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College was my biggest mistake

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Re: College was my biggest mistake

#91

Post by labcomputer »

ipince wrote: post #73

"I could teach myself more in an afternoon than I would learn in a 10-week class." This is either outright bullshit, or your college was complete crap. Most likely the former. Don't do this. You think you're gaining respect or credibility, but in actuality you're losing it.

It's the former. RIT is a pretty good school for science, technology and visual arts (Kodak and Xerox donated stupid amounts of money over the years). Like any college, you get out what you put in. It also has its fair share of over-confident freshmen. You know the type: always the smartest person in the room all throughout high school. When they actually have to do work to keep up, they "lose interest." Sometimes they don't even understand what they don't understand, and start to think they can teach themselves as much in an afternoon as a course covers in a quarter. As they say in the computer departments, "If you can't hack it, pack it." Someone has to design those boxes for Apple.

None of this is to say that university is the one (or even best, or even a good) way for a specific individual to start his/her career. But college-bound kids could do much worse than RIT.

I went there for a few years, so take what I say with the appropriate amount of salt.

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#92

Post by RealGeek »

dinkumthinkum wrote: post #76
RealGeek wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there anything we can't learn from Internet? Give a kid access to computer and Internet, and he will find his way out. This was experimented with kids in Indian slums, who never went to school and can not even read/write. http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/india/thestory.htm...

Oh poppycock. This was Carnegie's line, only it was about libraries. Without the Internet, libraries were there for everyone to use. How are kids that can't read going ... Oh come on, can we stop with this "The Internet solves all of our education problems" nonsense? I know it is, because this well educated populace doesn't exist and yet the Internet does. I submit to you that there is very little you need to use the…

See http://www.ted.com/talks/sugata_mitra_shows_how_kids_teach_t... and http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/india/thestory.htm...

> How are kids that can't read going

A picture is worth a thousand words.

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#93

Post by mattdeboard »

danielrm26 wrote: post #20
patdennis wrote: post #19

Success is sitting right infront of you. But if he'd finished college, he'd know that "infront" is two words! But in all honesty, I also dropped out of college and I agree with the sentiment of this post wholeheartedly. In fact, I might go a step further and say that the fear and uncertainty that came with not having a degree actually pushed me to hustle harder than I think I would've otherwise.

> In fact, I might go a step further and say that the fear and uncertainty that came with not having a degree actually pushed me to hustle harder than I think I would've otherwise. Stress caused by feeling behind is not a strong endorsement in my opinion.

How is this any different than going to college because you're afraid you won't be able to get a job without a degree?

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#94

Post by taskstrike »

BadassFractal wrote: post #54
taskstrike wrote: post #3

More challenging colleges teach you far more than you can teach yourselves. A top 5 computer science school churns out a much more capable and knowledgeable computer science major who is both well versed in theory and knows how computers actually works down to the bytes. Kudos to the writer, his ability to hustle is strong. There is more than one kind of talent.

Having gone to two of the top five cs schools, I haven't really learned much about computer science from either. The lectures were boring/unintelligible and not motivational (foreign researcher prof., you know what I'm talking about). The MPs were great, but they're not something you really need to pay for. These days you can find technical challenges for yourself anywhere. Read a book. The biggest benefit was forcin…

Name those schools

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#95

Post by jval »

This article is awesome.

If people don't want it to be advice, then don't take it as advice. It's just another anecdote to put inside your little book of anecdotes.

The thing is, the OP is targeting his advice at people who are in similar situations to him - people who know that university is moving too slowly, is too expensive, and not right for them.

His advice clearly isn't prescriptive to everyone. It is worth noting his circumstances. He may not have had the opportunity to attend a university that stimulated him. Attending a State College may have been cheaper, but even worse from a quality perspective.

Nobody knows. Point is, instead of judging the guy, why don't you read the piece for what it is - a story about how, for some people (and an increasing number of people at that), college is their biggest mistake. And you will notice that the title reads 'College is my biggest mistake' - not necessarily yours.

ps Statistics about populations of people who don't graduate are useless, as it clearly includes all sorts of idiots, drug addicts and fools who are on the wrong side of the bell curve. Show me statistics on people who drop out of degrees two years in to pursue entrepreneurial opportunities vs the graduating population and I might pay attention.

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#96

Post by DigitalSea »

As someone who failed every aspect of my education in high school with exception for music, English and the boringly easy to pass computer classes this resonates with me so much. I had always shared an interest in computers and electronics as a kid, but never went to college or undertook any secondary education whatsoever.

I went from having nothing to living comfortably and I'm still in my early 20's without a college education and don't plan on getting one. I work alongside people who spent 4 to 6 years studying to work where they are now and it feels nice knowing I didn't have to get in large amounts of debt to get to the same place as they did.

You definitely need to be able to sell yourself though. Every employer I've ever worked with has been impressed when I tell what got me into development was building a gaming clan website for a Tony Hawks Underground 2 game clan and I kept learning from then on.

This has inspired me to share my story which I'll write a blog post about shortly as well.

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#97

Post by warfangle »

magicalist wrote: post #39

Paying $44k a year to not go to any of your classes was indeed a big mistake. I could tell you another story about how I decided to take on a stupid amount of debt for school, but -- in the face of a lifetime of certain poverty -- the people I grew to know and the projects I actively pursued and worked hard on led me to a fulfilling life and a job that I love that covers my loans with ease. There is a point in this p…

Should they have to acquire such burdening debt to come to this realization, though?

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#98

Post by TheIntellects »

hotshothenry wrote: post #16

I feel like everything I read nowadays on this topic has had the tone of "don't go to college it's a waste of time" etc etc. While I agree it's definitely not for everybody, I don't agree with it being a waste of time or that nobody should go to school (even if you're not pursue a career a law/medicine/etc). I have self-taught myself everything I've learned in software engineering, beginning in middle school when I p…

Actually, he never encouraged anyone else not to go to college. I think the part about college being a waste of his time was really just to emphasize how he persevered and was able to create his own success.

My friend just linked me his own blog post after reading Steve's. http://www.jayhuang.org/blog/success-is-very-far-away-but-pe...

Re: College was my biggest mistake

#99

Post by benthumb »

Mac OS X: Avadis Tevanian - B.A. in Mathematics from the University of Rochester, and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer science from Carnegie Mellon University

Python: Guido van Rossum - masters degree in mathematics and computer science from the University of Amsterdam

Ruby on Rails: David Heinemeier Hansson - bachelor's degree in Computer Science

Ruby: Yukihiro Matsumoto - He graduated with an information science degree from University of Tsukuba

Linux: Linus Torvalds - master's degree in computer science from NODES research group

SpaceX: Elon Musk - From the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, he received an undergraduate degree in Economics, and stayed on another year to finish a second bachelor's degree in physics.

...I could go on

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