Schools Out, Forever • Hacker News Board

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#21

Post by robryan » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:12 PM UTC

nzmsv wrote: post #17

impeachgod wrote: post #11

I would love to do this, but in my country it is impossible to get a (decent) job without a degree. How do you get at least an internship as, say, a high school graduate with mediocre grades and nothing to your name? You show them your open-source projects? I think HR is technically illiterate and will be more impressed by any degrees you have.

Exactly. How do you get that internship as a high school dropout? Thinking back to high school, I couldn't even get a job at McDonalds (probably deemed too nerdy for customer service). My parents aren't computer programmers, and did not know anyone in the field. I also had a similar attitude for the first half of my university studies. I figured I could already program quite well, thank you very much, and classes wer…

Hmm, I had the same problem with those fast food/ supermarket customer service jobs in my teens. Got to the point where I was like well I wouldn't want one of these jobs even if they came after me.

I kinda find it funny now that I probably still wouldn't be able to get one of these lowly paid casual service positions.

I have a mate who takes uni the same way, clearly smart enough to pass programing classes easy judging by what he's done programming for fun, but just doesn't seem to care or apply himself enough assuming it will be really easy.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#22

Post by dasil003 » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:15 PM UTC

It's true that blind faith in the system is not the ideal recipe for success, however it's also true that being able to buckle down and do something you don't like or see the purpose of is very useful, especially when you're young.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#23

Post by fnid2 » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:15 PM UTC

ericd wrote: post #8

fnid2 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And a lot of those commercials are for trade schools teaching welding, health care instrument management (mri, phlebotomy, nuclear)... Not traditional universities, so the unis, which are much more expensive than those schools, are really hurting right now. People are going to the University of Phoenix online to learn vb.net instead of Harvard to learn "computer science".

I really doubt Harvard or any of the other top schools are hurting for applicants. When I was entering school, Harvard and MIT were taking <15% of their applicants, which leaves quite a bit of wiggle room.

Havard, in this case, is a metaphor for "traditional universities"

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#24

Post by youngian » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:17 PM UTC

School's Out, Forever. "School is out" contracts to "School's out", with an apostrophe to indicate the contraction.

I could not bring myself to read an article about education being pointless that has a grammatical mistake in the title, no less. If you make that mistake while slagging on education, I simply cannot give your opinions any weight.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#25

Post by mmt » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:33 PM UTC

youngian wrote: post #24

School's Out, Forever . "School is out" contracts to "School's out", with an apostrophe to indicate the contraction. I could not bring myself to read an article about education being pointless that has a grammatical mistake in the title, no less. If you make that mistake while slagging on education, I simply cannot give your opinions any weight.

Your response illustrates an all too common failure of formal education: holding formalities in greater regard than practical matters.

Language is usage is language. Not only was clarity not hurt, the point of the title I took away was a reference to the Alice Cooper song lyric, which as spoken (sung) language, contains no apostrophe.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#26

Post by btilly » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:33 PM UTC

I suspect his perceived correlation between the quality of the programmer and lack of education has quite a bit of selection bias.

I have coworkers with and without advanced degrees. There are lots of good and bad ones in both groups, and I get along with most just fine. But I strongly suspect that I'd have trouble working with anyone with a chip the size of the one perched on his shoulder. Which means that he's going to drive away the good educated people, and confirm his own preconception about quality. And he's going to create a lot of problems for himself down the road.

As a concrete example of what I am talking about, consider his four man team story. Given that he posted that with his real name, the engineer who he didn't like is going to be a burned bridge. Any educated software developer he knows who reads that will wonder, "What does he think of me?" There go a few more bridges. Anyone considering hiring him is likely to Google his name. If they turn up this then any interviewers with an education are likely to be turned off.

Technology in whatever town you're in tends to be a small community. You wind up working with the same people over and over again. A knack for making lots of people dislike you isn't a good thing.

Perhaps in several years he'll learn enough to be able to take that advice. After suffering for a bit. Kind of like how he has slowly recognized that a lot of what he refused to learn in school was actually something that is reasonable to learn.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#27

Post by abeppu » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:37 PM UTC

You know what you can do as a university student in a technical discipline which can't really be done for free searching the internet? Participate in real research, guided and mentored by real-life scientists. Do lab-based classes. Ask questions of your professors. Have deep conversations with your fellow students and with your lecturers during office hours.

Yeah, if you only want to try to absorb the material in a totally passive way, and if you would never speak up in class, then you might as well just watch video lectures on-line and read the books and do stuff on your own. But if you choose to really take advantage of the university environment, you get a lot more than just the facts presented in the courses. I'm sure it's possible to have a career with just your own experiences and self-study. But I don't think you should be so sure you're better off than a peer who got their degree and all the various experiences that can come with it.

By the way, I'm not sure whether you think it's the norm for engineers to not have formal training. Of the seven engineers on my team, all have at least an undergrad degree in CS or a related field, 3 have PhDs and 1 has a Masters.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#28

Post by ericd » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:37 PM UTC

fnid2 wrote: post #23

ericd wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really doubt Harvard or any of the other top schools are hurting for applicants. When I was entering school, Harvard and MIT were taking <15% of their applicants, which leaves quite a bit of wiggle room.

Havard, in this case, is a metaphor for "traditional universities"

I realize, could you point to an article about university admissions dropping? I haven't happened across anything saying that universities are in trouble, for any reason other than their endowments getting decimated due to the financial crisis.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#29

Post by flogic » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:44 PM UTC

abeppu wrote: post #27

You know what you can do as a university student in a technical discipline which can't really be done for free searching the internet? Participate in real research, guided and mentored by real-life scientists. Do lab-based classes. Ask questions of your professors. Have deep conversations with your fellow students and with your lecturers during office hours. Yeah, if you only want to try to absorb the material in a t…

Provided you don't go to a crap school. If you go to a crap school... well... you're on your own.

Re: Schools Out, Forever

#30

Post by youngian » Wed, Feb 17, 2010, 9:55 PM UTC

mmt wrote: post #25

youngian wrote: post #24

School's Out, Forever . "School is out" contracts to "School's out", with an apostrophe to indicate the contraction. I could not bring myself to read an article about education being pointless that has a grammatical mistake in the title, no less. If you make that mistake while slagging on education, I simply cannot give your opinions any weight.

Your response illustrates an all too common failure of formal education: holding formalities in greater regard than practical matters. Language is usage is language. Not only was clarity not hurt, the point of the title I took away was a reference to the Alice Cooper song lyric, which as spoken (sung) language, contains no apostrophe.

I disagree. Clarity was hurt. This title suggests multiple schools "out", which doesn't make a lot of sense (did the schools band together to out their gay friend? Or a corrupt politician?). Yes, obviously I can figure out what he meant. But there's a jarring half-second of confusion that disrupts my thinking, slows down my reading, and distracts me from what is being communicated.

I'm not rabid about grammar - the rules should be a bit malleable, depending on context. But most grammar exists so that we can understand each other. If you have poor grammar, I will have a harder time understanding you and we will have a harder time working together. In fact, I will be less likely to want to talk to you, because I could instead be talking to people with good grammar, and when I talk to them I don't have to pause for those cognitive potholes where I have to puzzle out what they're trying to say.