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Talking with co-workers who completed 4 year CS degrees, I feel like I got a much better value out of my now defunct 2 year trade school. Mind you this was 15

by donatj 7y ago

Talking with co-workers who completed 4 year CS degrees, I feel like I got a much better value out of my now defunct 2 year trade school. Mind you this was 15 years ago, but I came out of it with a decent enough working knowledge of C, C++, VB.Net and Java - and basic understanding of SQL, PLScheme and functional. On top of that there was a solid year of data structure class. Trade schools have been largely demonized and shut down in the last couple years, but I can say honestly I would not be where I am today without it. I never would have cut it in college, I did really mediocre in grade school, I had trouble focusing on things I didn't care about. However, in trade school I flourished, largely because I actually cared about what I was learning. I graduated with a 4.0 and I make six figures now. I genuinely see college requirements as a horrible way to filter useful but unbalanced people like myself out of the work force.

1290cc 7y ago
Same here, getting close to hitting 7 figures. Never stepped foot in a university but I was coding from 13 and working part time from about that age. Uni just seemed like a waste of time as the CS curriculum was already out of date for modern development in the country I'm from (this was mid 90s and internet was taking off). I would not recommend this career track if you're the kind of person that wants to climb a career ladder and go into management on the business side of things, there are definitely useful skills to acquire on the legal and softskills side. Having any degree will just check a box and help people without a clear view of what they want out of the future. It can also help if you want to put yourself through being just another number at a FANG organisation. Too stubborn and arrogant to allow someone to tell me I'm incapable of being a success without a piece of paper.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- winrid 7y ago
  Regarding the management comment. I took the trade school route and after being an IC for a while I currently lead a team of engineers - without a degree. Maybe it would have helped though. I've had to read CS books everyday and still do.
- cryptica 7y ago
  The most valuable lessons I got from University were: - Time and space complexity (Big O, Little O, big Omega) - Algorithms and data structures (linked lists, heaps, trees, graphs, search algorithms, sorting algorithms) - Artificial intelligence (neural networks, evolutionary computation, decision trees) - Electrical engineering logic gates and circuit analysis (gives a good basic understanding) - Discrete maths (De Morgan's laws) - Database design The database design course I did was heavily centered around relational databases but some of the core concepts of this course ended up being very valuable for any kind of DB and also for areas outside of the DB. It taught me a lot about useful software engineering concepts such as identifying functional dependencies in the data, achieving good separation of concerns, establishing a clear data flow, one-source-of-truth principle, indexing of data, etc...
  - antb123 7y ago
    Unfortunately with 95% of programming you just reuse libraries created by someone else and modern programming language come with much of the data structures built in.
  - pickle-wizard 7y ago
    I had to learn all that stuff, and it has been nearly 20 years since I took many of those classes. Except for the database design, which I use regularly, I've forgotten it all. Which is really frustrating, because I put a lot of time, effort and money into learning that stuff. The other day one of our network guys asked me what a Red-Black Tree is. I couldn't explain it. I got an A in my algorithms and data structures class, but I haven't used it so I forgot it.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
mlthoughts2018 7y ago
While I agree trade schools are not considered enough for the value they can add, your comment strikes me as reinforcing the college degree path. 1. Beyond a few general requirements, most CS programs do let you focus on what you’re interested in, and to much greater depth and pragmatic application than trade school. “Focusing on things you don’t care about” is a very minor part of college technical programs unless you make up your mind to solely care about some small niche. 2. “I never would have cut it in college” is not a free pass from needing a well-rounded education, appreciation of art, literature, business, ethics, etc., and good writing, communication and organizational skills well beyond what’s taught in trade school. This is becoming increasingly critical in business software settings, where developers are often working directly in tandem with product managers. I could see trade school working for very specific niche areas, like DBA for a single specific enterprise database system, or breadth of knowledge in devops compatibility across multiple cloud vendors. But I can’t see trade school as a reliable way to get necessary experience for general software architecture applied to business problems and fundamentals for the social coordination of multi-system software projects. You personally might have had the raw talent and gumption to parlay trade school into that sort of career skill, I’m just saying it’s not likely to work out as well for a random student in today’s job market.
- BeetleB 7y ago
  > Beyond a few general requirements, most CS programs do let you focus on what you’re interested in, and to much greater depth and pragmatic application than trade school. Not that few. Here's what mine has: - Writing x 2 - Discrete Mathematics (a few concepts in there are really needed - the rest is mostly not) - Public Speaking - Humanities x 4 - Calculus x 2 (I doubt even 10% of SW folks use this) - Linear Algebra (as few as calculus use this) - science course (e.g. chemisty, bio, phys - you pick) x 2 - Non tech seminars x 2 - Probability and Statistics (I'd argue one should take this, but I'd still wager less than a quarter of developers use this) What's worse: The majority of the above are in the first two years - so if you don't have the discipline to do courses you feel are irrelevant, you just want get to the fun stuff. Only 6 out of the first 20 courses are related to computers. > “I never would have cut it in college” is not a free pass from needing a well-rounded education, appreciation of art, literature, business, ethics, etc., and good writing, communication and organizational skills well beyond what’s taught in trade school. This is becoming increasingly critical in business software settings, where developers are often working directly in tandem with product managers. Look - I think I gained quite a bit from the well rounded education I got. And my general advice is that people should go for it. However, I also have the reality of experience: Most of my peers who have degrees are poor at writing, poor at communication, poor at ethics, and poor at business skills. I see nothing differentiating them from trade school folks in this regard - and these all matter in the work place. So yes, I gained quite a bit from those courses. But the reality is most grads do not.
pgcj_poster 7y ago
> Trade schools have been largely demonized and shut down in the last couple years, I didn't know this and I find it incredibly surprising. I've literally never heard anyone say anything bad about trade school ever. In fact, I almost always hear about it in contrast with college, which is said to be an expensive waste of time that turns kids into gay communists.
- mathgladiator 7y ago
  It depends a lot on the school and parents. I had considered a trade school since I like to build shit, but i was pushed away from it.
- slantaclaus 7y ago
  Gay communist here, can confirm
AjwadJaved 7y ago
Good bootcamps are an alrighty substitute, no? Most of them are a bit of a scam but they do get you up and running pretty quickly with a top-down approach.

by donatj 7y ago

1290cc 7y ago

Same here, getting close to hitting 7 figures. Never stepped foot in a university but I was coding from 13 and working part time from about that age. Uni just seemed like a waste of time as the CS curriculum was already out of date for modern development in the country I'm from (this was mid 90s and internet was taking off). I would not recommend this career track if you're the kind of person that wants to climb a career ladder and go into management on the business side of things, there are definitely useful skills to acquire on the legal and softskills side. Having any degree will just check a box and help people without a clear view of what they want out of the future. It can also help if you want to put yourself through being just another number at a FANG organisation. Too stubborn and arrogant to allow someone to tell me I'm incapable of being a success without a piece of paper.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
winrid 7y ago
Regarding the management comment. I took the trade school route and after being an IC for a while I currently lead a team of engineers - without a degree. Maybe it would have helped though. I've had to read CS books everyday and still do.
cryptica 7y ago
The most valuable lessons I got from University were: - Time and space complexity (Big O, Little O, big Omega) - Algorithms and data structures (linked lists, heaps, trees, graphs, search algorithms, sorting algorithms) - Artificial intelligence (neural networks, evolutionary computation, decision trees) - Electrical engineering logic gates and circuit analysis (gives a good basic understanding) - Discrete maths (De Morgan's laws) - Database design The database design course I did was heavily centered around relational databases but some of the core concepts of this course ended up being very valuable for any kind of DB and also for areas outside of the DB. It taught me a lot about useful software engineering concepts such as identifying functional dependencies in the data, achieving good separation of concerns, establishing a clear data flow, one-source-of-truth principle, indexing of data, etc...
- antb123 7y ago
  Unfortunately with 95% of programming you just reuse libraries created by someone else and modern programming language come with much of the data structures built in.
- pickle-wizard 7y ago
  I had to learn all that stuff, and it has been nearly 20 years since I took many of those classes. Except for the database design, which I use regularly, I've forgotten it all. Which is really frustrating, because I put a lot of time, effort and money into learning that stuff. The other day one of our network guys asked me what a Red-Black Tree is. I couldn't explain it. I got an A in my algorithms and data structures class, but I haven't used it so I forgot it.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

mlthoughts2018 7y ago

While I agree trade schools are not considered enough for the value they can add, your comment strikes me as reinforcing the college degree path. 1. Beyond a few general requirements, most CS programs do let you focus on what you’re interested in, and to much greater depth and pragmatic application than trade school. “Focusing on things you don’t care about” is a very minor part of college technical programs unless you make up your mind to solely care about some small niche. 2. “I never would have cut it in college” is not a free pass from needing a well-rounded education, appreciation of art, literature, business, ethics, etc., and good writing, communication and organizational skills well beyond what’s taught in trade school. This is becoming increasingly critical in business software settings, where developers are often working directly in tandem with product managers. I could see trade school working for very specific niche areas, like DBA for a single specific enterprise database system, or breadth of knowledge in devops compatibility across multiple cloud vendors. But I can’t see trade school as a reliable way to get necessary experience for general software architecture applied to business problems and fundamentals for the social coordination of multi-system software projects. You personally might have had the raw talent and gumption to parlay trade school into that sort of career skill, I’m just saying it’s not likely to work out as well for a random student in today’s job market.

BeetleB 7y ago
> Beyond a few general requirements, most CS programs do let you focus on what you’re interested in, and to much greater depth and pragmatic application than trade school. Not that few. Here's what mine has: - Writing x 2 - Discrete Mathematics (a few concepts in there are really needed - the rest is mostly not) - Public Speaking - Humanities x 4 - Calculus x 2 (I doubt even 10% of SW folks use this) - Linear Algebra (as few as calculus use this) - science course (e.g. chemisty, bio, phys - you pick) x 2 - Non tech seminars x 2 - Probability and Statistics (I'd argue one should take this, but I'd still wager less than a quarter of developers use this) What's worse: The majority of the above are in the first two years - so if you don't have the discipline to do courses you feel are irrelevant, you just want get to the fun stuff. Only 6 out of the first 20 courses are related to computers. > “I never would have cut it in college” is not a free pass from needing a well-rounded education, appreciation of art, literature, business, ethics, etc., and good writing, communication and organizational skills well beyond what’s taught in trade school. This is becoming increasingly critical in business software settings, where developers are often working directly in tandem with product managers. Look - I think I gained quite a bit from the well rounded education I got. And my general advice is that people should go for it. However, I also have the reality of experience: Most of my peers who have degrees are poor at writing, poor at communication, poor at ethics, and poor at business skills. I see nothing differentiating them from trade school folks in this regard - and these all matter in the work place. So yes, I gained quite a bit from those courses. But the reality is most grads do not.

pgcj_poster 7y ago

> Trade schools have been largely demonized and shut down in the last couple years, I didn't know this and I find it incredibly surprising. I've literally never heard anyone say anything bad about trade school ever. In fact, I almost always hear about it in contrast with college, which is said to be an expensive waste of time that turns kids into gay communists.

mathgladiator 7y ago
It depends a lot on the school and parents. I had considered a trade school since I like to build shit, but i was pushed away from it.
slantaclaus 7y ago
Gay communist here, can confirm

AjwadJaved 7y ago

Good bootcamps are an alrighty substitute, no? Most of them are a bit of a scam but they do get you up and running pretty quickly with a top-down approach.