I studied engineering, not English. I still can't find a job • Hacker News Board

Re: I studied engineering, not English. I still can't find a job

#71

Post by kstrauser » Thu, Aug 28, 2014, 5:11 PM UTC

Tarrosion wrote: post #67

kstrauser wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can you imagine "if you are studying art and want a job as an artist, you'd better be doing drawing and uploading to deviantART in your free time. Otherwise you're just not cut out for this career." Yes. Yes, I can absolutely imagine judging someone in a partially-artistic field on whether they enjoy making art on their own time. That doesn't apply in every field, sure, and I bet chip designers don't generally go h…

I absolutely agree that when hiring an artist, you want that person to be excited about art. I suppose in a nutshell, my thought is: all time is your own time. Choosing to pursue a career in is a monumental investment of your own time into . We ought not judge as terribly different those who spend ~50 hours a week of their own time doing X and getting paid for it and those who spend ~50 hours per week of their own ti…

I don't disagree with you in general, but we're in the context of people starting new careers. A professional will have a portfolio of on-the-job work they've done. A recent grad only has the fact that they've graduated and not anything to really demonstrate their aptitude or abilities. I'd be skeptical of such a student who'd never branched out to do something fun during their entire learning time.

But back to the career professional context. I think maybe I've identified the disconnect. Could it be that asking about personal projects is a way of identifying not just a competent developer but an actual geek? Those are different roles with different requirements. For example, you probably don't want to unleash a geek on your legacy business logic maintenance project. They'll probably be bored and end up breaking stuff in the name of optimization or cleanup. Similarly, you don't want "just" a programmer in your R&D team where you genuinely want and need creative innovation.

So maybe both sides are correct: for some jobs, it's completely appropriate to expect personal projects. For others, it shouldn't be expected at all. What do you think?

Re: I studied engineering, not English. I still can't find a job

#72

Post by mordocai » Thu, Aug 28, 2014, 6:38 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #70

mordocai wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You might want to check that." You are correct. I should have said "Most colleges I considered when starting my degree". Look, we might have to agree to disagree. What I think, and what the one Computer Science Department Head I spoke to thought, is that Computer Science is math. Period. Just like a degree in Math, it does not have to have a directly practical application to serve a purpose. The fact that we have ma…

"The fact that we have machines that run these theories is purely a sideline to the theories themselves." I'm not sure you got my point entirely. If you've got a machine sitting there than can help you, you should use it . If you're going to write about operating systems, you're an academic fool if you don't also actually take some time to gain some real experience on the very-cheap systems that can help validate tha…

And you are a fool if you dismiss people/ideas simply because you don't feel they are practical. Sure, don't try to use them in your business. However, many many very useful and practical things have come out of these impractical theories and people who never try to practically prove anything or use their theories. It is a win for everybody to have at least some subset of people who do pure theoretics.

That being said, as already stated, you shouldn't be going into these types of programs if your end goal is to get a job in the industry.

Re: I studied engineering, not English. I still can't find a job

#73

Post by robotresearcher » Thu, Aug 28, 2014, 7:46 PM UTC

2mur wrote: post #29

robotresearcher wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"universities are not, and were never intended to be, career training centers" The professional vocational degrees like engineering, medicine and law are intended exactly for career training. They are usually certified by practitioner guilds, for example. You are quite right about computer science, but that is not a vocational professional program. The OP studied engineering. (edit: reading down a bit, someone spotte…

I can't speak for law school. Medical school is absolutely not career training. It simply gives you the knowledge and vocabulary so that you can be trained to be doctor. The additional training, of course, happens in your residency. You are utterly unprepared to truly be a physician when you graduate medical school, even if you have earned the right to be called 'doctor.'

An introductory vocational professional program is still a vocational professional program.

Re: I studied engineering, not English. I still can't find a job

#74

Post by Balgair » Fri, Aug 29, 2014, 12:29 AM UTC

"...a 2006 study of college professors in STEM fields showed that a whopping 59.8 percent hadn’t had any job experience in their industry. That means that a large portion of the professors tasked with teaching college grads how to become marketers, managers and salespeople have never marketed anything, managed anyone or sold anything at all."

Come on HN, you guys missed this cherry? I do like that you dug through the 22 year old's Linkedin profile to get his real degree, but yall missed a pretty big logical flaw there.

That said, there is a lot to analyze about the poor kid. First, he thinks that spending a year unemployed is abnormal. Granted the guy was in State College for a long time, and that is a pocket universe filled with football, cheap beer and cheaper dates. He's been sheltered with the Penn State pride and now is finally realizing that you gotta kiss a lot more ass than what he is used to in order to make it through an interview.

Second, he's at least misleading readers to his actual degree (as yall sought out online) and he thinks thats ok to do on a national level. A simple google search is going to ruin this guy. But as a voting, draft-eligible citizen, he's allowed to pave his own path.

Third, he's naive at best, ignorant at worst. Honestly, he seems harmless, and that is not going to cut it for the guy now that he dug this grave. He's got to get some beating in here before he realizes that he is the only one that will straighten his own back.

Best wishes to the poor guy. As John Wayne said: Life is hard, but its a lot harder when you're stupid.