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Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

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Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#52
post #12
post #7

Pst. Don't exclude people without college degrees. They're often far more resourceful, in my experience, and there's little that college gives you as a developer. Hire the person, not the school.

If you're a person who doesn't need a university program, then you're a person who can get an incredible amount of value out of one as well. No school gives you anything, but you can take a hell of a lot out of a halfway decent program.

Absolutely, school has lots to offer, but what's often missing from the equation in discussions like these is opportunity cost.

People compare school vs "not-school" as if the alternative to school is sitting on your butt. In truth, one can accomplish a heck of a lot with that time and money.

It's a hugely personal decision of course.

Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#53

A J.D. degree from the United States is not exactly a master's degree, and not a doctorate in the way a Ph.D. degree is, so I chose "Other."

A J.D. is considered a terminal degree (there is no further degree beyond a J.D.; the S.J.D. is considered a different track), so technically you do have a doctorate.

But ethical rules are questionable as to whether you can call yourself a "doctor," because it's potentially misleading. So US lawyers are in the strange position of having doctorates, but being unable to say so.

Here's some more info: http://abajournal.com/magazine/lawyers_are_doctors_too/

Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#54
post #23
post #14

Doctorate is not PhD, MD, or JD. please correct your poll

Doctorate is accurate. While PhD is technically a "research doctorate" and MD and JD are "professional doctorates", all three are types of doctorate degrees. PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) MD (Doctor of Medicine) JD (Juris Doctor)

accurate, but not specific

Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#55
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're a person who doesn't need a university program, then you're a person who can get an incredible amount of value out of one as well. No school gives you anything, but you can take a hell of a lot out of a halfway decent program.

Unless you'd rather be in the working world than talking homework with a bunch of rich, naive kids.

I failed out of University in my last year, but I had a wonderful experience there. OTOH this was in the days when you could get an engineering degree from a top Canadian university for $2.5k a year tuition.

Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#56
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you oh-so-effectively refute it.

Is that supposed to be an argument? Or is your argument that all people who go to college are "rich and naive kids" as you implied earlier in the thread? You're exposing a pretty huge chip on your shoulder.

No, I posted that before parent edited his post (classy). Initially, he only claimed that my point was a fallacy and made no argument whatsoever.

Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you'd rather be in the working world than talking homework with a bunch of rich, naive kids.

You sound very bitter about this. For what it's worth, I have a PhD and was not a "rich kid" - I was fortunate enough to grow up in the UK at a time when the government gave grants to people who would not otherwise be able to afford a university education (I'm not sure if they still do this - I know a lot has changed).

They don’t. I believe the last tuition grants were issued in 1996, and they’d been price-frozen for a while before that.

Re: Poll: What is your highest educational qualification?

#59
post #35
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's little that college gives you as a developer I hear this fallacy a lot. A lot of people seem to give it a pass and nod along with it, maybe because it makes them feel better or maybe because it seems like the politically correct thing to say in a room full of talented hackers, only some of whom went to college. While you in no way need to go to college to be a developer, I think people should be highly skepti…

I have a bachelor's degree in computer science. I probably learned some topics better than I would have on my own, thanks to being forced to dig deeper for the class. But I was an avid self-studier of computer science, and I learned a whole lot on my own. For the amount of computer science knowledge I need to do my real world work so far, I'm not convinced getting the formal education made a noticeable difference. Th…

Sounds like you went to a great school. Most colleges in India don't allow any flexibility in what courses you can take. You have to pass all the prescribes subjects. Liberal arts? That's unheard of back here.
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