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Dropping out is probably not for you

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Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#71

Post by Gobitron »

adbge wrote: post #66

I dropped out of school last semester, so I think I can add some (unique) perspective. Maybe I will flesh these thoughts out into a blog post later. When considering dropping out of college, you're the one who is ultimately responsible for that decision, you're the one who will live with the consequences, and you're the one who has the best information for making that decision. It's all on you. You have to ask yourse…

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?

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#72

Post by randomdata »

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 ;)

It is true that dropouts in the past have had to work hard to point out that college is not necessary for success. However, given how many articles we have seen about not dropping out on HN in the last week, it seems the tables have actually turned. It is the graduates now working hard to restore value to their degrees.

College has no proven track record. The best we have is some loose correlation showing people who work hard to attain a degree are also likely to work hard in industry, and thus earn more money. No surprises there. Hard working people have always earned more typically.

I don't want to diminish the value of college. It comes with a lot of great experiences for personal growth. It is a wonderful passtime. However, these articles are starting to highlight that it plays no role in business else there would be no reason to argue for going to college.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#74

Post by mechanical_fish »

cperciva wrote: post #23
ctdonath wrote: post #15

Notice that all the lauded examples of "well, X dropped out and made it big!" entail X starting the business during schools and being so wildly successful at it that school was just in the way. Michael Dell was spending all his waking hours building PCs in his dorm. Gates was well on his way to selling DOS to IBM. Each had already gotten to where college helps you go. Remember Gladwell's "10,000 hours" rule of thumb…

50 hours per week for 50 weeks per year for 4 years is 10,000 hours Or for most students, 40 hours per week for 16 weeks per term for 2 terms per year for 4 years is 5,120 hours. Which might just explain why students coming out of college tend to be at most half good at something.

Grad school will give you the other half. But: Beware premature optimization. ;)

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#75

Post by 9085 »

adbge wrote: post #66

I dropped out of school last semester, so I think I can add some (unique) perspective. Maybe I will flesh these thoughts out into a blog post later. When considering dropping out of college, you're the one who is ultimately responsible for that decision, you're the one who will live with the consequences, and you're the one who has the best information for making that decision. It's all on you. You have to ask yourse…

I also dropped out and I have quite a different experience. My experience with CS in school was that it was boring. The teachers did not teach it well and I was better off learning on my own. I think this is highly dependent on your own personal learning style. College is not for everyone.

If you're smart, you have support. I don't know what people were around you but generally the right people can tell if you'll make it in this world. Their support means a lot. Find those people to surround yourself with.

I think being a dropout is easier now than ever. There is a large collective who understand college is not what it use to be. You can definitely do well without it, and they know.

"Computer Science is now an established discipline and schools actually teach it, so being self-taught is less of a necessity and more of an oddity." I disagree. Computer Science is established for Computer Science. It gives you almost zero introduction into the industry. If you want to be a software engineer for a living then it's the experience of work and your personal drive that outweighs a degree.

This industry has gotten to a point where we realize skill outweighs paper trails. If you can prove that you can do the work and do it well, you will get hired. I rather hire and work with someone who does not have a CS degree and knows what they are doing versus the opposite. It's the only way to hire -- skill.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#76

Post by mnisjk »

webwright wrote: post #45
edw519 wrote: post #3

The simplest test of whether or not you should drop out is this one: If you have to ask someone if you should then you shouldn't. I think I have a simpler test: Do you have a customer? Of all the things that you need to do to start a successful business, I think that getting someone to pay you for your work is the hardest. Deceptively hard. I've seen it all too often: Good technical skills. Check. Good design skills.…

This. Passing college is cake. It requires very few hours of time compared to a real job-- it's a GREAT time to spin up a side business to see if you can generate/find demand for what you have. It's also a great time to experiment with co-founders. That said, necessity is the motherhood of invention and failure isn't going to sting THAT much. It's not terribly challenging to un-drop-out of college is it? Finally, I s…

If passing college was a cake then perhaps you should have reconsidered your major.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#77

Post by eof »

abyssknight wrote: post #30
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…

I have to disagree. A college education costs about $26,000 for Florida residents here in Orlando for a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. Compare that to my first year's salary which was roughly double that, and the cost begins to look minimal. The opportunity cost is relative, since the people you meet in college may very well be the best resources you have for maintaining your drive, innovative spirit, and w…

26k + 4 * 25k a year salary you aren't earning (very conservative for someone who is going to spend 4 years trying to make money being a programmer)

And you have a 126k education.

That ~50k you are making a year is roughly the same as my first salaried position; except that I dropped out of college and spent that time jerking off and doing some free lance work.

Certainly there is a lot of value in college; I learned to program (even though I didn't graduate) primarily in college, and my buddies from there are some of my best friends (and potential networking opportunities).

However, at 26, with no degree, minor networking, and (in my opinion) an amateur portfolio I was able to get multiple 45k+ opportunities. At 28 with a better portfolio I can work as much or as little as I choose for $50+ an hour.

In this industry, no one gives a shit about your degree for 99% of cases. Can you hack it and show you can hack it? Then you can get a job.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#78

Post by spudlyo »

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 ;)

I dropped out over 20 years ago, and while not 'wildly' successful, I'm happily successful. I have no regrets, I never wonder how things would have been different, and I don't feel like an impostor. Your mileage may vary.

If you're passionate about the work and reasonably good at networking and selling yourself, I believe you can still make it in the industry without a college degree. You must have the passion though. Some people can choose a career in IT by spending an afternoon in their high school guidance councilor's office, and after 4 years of hard work in college actually realize that goal. For those kinds of people, college is essential.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#79

Post by pnathan »

trefn wrote: post #54
pnathan wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Idaho, the 4 year universities are about 3K per semester. Assuming a 4-year degree, that's 24K in tuition. If it's 5 years, that's 30K. You can live on about 1K per month. So loosely, that's about 20K per year to get a degree here.

it's correct to think about the bigger picture, but you'd be paying rent anyway. I think the right number to look at is tuition + opportunity cost, e.g. 6K + 18K salary or whatever.

Opportunity cost was very little for me and all the other CS people I knew in undergraduate. The alternative for most people was doing tech support and making 24K/year with no growth potential (using local rates). Since the local rate for a BSCS is about 50K, there's no meaningful reason for the bulk of students to drop out. You'd have to have 20% year over year growth in income (not counting the bennies coming in with a salary job) to equal it.

In other words, for a computer science student - if you have a business raking in cash and you need to drop out to keep the money stream, you're losing out. Otherwise, stay in college.

Re: Dropping out is probably not for you

#80

Post by hugh3 »

cperciva wrote: post #23
ctdonath wrote: post #15

Notice that all the lauded examples of "well, X dropped out and made it big!" entail X starting the business during schools and being so wildly successful at it that school was just in the way. Michael Dell was spending all his waking hours building PCs in his dorm. Gates was well on his way to selling DOS to IBM. Each had already gotten to where college helps you go. Remember Gladwell's "10,000 hours" rule of thumb…

50 hours per week for 50 weeks per year for 4 years is 10,000 hours Or for most students, 40 hours per week for 16 weeks per term for 2 terms per year for 4 years is 5,120 hours. Which might just explain why students coming out of college tend to be at most half good at something.

40 hours per week? Sure, maybe if you're a total conch.

For me, undergrad was more like eighteen hours a week for fourteen weeks, then fifty hours a week for one week. And that was with a heavy physics/maths courseload.

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