy, but only federal loans are guaranteed by the government. also, the government sets the interest rates on federal loans.

a private student loan is not a particularly safe debt to issue. even though the loan cannot be discharged, there is still a substantial risk that the borrower will never be able to pay it back. credit cards and personal loans are a pretty good comparison IMO, as the main difference is the fact that student loans cannot be discharged. this is in fact priced in already; even private student loans have much lower interest rates than any other kind of unsecured loan.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#167

Post by spiritcat »

two2two wrote: post #63

I'm a returning student about to complete my degree at the end of this year. I went to an art school for a few years out of high school and ended up in customer service positions with some great companies. I didn't want to continue in customer service, so I decided to go back to school. Started with two years at community college, and now finishing up my last two at university. Some insights I picked up along the way…

pretty similar to my community college transfer experience

don't forget how much cheaper it is!

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#168

Post by matte_black »

porphyrogene wrote: post #26

It is never too late for education. It is always too early for crippling debt that exceeds your proven earning potential. None of this advice touches on the lost principle of not putting one's future on layaway. Student load debt forgiveness is a death sentence for American politicians yet there are millions of us waiting for a miracle.

The "miracle" is waiting for inflation to make your debt cheaper to pay.

Re: A Guide for Adults Going to College

#170

Post by learc83 »

telchar wrote: post #100
lordnacho wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fact that it’s a 4-year slog is one of the factors that make university degree holders earn premium in the labor marketplace Aren't you on holiday for a lot of those 4 years? I went to uni for 4 years, and it was 3 terms of 8 weeks each, per year. In other words, 96 weeks. Throw in the occasional rest week and it should really fit in two years.

What part of the world is that? In the US it's typical to have 2 16-18 week semesters per year, usually with a job or internship for 10-12 weeks in the summer.

Minor quible, the most common system in the US has 15 week semesters for fall and spring.
Post reply on HN