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Dropping out is probably not for you

jacquesmattheij.com

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Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#101

Post by lurker17 »

dasil003 wrote: post #94
michaelochurch wrote: post #10

Thank you. Excellent article that needs to be read by everyone who's considering dropping out for "a startup". Let's ignore the complexities and focus on crude market value. A smart person with no college degree can probably earn $25,000 per year at 18. We're assuming a middle to upper-middle class background-- no special family connections-- and a reasonable work ethic. With a CS, math, or science degree from a good…

Your back of the envelope is dubious. Where are they paying 22-year-olds $80k? Only at soul-sucking corporations and over-funded startups with no fiscal responsibility. Also, the person with the capability to get a CS/Math/Science degree (from a respectable program) will likely have other potential that fall somewhere between the typical dropout and Gatesian success. I think the strongest argument to stay in school i…

Many people at Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Facebook, and others have retained their souls along with their $80+K new-grad salaries.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#102

Post by Goladus »

adbge wrote: post #83
Gobitron wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting story. Do you have any regrets about your decision? Were you making money before you dropped out and are you making enough to support yourself now?

I don't have any substantial regrets, but it's possible that those will come with time. I sincerely wish that I could have made college work for me, but I think that I'd have to be a substantially different person for that to happen. One thing that I do regret is that I'm missing out on the opportunity to engage in academic research. I would like to try it, just to see what it's like, and I'm afraid that I might not…

From what I can tell, knowing several who have earned or are pursuing PhDs, is that an academic career requires a long-term commitment and a willingness to do a lot of hard work for rewards that are a long ways off (and not guaranteed).

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#103

Post by peterwwillis »

There's a lot more positive benefit to staying in school than dropping out. For one thing, making money is something you'll do for the rest of your life (unless you're the kind of fiscally-responsible freak that can save enough to retire by 30).

You have all the time in the world to start a company or join one. But right now, while you're young and have the time and resources available, you're at the best possible position to acquire the experiences and knowledge you'll need for the rest of your life. Yes there's debt; you'll pay it off. Yes it's tiring; you'll get used to it.

Is it easy to drop out? Yes. Can you make money (assuming you're smart enough and have learned enough to get a job now)? Yes. Does it make sense to cripple yourself for the future just to get a couple years ahead of your peers? Hell no.

Do whatever you have to do to finish school and try hard to enjoy yourself while you're there. Life isn't going anywhere that you need to drop out to get there.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#104

Post by Goladus »

lurker17 wrote: post #101
dasil003 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your back of the envelope is dubious. Where are they paying 22-year-olds $80k? Only at soul-sucking corporations and over-funded startups with no fiscal responsibility. Also, the person with the capability to get a CS/Math/Science degree (from a respectable program) will likely have other potential that fall somewhere between the typical dropout and Gatesian success. I think the strongest argument to stay in school i…

Many people at Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Facebook, and others have retained their souls along with their $80+K new-grad salaries.

Yeah, you might be able to get a high-paying recent-grad job but odds are you won't, either because you don't make the cut technically (the bar is high) or because your job-finding, interviewing, and negotiating skills are crap.

Often, it's both-- because you don't make it through a college-assisted placement program into a high-profile company that likes to hire recent grads, and the college hasn't provided any reasonable training on how to go about getting a good job and compensation on your own, you flounder and struggle up a ladder of mediocre tech jobs until you figure that stuff out. You are probably not making $80k/yr during that time.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#105

Post by Eliezer »

mml wrote: post #31

As a dropout, I can tell you this: if you do drop out, you are choosing the hard way. Later on, even if you're wildly successful, you will wonder how much more successful you could have been if you'd finished. You'll also suffer from the impostor syndrome, and it will likely haunt you for the rest of your life, regardless of the outcome. Young smartasses have a way of becoming old maintenance programmers ;)

As an autodidact (I never dropped out of anything, I just didn't go to high school after 8th grade) allow me to say that I have never, ever wondered how successful I could've been if I'd gone to college, nor yet suffered from impostor syndrome.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#106

Post by michaelochurch »

padobson wrote: post #89
michaelochurch wrote: post #10

Thank you. Excellent article that needs to be read by everyone who's considering dropping out for "a startup". Let's ignore the complexities and focus on crude market value. A smart person with no college degree can probably earn $25,000 per year at 18. We're assuming a middle to upper-middle class background-- no special family connections-- and a reasonable work ethic. With a CS, math, or science degree from a good…

I graduated with honors from a top 10% university and it cost a heck of a lot more than $25k AND I've now been working for 3.5 years and I haven't hit the $80k mark yet. Only a small subset of the skills that I'm marketing right now did I learn in college. Furthermore, I'm doing better than a lot of my peers. Your numbers are suspect at best. $25k x 4 = $100,000 opportunity cost for college. $20k x 4 = $100,000 colle…

It depends on your ambitions and your skill set. Average college graduates are definitely not making $80k/year out of school.

CS graduates with decent coding skills can get that much. And in my experience, your major doesn't matter much if you can code. A CS major might make your CV 20% more appealing, and what you'll learn is certainly valuable, but technical skill (not major) is what matters. (I majored in math, not CS.)

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#107

Post by alexholehouse »

virmundi wrote: post #32
eof wrote: post #22

Surprised by the lack of support for dropping out. Is a 4 year education and a degree valuable? Of course. Is it worth $xx,000 in student debt and 4 year opportunity cost of doing something else? Rarely. Especially for this crowd. If you are a 19 year old with some programming skills, and you are paying for your own college (via loans or with cash) dropping out is a GREAT idea. Spend the next three years working on y…

See I'm going the other way. I'm in the process of applying for a Master's Degree in Computer Science. Historically I've been rather reluctant to do this since I can learn on my own, and have. However, I think the structure and the environment provided by school is worth the 25k a total cost. Having money on the barrel head provides a real sense of focus. Having a peer group that wants to really pursue the same topic…

I did a masters in CS for almost the same reasons and it was one of the best decisions I've ever made. Met a tonne of amazing people, learnt a stupid amount in one year (which I say with some authority in learning stupid amounts in short spaces of time) and had a really fantastic time. I found that it forced me to do things I wouldn't perhaps on the face of it have chosen, but turned out to be really interesting and influence my work in other areas (like predicate logic, which I initially hated but learned to love).

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#108

Post by vsl2 »

randomdata wrote: post #86
hugh3 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The dislike comes form it being pointless busywork. It may not have been pointless busywork to you, depending on your upbringing. Or from what university you're at, and what you're studying. My advice to programmer types who come into university thinking they already know all about programming: forget CS and take as much mathematics as you can. That stuff is hard and you can't learn it anywhere else.

Or from what university you're at, and what you're studying. I should clarify that it is pointless busywork with respect to a career. There's definitely something to be said about learning for the sake of learning and personal growth. Not having world class knowledge of mathematics is not going to hinder your wallet in any way though.

I think focusing only on programming skills and what will help you in your first jobs out of college is short-sighted. Being a college dropout entrepreneur may be some sort of badge of honor in your 20's, but unless you do something extraordinary or make FU money, its not something that will help you later in life. Will having that MIT CS degree help you get that lucrative job when you're 40 years old with a family, mortgage and other responsibilities (i.e. not so easy to do risky startups)?

You also learn other skills that come in useful in your career, though I agree some can be worthless. I hated some of my classes in college, particularly the writing class requirements, but even those are helping me today because almost everything requires some sort of clear and coherent writing.

Its only 2-3 years if you work hard to graduate early, during which you'll have many opportunities to try out various ideas and meet many of your lifelong friends and likely, cofounders. If you don't have much money, excel at a state school and graduate with a manageable amount of debt, or better yet, work hard and get a scholarship.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#109

Post by danielrhodes »

"If those three conditions are not met, please ignore the rest of this post, you have already made some bad decisions and the question of staying in or dropping out is the least of your problems."

Jacques appears to have a very shallow knowledge into the value of liberal arts. It has nothing to do with a marketable skill (if you want that, go to a vocational school), and everything to do with refining the quality if your thought and mind.

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