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I dropped out after two years of college and don't regret it even for a second. These days, I'm: -Doing data analysis with pandas on parking tickets just beca

by bpchaps 11y ago

I dropped out after two years of college and don't regret it even for a second. These days, I'm: -Doing data analysis with pandas on parking tickets just because it's fun and it helps people. -Freelancing for HFT firms and doing low level performance tuning. -Playing the drums. -Suing Chicago's mayor. -In the running for an amazing security engineer job. -In the works to start algorithmic trading. -Helping setup a giant LAN party as one of four cofounders. A huge part of me thinks that if I'd continued college, I wouldn't have had a chance to do even a single one of these. My mental model would have just been too hyper focused towards Getting Paid to allow the mental flexibility to say "I can do/learn that!" in most scenarios. I seriously don't consider myself particularly smart/intelligent - most of what I know these days is just learned through hard work and genuine curiosity, which college hugely inhibited. One of the other comments mentioned that degrees open the door for you. Yes they do, but the places I've seen and worked at where that matters are incidentally the worst I've worked at. Self education goes a long way as long as you teach yourself how to learn before you start learning. Employers are often very impressed by that quality, so it's still definitely possible. That said, many folk don't like the fact that I didn't to go college. There's often a lot of animosity with mentions of student loans and knowledge depth over width. "Jealousy" comes close, but it's more seething and exclusionary than that. College is useful if you want to learn things, but often a quicker and more holistic way to learn is to skip college altogether and teach yourself and save your future self from asinine student loans. This goes for folks who're able to get their student loans paid, too. Maybe especially, since you have the money to get an apartment to learn your desired subjects, but also about life. :) (edit: if this sounds arrogant, please let me know. I'm trying to better myself and humility's a strong one I need to work on.)

capote 11y ago
I think you're focusing too much on school being a way to "open doors" or get a job. If you go to school for another reason, namely just to be impressed by professors who are insightful and brilliant, to learn cool things, and to expand your ways of thinking and learning... you wouldn't regret it.
- bpchaps 11y ago
  You should be impressed by professors from all sorts of colleges from all sorts of fields from all over the world already :). The internet's a beautiful thing. So many free lessons and academic papers to choose from.
  - capote 11y ago
    Sure, but I see value in having it structured by the institution. And lectures aren't all you do in school, mind you. You work with peers, you go talk to the professors, you even become friends with them. I used to spend entire evenings in a professor's office just talking about things not even connected to the class I was in. Even the TAs were brilliant people to meet. The combination of all of this is indispensable to me, and I wouldn't have done it any other way.
    - bpchaps 11y ago
      This is actually one of the reasons why I and a lot like me advocate not going to school. There aren't enough non-judging peer groups focused on learning. The ones I've tried looked into tend to avoid the uneducated cranks. Having this sort of network will allow those who can't afford it and large sets of immigrants to have access to information they wouldn't normally have. I come from a largely hispanic area where many of those undocumented recently got the chance to get jobs, but they're still not able to get state assisted education and can't go to higher education. You'd be surprised how many professors you can talk to. I've had some very, very interesting conversations with professors over email, in person and over the phone. All it took was reaching out. A lot of them don't mind talking so long as you show genuine interest and have enough background to back yourself up.
nja4 11y ago
Anecdotal evidence doesn't work though. The majority of "good" software jobs don't just want anyone. The average person can't do all the things you just listed. The average person can't market his/herself without a degree effectively. I feel like we all know success stories, but I would say I have worked with a lot more phds than I have people without a degree. Does that mean that everyone needs to get a phd? No. You can be successful with any level of education, but it's unwise to advise any student to go for this without being exceptional. EDIT: I have worked/am working at 3 companies, a non-profit, Tableau, and Intentional Software. I'm 21. I'm a student. Across the ~100-200 engineers I've met, I've been the least educated.
- bpchaps 11y ago
  Just curious, if I may.. how old are you? My generation was told without question that we need to go to school. Parents, family and teachers all repeated the same thing over and over again. Yet, the folk my age I've talked to all say "Holy fuck, my degree is useless." More of what I'm suggesting is that it's entirely possible to learn depth in a subject without the need for school. I get what you're saying, but with a lot of the dynamics of college education these days, it seems that college is an even greater risk than not going to college. I know and have worked with an almost equal amount of phds and nongrads. They all say the same thing - "I'm not sending my kid to college. What a waste of their time and money."
- bpchaps 11y ago
  Replying to your edit - It sounds like you're an exception and a smart person, then. No sarcasm there. The problem with being exceptional is that you tend to think of everybody else as exceptional, so the ones who'll naturally fail don't really have a fallback. One fallback can be self learning, but the crazy culture of "College dropouts only work at Best Buy"[0] prevents them from being able to get back on their feet. (Of the 1,500 or so engineers I've worked with, I've only known one other person with less education. He dropped out of high school and started worked directly for Wolfram ;).) [0] It's funny how earlier I was accused of using myself as anecdata earlier, but that same user emphatically agreed with someone who used their friend's dropout failure story as evidence that college dropouts will fail. It's so one sided... Editedit: oh, it was you. Yeah, check it out. It's kinda funny.
galistoca 11y ago
One decision opens one door while closing another door. No human being is able to say which decision is better because they only lived one branch of their decision tree. What you've listed out is all nice, but you are forgetting same could be said if you chose to NOT drop out. You probably would have succeeded even if you didn't drop out--in different ways. On the other hand, those who fail do fail regardless of what decision they make. I would say the reason you're living a life you're satisfied with is not because of the decisions you made but because of how well you dealt with consequences of your decisions.
- bpchaps 11y ago
  I'm not necessarily saying that school is useless and that my choice was the best one. I'm saying that there are alternatives that work but are never talked about. I'm saying that "I didn't go to college", shouldn't be a taboo as it so often is. Wider selection and a fallback that doesn't cause major life consequences is all I'm asking for for others. 18 year olds are smart enough not to make the good decisions, but they often don't have the wisdom to make the right decisions.

by bpchaps 11y ago

capote 11y ago

I think you're focusing too much on school being a way to "open doors" or get a job. If you go to school for another reason, namely just to be impressed by professors who are insightful and brilliant, to learn cool things, and to expand your ways of thinking and learning... you wouldn't regret it.

bpchaps 11y ago
You should be impressed by professors from all sorts of colleges from all sorts of fields from all over the world already :). The internet's a beautiful thing. So many free lessons and academic papers to choose from.
- capote 11y ago
  Sure, but I see value in having it structured by the institution. And lectures aren't all you do in school, mind you. You work with peers, you go talk to the professors, you even become friends with them. I used to spend entire evenings in a professor's office just talking about things not even connected to the class I was in. Even the TAs were brilliant people to meet. The combination of all of this is indispensable to me, and I wouldn't have done it any other way.
  - bpchaps 11y ago
    This is actually one of the reasons why I and a lot like me advocate not going to school. There aren't enough non-judging peer groups focused on learning. The ones I've tried looked into tend to avoid the uneducated cranks. Having this sort of network will allow those who can't afford it and large sets of immigrants to have access to information they wouldn't normally have. I come from a largely hispanic area where many of those undocumented recently got the chance to get jobs, but they're still not able to get state assisted education and can't go to higher education. You'd be surprised how many professors you can talk to. I've had some very, very interesting conversations with professors over email, in person and over the phone. All it took was reaching out. A lot of them don't mind talking so long as you show genuine interest and have enough background to back yourself up.

nja4 11y ago

Anecdotal evidence doesn't work though. The majority of "good" software jobs don't just want anyone. The average person can't do all the things you just listed. The average person can't market his/herself without a degree effectively. I feel like we all know success stories, but I would say I have worked with a lot more phds than I have people without a degree. Does that mean that everyone needs to get a phd? No. You can be successful with any level of education, but it's unwise to advise any student to go for this without being exceptional. EDIT: I have worked/am working at 3 companies, a non-profit, Tableau, and Intentional Software. I'm 21. I'm a student. Across the ~100-200 engineers I've met, I've been the least educated.

bpchaps 11y ago
Just curious, if I may.. how old are you? My generation was told without question that we need to go to school. Parents, family and teachers all repeated the same thing over and over again. Yet, the folk my age I've talked to all say "Holy fuck, my degree is useless." More of what I'm suggesting is that it's entirely possible to learn depth in a subject without the need for school. I get what you're saying, but with a lot of the dynamics of college education these days, it seems that college is an even greater risk than not going to college. I know and have worked with an almost equal amount of phds and nongrads. They all say the same thing - "I'm not sending my kid to college. What a waste of their time and money."
bpchaps 11y ago
Replying to your edit - It sounds like you're an exception and a smart person, then. No sarcasm there. The problem with being exceptional is that you tend to think of everybody else as exceptional, so the ones who'll naturally fail don't really have a fallback. One fallback can be self learning, but the crazy culture of "College dropouts only work at Best Buy"[0] prevents them from being able to get back on their feet. (Of the 1,500 or so engineers I've worked with, I've only known one other person with less education. He dropped out of high school and started worked directly for Wolfram ;).) [0] It's funny how earlier I was accused of using myself as anecdata earlier, but that same user emphatically agreed with someone who used their friend's dropout failure story as evidence that college dropouts will fail. It's so one sided... Editedit: oh, it was you. Yeah, check it out. It's kinda funny.

galistoca 11y ago

One decision opens one door while closing another door. No human being is able to say which decision is better because they only lived one branch of their decision tree. What you've listed out is all nice, but you are forgetting same could be said if you chose to NOT drop out. You probably would have succeeded even if you didn't drop out--in different ways. On the other hand, those who fail do fail regardless of what decision they make. I would say the reason you're living a life you're satisfied with is not because of the decisions you made but because of how well you dealt with consequences of your decisions.

bpchaps 11y ago
I'm not necessarily saying that school is useless and that my choice was the best one. I'm saying that there are alternatives that work but are never talked about. I'm saying that "I didn't go to college", shouldn't be a taboo as it so often is. Wider selection and a fallback that doesn't cause major life consequences is all I'm asking for for others. 18 year olds are smart enough not to make the good decisions, but they often don't have the wisdom to make the right decisions.