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A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

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Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#31

Post by t-writescode »

collegeburner wrote: post #20

I'm looking at college this fall and seriously wondering about this. I'll have to spend a lot of money if I go to an "elite" school, and the point of doing that is to make connections with my peers and with professors. I don't see the point of paying that kind of money for that sort of experience. That aside, not starting college may not be a good idea, either. Does anyone with more experience have advice on this? I…

> I do have a job at a cybersecurity firm where I'm a part-time developer, and my boss would probably convert me to full-time.

You already have a job and your boss has made you a developer. One thing you'll get in school that you won't get on the job, in general, is algorithm training. This is an important step for developing the best code you can and being exposed to weird and different ways to write things. This is important.

I personally do not see a real advantage to going to an elite school, depending on how you define elite school. If you're speaking Ivy League or some school that's world renowned, then no, that's not really important, I don't think. You already have contacts in the industry and there are "lesser" schools that are still pretty great.

Your company might be willing to pay for your college education. It almost certainly won't be from MIT; but, it could greatly reduce the costs you're worried about.

The next thing to consider is future employment, not this employment. Future companies that you work for may want you to have a degree or look down on you for your lack of one. Lacking particularly impressive projects or lots of random technologies on your resume may cause this.

Whether you decide that's going to matter or not is up to you; but, I think the one thing you should make sure you have experience in, either way, are the classes seen as less important for day to day development: your algorithm classes, discrete math classes, and similar. You can get much of that education online and for either free (YouTube, etc) or through educational sites like Pluralsight.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#33

Post by baggy_trough »

einpoklum wrote: post #23

> Don’t like any candidates? Then get engaged in issue activism. Recommendations to be politically active regardless of the cause and position sound rather vacuous. Or rather - sound like someone has an opinion, but not the guts to voice their opinion. Anyway, the main problem is the debt issue. If students going into the first year of University (or "college") did not have to pay for it, it wouldn't be such a gamble…

Far too many people go to college as it is. More subsidies to go to college only make that problem worse.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#34

Post by ForHackernews »

perl4ever wrote: post #27
wikibob wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. Graduation rates are drastically lower from community colleges. There is vastly less academic support available. The people around you will be vastly less ambitious. This will rub off on you. Yes 4 year university is now overpriced in America. But if you can, go to a 4 year university. Yes maybe go to an in-state university instead of out of state if that is cheaper, or go where you get the best financial a…

What exactly is the negative consequence you are envisioning from 2 years at community college and 2 years at your in-state 4-year school, vs. all four years at the latter? The typical alternative that people need to be guided away from is one of the for-profit "career" schools that doesn't have transferable credits and is way more expensive than community college.

A lot of people I went to high school with chose to stay home and go to community college to figure things out. Most of them puttered around for a year or two, studying part time while working, eventually getting distracted and abandoning their degree plans.

I think I can count on one hand the kids who actually transferred to a 4-year university and finished their bachelors degree.

I guess dropping out of a community college is a less costly misfire than dropping out of an expensive 4-year university, but anecdotally the people who went straight to university tended to stay there and finish. Obviously, this wasn't a controlled study and the university crew were probably more academically-minded to start with, but it is an observation.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#35

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

perl4ever wrote: post #27
wikibob wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. Graduation rates are drastically lower from community colleges. There is vastly less academic support available. The people around you will be vastly less ambitious. This will rub off on you. Yes 4 year university is now overpriced in America. But if you can, go to a 4 year university. Yes maybe go to an in-state university instead of out of state if that is cheaper, or go where you get the best financial a…

What exactly is the negative consequence you are envisioning from 2 years at community college and 2 years at your in-state 4-year school, vs. all four years at the latter? The typical alternative that people need to be guided away from is one of the for-profit "career" schools that doesn't have transferable credits and is way more expensive than community college.

The point is that a lot of people who go to community college who plan to finish at a state school don't actually make it to that state school.

I agree with the parent comment, the people in community college will tend to be less ambitious and it will likely affect you. This is not a knock on community college folks, it's just different people have different priorities.

I do think that there are many states with excellent public universities that are a comparably great bargain, especially if you can get scholarships.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#36

Post by pico303 »

collegeburner wrote: post #20

I'm looking at college this fall and seriously wondering about this. I'll have to spend a lot of money if I go to an "elite" school, and the point of doing that is to make connections with my peers and with professors. I don't see the point of paying that kind of money for that sort of experience. That aside, not starting college may not be a good idea, either. Does anyone with more experience have advice on this? I…

Go to college. While I have worked with engineers who didn’t attend university who were good engineers, the ones who attend university have a better, more mature approach to problem solving and learning new technologies. If you find a good computer science program, you’ll also gain a solid foundation on the underpinnings of the systems you’re working on — compiler design, CPUs, mathematics — and be worth so much more when you come to the table looking for a job.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#37

Post by phrodo »

wikibob wrote: post #21
frankbreetz wrote: post #18

As a millennial college graduate, my number one piece of advice to college bound high schoolers is do the first two years at community college. The debt is not worth the experience. Most people spend the first two years figuring stuff out, community college is a great place to do that. I didn't even know this was an option until after college and I feel failed by my high school college advisors. Unless you are very c…

Disagree. Graduation rates are drastically lower from community colleges. There is vastly less academic support available. The people around you will be vastly less ambitious. This will rub off on you. Yes 4 year university is now overpriced in America. But if you can, go to a 4 year university. Yes maybe go to an in-state university instead of out of state if that is cheaper, or go where you get the best financial a…

Could it be that the perceived necessity of attending a 4 year school from the get-go is causing some of these issues? If the expectation is that good students go to 4 year schools, which I believe it currently is, then only the less ambitious students will go to community colleges. It's a positive feedback loop that could be broken by making prospective students aware of the financial and self-discovery benefits of community colleges.

Some of the best professors I had were at the community college I attended before transferring to a much larger 4 year school. The class sizes were smaller and they had more time to help their students than their 4 year school counterparts.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#38

Post by toomuchtodo »

t-writescode wrote: post #31
collegeburner wrote: post #20

I'm looking at college this fall and seriously wondering about this. I'll have to spend a lot of money if I go to an "elite" school, and the point of doing that is to make connections with my peers and with professors. I don't see the point of paying that kind of money for that sort of experience. That aside, not starting college may not be a good idea, either. Does anyone with more experience have advice on this? I…

> I do have a job at a cybersecurity firm where I'm a part-time developer, and my boss would probably convert me to full-time. You already have a job and your boss has made you a developer. One thing you'll get in school that you won't get on the job, in general, is algorithm training. This is an important step for developing the best code you can and being exposed to weird and different ways to write things. This is…

I have no college education because decades ago, I was in the same situation as OP: had a job in hand, so I went to work instead of college. It was the best choice I ever made. I never worked somewhere that required a degree, three years into my career was making six figures, and have made at least that for the next ~20 years of my career. I had no student debt, or school expenses. I have had employers offer reimbursement to go get the the undergrad checkbox, which I’ve passed on (more important things to do IMHO).

YouTube, online material, and actual experience of trial and error will take you a long way without a degree. You probably also don’t want to work someplace that prioritizes a degree over experience. Don’t forget to network: that’s the biggest ROI you’ll ever have. It’s who you know, not what you know. Two cents from 20+ years.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#39

Post by ForHackernews »

dmoy wrote: post #26
zdragnar wrote: post #4

I generally detest the large expense of universities given the difference between what they claim to offer and the actual value. That said, the options here seem to not be any better. Get a job? Fresh out of high school kidd are going to have a hard time finding gainful employment for awhile, especially in the hardest hit areas. Volunteer for a political campaign? Meh. That isn't much of a substitute, even if it has…

> Volunteer for a political campaign? How is that an option, do they house and feed you if you vomubt for a political campaign?

Sometimes, yes. It's common for local supporters to open their homes to out-of-state volunteers. When I was younger, I spent months living for free in a nice lady's basement in Iowa.

Re: A twenty-year professor on starting college this fall: Don’t

#40

Post by skybrian »

I'm not sure this fall would be a great time to work on a political campaign either, since you might not want to be meeting a lot of people in person. I guess you could improve your phone and video conferencing skills, though?

Giving online courses a try seems like a good idea.

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