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I'm 37. At my age a degree is completely irrelevant if you have the skill set. In fact, ten years ago I was approached by a university to start my Master's degr

I'm 37. At my age a degree is completely irrelevant if you have the skill set. In fact, ten years ago I was approached by a university to start my Master's degree, with the missing Bachelor's degree being credited through time spent working in my industry at the time. The reality of education in America is that it's an expensive tickbox. It verges on being a racket. While you don't want to be the lone rebel being crushed under the wheels of the machine, if you can avoid becoming indentured to the government with a student loan then do yourself a favour and choose not to waste money on education you can just teach yourself.

dopamean 11y ago
I'm 29 and do not have an undergrad degree. I was recently accepted to a well respected masters in computer science program. I declined to go because I'm pretty happy with my career trajectory at the moment and I think taking the time off work to do that would actually be detrimental.
- ErikRogneby 11y ago
  Usually to be accepted you need to apply. Why apply if you were going to turn it down? (genuine curiosity)
  - jamestnz 11y ago
    I'm not the OP, but I think it's not that uncommon for people to apply for positions/opportunities that they're either ambivalent about, or outright have no intention of accepting. I know I've done it before. Some feel this helps them to stay "well practiced" at going through recruitment/interviewing, gives them a good reason to keep their résumé up to date, expands their professional network, gives the potential confidence-boost of being offered a position then declining it, and so forth.
  - dopamean 11y ago
    Hey sorry for the late reply. I applied at a time when I was unhappy with my job and was unsure of my prospects. During the time I applied I was out doing interviews as well. I got a job at a company I love and am really excited about it. That excitement has more to do with why I declined to go to grad school in the end.
eropple 11y ago
> indentured to the government with a student loan I graduated with under $30K in debt from a state school (with a number of merit scholarships and some but not extensive parental help) and paid it off my second year out of college. One need not take on heavy debt (don't you love the rhetorical phrasing, though? Indentured!) to go to college, and I tend to think that self-styled autodidacts discount the social rounding and educational breadth available at any good university.
- redblacktree 11y ago
  > self-styled autodidacts discount the social rounding and educational breadth available at any good university. Yes, you learn to use words like "autodidact" instead of "self-taught."
  - logical42 11y ago
    'Self-taught' isn't exactly a drop in replacement for 'autodidact'. You'd have to say 'self-taught person' or something, which is more awkward as a phrase.
- oberstein 11y ago
  How much under $30k were you? $30k is still a lot of money, even if it's not the even larger $100k-$150k number more and more people are reporting. What were your average monthly expenses including the summer months, and did you work at all? If you're going to be indentured, then at least indenture yourself for an engineering degree. $30k isn't hard to pay off within a year or two of full time employment, and even $100k-$150k in debt isn't infeasible to pay off in a short amount of time (shorter than it took to accumulate) if your degree qualifies you for a well-paying low-stress engineering position at BigCo. Do you think that your assertion about not taking on heavy debt will remain true? Debt continues to rise, as does the cost of tuition. If more students seek out the cheaper state schools, or the cheaper community colleges beforehand, the cheaper state schools are going to raise their prices to deal with the increase in load.
  - morgante 11y ago
dtparr 11y ago
> At my age a degree is completely irrelevant if you have the skill set. This is a dangerous thing to say without any qualifiers. It depends on the industry, economic conditions in your area, type/size of company you want to work for, etc. I've known a couple individuals who had the skills and 20+ years of experience who lost jobs at floundering companies and weren't able to find anything relevant due to a lack of a degree. In both cases, they had a few interviews that were basically "Wow, you're a great fit experience-wise and it like you've worked with the same technologies/processes we use here and some we're hoping to go to. Oh, except we can't hire you for an engineering role unless you have at least a BS. Would you be interested in an hourly maintenance job?"
- nsxwolf 11y ago
  But that's madness! You'd be great for this job but we can't hire you because you don't have a piece of paper? How long can these self inflicted meaningless restrictions continue?
  - IkmoIkmo 11y ago
    I agree. Although sometimes there are legal requirements. Like a lawyer in a law firm, don't know how it is in the US (probably the same) but here there's no way you can practice law and represent someone in a court without a master's legal degree. And starting your own firm requires a degree above that. Although you can start a legal advisory firm without it. I appreciate you may still think that legal requirement is madness but I can imagine there are some jobs where you want a government to accredit a university's degree, as a form of consumer protection and regulation. For example say a doctor, or a financial advisor, you may want to have 'audited' and given some level of quality assurance, which is essentially what government-accredited degrees aim to prove. What would be madness is if that same government did not try to accommodate for people with degree-equivalent experience to get their experiences accredited with a formal degree at no-cost or low-cost. For example if you're a self-taught engineer who, due to work experience, could actually finish engineering courses without going to any classes because of self-education, then you ought to be able to (after demonstrating said experience) pay for the mere administrative cost of examination (i.e. $50 per exam) and take all examinations in a year for less than $1k and get your degree. Without spending years, going to classes, and paying tens of thousands for teaching you don't need and won't make use of. This isn't always easy but separating examination from teaching in schools is something I think we haven't explored enough. You can do a GED or GMAT without enrolling in any classes, and just taking exams, and if self-taught or skilled by experience somehow, then the test is just an accreditation of your skills. Yet we don't have equivalents for advanced degrees. It's not easy to set this up of course, but I think we ought to try more. Although for legal professions it exist, the bar exam afaik doesn't require you to ever have gone to law school, if you happen to be able to take it due to e.g. working in a legal office and somehow picking up everything in an assistant role.
jschwartzi 11y ago
There's a good 17 years gap that a non-graduate would have to fill. How did you spend your time after you finished high school?

dopamean 11y ago

I'm 29 and do not have an undergrad degree. I was recently accepted to a well respected masters in computer science program. I declined to go because I'm pretty happy with my career trajectory at the moment and I think taking the time off work to do that would actually be detrimental.

ErikRogneby 11y ago
Usually to be accepted you need to apply. Why apply if you were going to turn it down? (genuine curiosity)
- jamestnz 11y ago
  I'm not the OP, but I think it's not that uncommon for people to apply for positions/opportunities that they're either ambivalent about, or outright have no intention of accepting. I know I've done it before. Some feel this helps them to stay "well practiced" at going through recruitment/interviewing, gives them a good reason to keep their résumé up to date, expands their professional network, gives the potential confidence-boost of being offered a position then declining it, and so forth.
- dopamean 11y ago
  Hey sorry for the late reply. I applied at a time when I was unhappy with my job and was unsure of my prospects. During the time I applied I was out doing interviews as well. I got a job at a company I love and am really excited about it. That excitement has more to do with why I declined to go to grad school in the end.

eropple 11y ago

> indentured to the government with a student loan I graduated with under $30K in debt from a state school (with a number of merit scholarships and some but not extensive parental help) and paid it off my second year out of college. One need not take on heavy debt (don't you love the rhetorical phrasing, though? Indentured!) to go to college, and I tend to think that self-styled autodidacts discount the social rounding and educational breadth available at any good university.

redblacktree 11y ago
> self-styled autodidacts discount the social rounding and educational breadth available at any good university. Yes, you learn to use words like "autodidact" instead of "self-taught."
- logical42 11y ago
  'Self-taught' isn't exactly a drop in replacement for 'autodidact'. You'd have to say 'self-taught person' or something, which is more awkward as a phrase.
oberstein 11y ago
How much under $30k were you? $30k is still a lot of money, even if it's not the even larger $100k-$150k number more and more people are reporting. What were your average monthly expenses including the summer months, and did you work at all? If you're going to be indentured, then at least indenture yourself for an engineering degree. $30k isn't hard to pay off within a year or two of full time employment, and even $100k-$150k in debt isn't infeasible to pay off in a short amount of time (shorter than it took to accumulate) if your degree qualifies you for a well-paying low-stress engineering position at BigCo. Do you think that your assertion about not taking on heavy debt will remain true? Debt continues to rise, as does the cost of tuition. If more students seek out the cheaper state schools, or the cheaper community colleges beforehand, the cheaper state schools are going to raise their prices to deal with the increase in load.
- morgante 11y ago

dtparr 11y ago

> At my age a degree is completely irrelevant if you have the skill set. This is a dangerous thing to say without any qualifiers. It depends on the industry, economic conditions in your area, type/size of company you want to work for, etc. I've known a couple individuals who had the skills and 20+ years of experience who lost jobs at floundering companies and weren't able to find anything relevant due to a lack of a degree. In both cases, they had a few interviews that were basically "Wow, you're a great fit experience-wise and it like you've worked with the same technologies/processes we use here and some we're hoping to go to. Oh, except we can't hire you for an engineering role unless you have at least a BS. Would you be interested in an hourly maintenance job?"

nsxwolf 11y ago
But that's madness! You'd be great for this job but we can't hire you because you don't have a piece of paper? How long can these self inflicted meaningless restrictions continue?
- IkmoIkmo 11y ago
  I agree. Although sometimes there are legal requirements. Like a lawyer in a law firm, don't know how it is in the US (probably the same) but here there's no way you can practice law and represent someone in a court without a master's legal degree. And starting your own firm requires a degree above that. Although you can start a legal advisory firm without it. I appreciate you may still think that legal requirement is madness but I can imagine there are some jobs where you want a government to accredit a university's degree, as a form of consumer protection and regulation. For example say a doctor, or a financial advisor, you may want to have 'audited' and given some level of quality assurance, which is essentially what government-accredited degrees aim to prove. What would be madness is if that same government did not try to accommodate for people with degree-equivalent experience to get their experiences accredited with a formal degree at no-cost or low-cost. For example if you're a self-taught engineer who, due to work experience, could actually finish engineering courses without going to any classes because of self-education, then you ought to be able to (after demonstrating said experience) pay for the mere administrative cost of examination (i.e. $50 per exam) and take all examinations in a year for less than $1k and get your degree. Without spending years, going to classes, and paying tens of thousands for teaching you don't need and won't make use of. This isn't always easy but separating examination from teaching in schools is something I think we haven't explored enough. You can do a GED or GMAT without enrolling in any classes, and just taking exams, and if self-taught or skilled by experience somehow, then the test is just an accreditation of your skills. Yet we don't have equivalents for advanced degrees. It's not easy to set this up of course, but I think we ought to try more. Although for legal professions it exist, the bar exam afaik doesn't require you to ever have gone to law school, if you happen to be able to take it due to e.g. working in a legal office and somehow picking up everything in an assistant role.

jschwartzi 11y ago

There's a good 17 years gap that a non-graduate would have to fill. How did you spend your time after you finished high school?