Just like in startups, you get what you measure. In school, you measure by grades, so you get students who play the rules to get good grades.
Also see Goodhart's Law: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure."[0]
School is all about signaling, not skill-building
31–40 of 222 posts
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Visa.
So you added to the demand for this otherwise mediocre product (education), and then wonder why the product quality isn't better? I think it is just supply-demand economics.
In my opinion all education criteria must be eliminated as soon as possible from all immigration rules worldwide, but until then, what can I do.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#33I strongly disagree. Elite colleges are all about signaling. But I don't doubt for a second that my CS degree taught me an enormous amount - some skill-building, lots of abstract thinking - that I wouldn't have been able to achieve as quickly as anywhere else.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#34Maybe for the elite. But for middle class people like myself, I developed marketable skills, secured multiple internships, and found it easy to get a full-time job straight out of school. I had about a years worth of industry experience via internships (one for 6 months, two others 3 months each). Signaling doesn't buy you much. At least in engineering, because a technical interview will sort out whether or not you a…
Yes, Software Engineering is a super special exception that does not apply anywhere else.
That's a valid opinion, but it doesn't address the question: do other fields lean more heavily on signaling than others?
Does going to a top 10 law school matter more than graduating from a Top 10 CS program?
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#35All these anti-education articles are pretty tedious. If you believe it's the schools who have it all wrong by teaching subjects that aren't useful for building phone apps, you're probably already pretty set in your worldview.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#36I strongly disagree. Elite colleges are all about signaling. But I don't doubt for a second that my CS degree taught me an enormous amount - some skill-building, lots of abstract thinking - that I wouldn't have been able to achieve as quickly as anywhere else.
It's completely possible to acquire CS skills in much less time elsewhere.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#37Technologies like online education would crush the existing education system if the playground is fair. Unfortunately the latter has public funding in it and prevents the society from moving forward.
Except online education is dominated by the existing players, and they are charging the same kind of money you would pay in person. If you're getting a STEM degree especially, Coursera will charge you something like $600/credit.
This is because of, wait for it, signaling. You don't actually need all that much education to be an entry level software engineer, especially outside silicon valley. But you do need those letters after your name.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, Software Engineering is a super special exception that does not apply anywhere else.
That's a valid opinion, but it doesn't address the question: do other fields lean more heavily on signaling than others? Does going to a top 10 law school matter more than graduating from a Top 10 CS program?
Absolutely yes, without any doubt.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
My point is that signaling works without any sort of coursework. The instant you make it into Stanford, you're a Stanford kid, which puts you into an elite group of desirable employees. And of course these colleges are special snowflakes, they wouldn't be signals otherwise. Nobody cares if you went to a community college down the street, it associates no household name with you.
No, community college diploma is a strong signal compared to no diploma. You seem too preoccupied by concerns of top few percent.
Sure, I suppose you're right. I'm mentioning these top colleges because we're on HN, which is heavily oriented around the Bay Area tech ecosystem, which loves to dip into that pool.
Re: School is all about signaling, not skill-building
#40I strongly disagree. Elite colleges are all about signaling. But I don't doubt for a second that my CS degree taught me an enormous amount - some skill-building, lots of abstract thinking - that I wouldn't have been able to achieve as quickly as anywhere else.
Most colleges aren't elite. The vast majority of college graduates do not go to elite colleges. It's myopic to think of elite schools as "all schools" as so many articles do.
Seriously, rankings are so pointless. I personally value someone's skills, not what institution they obtained them from. I guess for our society's elite, it's their version of keeping up with Joneses. Or maybe the upper class feels the need for their kids to get elite credentials to compensate for a lack of any real skill. I don't know how motivated I'd be in life, if I didn't have to work to support myself. So in that sense, I do have some empathy for people in that position.