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A lot of schools offer certificates, if you are looking for vocational training https://extension.berkeley.edu/public/category/courseCategoryCertificateProfile

by lsc 8y ago

A lot of schools offer certificates, if you are looking for vocational training https://extension.berkeley.edu/public/category/courseCategoryCertificateProfile.do?method=load&certificateId=17558767 https://extension.berkeley.edu/public/category/courseCategor... (among others) but my point here is just that college is... not vocational school. Which isn't to say it's worthless, there are lots of good reasons to go to college, and a lot of people feel they get a lot out of it; I'm just saying that if you want vocational education and you go to college, you are not really using the right tool for the job. I don't have a degree myself, and I dunno, I do pretty okay. I probably would do better if I were the sort of person who went to college; but I do a lot better than a lot of people who are that sort of person, so who knows? I personally want the non-monetary bits of college, but that's mostly... hobby, you know? I like reading. I like talking about books. It really does sound like a lot of fun. Monetarily, though, getting a degree wouldn't get me a raise. It might help me twenty years out, say, or if I spent a lot of time unemployed, as a degree loses it's value much more slowly than a job at a prestigious place, but I don't think a degree has a higher value in the short term than a job at a prestigious place.

kidneysincluded 8y ago
Thanks for the resources and feedback. I'm not really looking for vocational training from a college. I have a bachelors in a non-tech field, and I've actually worked in the education sector for quite some time. I've become very disillusioned about the efficacy of higher education. I was more just curious about people's experiences in the field, and whether the lack of a bachelors makes it harder for career advancement down the line. Thanks again!
- AnimalMuppet 8y ago
  Non-tech bachelors, tech associates, and experience? I wouldn't go back for a tech bachelors unless one of two things were true: 1. You know that you're not getting hired because you don't have a tech bachelors. Not just for once job - I wouldn't go back until I saw a repeated pattern. 2. You decide that you need some things from the degree for yourself, not for credentials for others to look at. That is, you need the knowledge, not the piece of paper.
perl4ever 8y ago
It seems to be a very popular meme these days to declare that college is not vocational education, but that seems to me to be historically ignorant or revisionist, because of how many universities originated as land-grant colleges (e.g. Cornell) or teacher's colleges (e.g. SUNY Albany). Aren't the universities that didn't originate as vocational education more the exception than the rule? It's as though people want to write out of history the whole political movement to make education relevant to the masses during the industrial revolution. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land-grant_university https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land-grant_university and: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morrill_Land-Grant_Acts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morrill_Land-Grant_Acts
- lsc 8y ago
  Huh. interesting. that was not my impression, but I didn't know about the land-grant acts, so perhaps I am wrong. Vetoed by Buchanan - you don't get a much stronger endorsement of a government action than that. It's interesting, and I'm going to read up more on this; I mean, from the overview, it looks like C.P. Snow's "The Two Cultures" thing was a live issue much earlier than I had thought. Note, I think you might be using the word "revisionist" wrong. I was being ignorant or lying, right? (I mean, I was being ignorant, but you can't tell ignorance from deception at a distance.) Historical revisionism is a different thing; and certainly not a thing you can do without quite a lot of knowledge about the subject and the historical context. It's not just making things up (any more than the rest of history isn't just making things up) Go read the wikipedia article on it :)

by lsc 8y ago

kidneysincluded 8y ago

Thanks for the resources and feedback. I'm not really looking for vocational training from a college. I have a bachelors in a non-tech field, and I've actually worked in the education sector for quite some time. I've become very disillusioned about the efficacy of higher education. I was more just curious about people's experiences in the field, and whether the lack of a bachelors makes it harder for career advancement down the line. Thanks again!

AnimalMuppet 8y ago
Non-tech bachelors, tech associates, and experience? I wouldn't go back for a tech bachelors unless one of two things were true: 1. You know that you're not getting hired because you don't have a tech bachelors. Not just for once job - I wouldn't go back until I saw a repeated pattern. 2. You decide that you need some things from the degree for yourself, not for credentials for others to look at. That is, you need the knowledge, not the piece of paper.

perl4ever 8y ago

It seems to be a very popular meme these days to declare that college is not vocational education, but that seems to me to be historically ignorant or revisionist, because of how many universities originated as land-grant colleges (e.g. Cornell) or teacher's colleges (e.g. SUNY Albany). Aren't the universities that didn't originate as vocational education more the exception than the rule? It's as though people want to write out of history the whole political movement to make education relevant to the masses during the industrial revolution. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land-grant_university https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land-grant_university and: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morrill_Land-Grant_Acts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morrill_Land-Grant_Acts

lsc 8y ago
Huh. interesting. that was not my impression, but I didn't know about the land-grant acts, so perhaps I am wrong. Vetoed by Buchanan - you don't get a much stronger endorsement of a government action than that. It's interesting, and I'm going to read up more on this; I mean, from the overview, it looks like C.P. Snow's "The Two Cultures" thing was a live issue much earlier than I had thought. Note, I think you might be using the word "revisionist" wrong. I was being ignorant or lying, right? (I mean, I was being ignorant, but you can't tell ignorance from deception at a distance.) Historical revisionism is a different thing; and certainly not a thing you can do without quite a lot of knowledge about the subject and the historical context. It's not just making things up (any more than the rest of history isn't just making things up) Go read the wikipedia article on it :)