4 ms·

He isn't just sticking you in a bucket randomly. Your language on the subject has an emotional edge that goes beyond dispassionate observation that college educ

He isn't just sticking you in a bucket randomly. Your language on the subject has an emotional edge that goes beyond dispassionate observation that college education may be overvalued. It actively pushes the reader toward the conclusion that you actually do have a dog in the fight, and the college system has somehow wronged you. I don't know if it has, but based on said language, I'd be surprised if it hadn't. My perspective: Having gone to CMU CS, which on the one hand doesn't have particular brand recognition outside CS, but on the other hand is fairly good at CS as undergrad programs go, I believe I can say that I probably did get 100k and possibly even 200k of value out of the education, quite aside from the piece of paper. A lot of the teachers I had were really seriously excellent (and I don't say that lightly), and I wouldn't have been able to learn from teachers that good in that array of subjects (field theory, abstract algebra, robotics, cryptography, etc) as well in any other situation. Yes, I could have read wikipedia and the lkml and so on, but, having done both, classes from really really good teachers work better. On the other hand, I think I got lucky not only in terms of the ratio of program strength to brand recognition, but also in which teachers I got within the university; if I had taken different classes in different semesters, I believe I could have done a lot worse. Not remotely all the teachers were good or even passable. And, I could easily imagine getting very little value out of the experience, and I bet a lot of people, particularly ones at big-brand institutions, do overpay for the education they get. The point is, it's a complicated question. There clearly is some value in some undergrad programs, and there also clearly is a problem with rising prices. Comparing it to a con scheme is not really doing it justice.

kwis 15y ago
I'd bet that the net present value of your CMU CS experience is quite a bit higher than you estimate. As a credential, it's very well known in tech-heavy industries and will help open doors there. Further, it's a good enough school that it will help open doors if you decide to pursue a graduate degree in the future. As an experience, you got the opportunity to work with top professors and it sounds like you actively sought them out to get those experiences. Further, you almost certainly got to know a lot of students and if you were smart, reliable and hard-working, likely created a situation that could open professional opportunities in the future. I'll concede that the correlation between a conferred degree and the value captured by the student is not perfect, and that a degree is not the only opportunity to capture value between the ages of 18 and 22. But I largely believe the "debate" consists largely of overblown, hyperbolic rhetoric and oversimplification.

kwis 15y ago

I'd bet that the net present value of your CMU CS experience is quite a bit higher than you estimate. As a credential, it's very well known in tech-heavy industries and will help open doors there. Further, it's a good enough school that it will help open doors if you decide to pursue a graduate degree in the future. As an experience, you got the opportunity to work with top professors and it sounds like you actively sought them out to get those experiences. Further, you almost certainly got to know a lot of students and if you were smart, reliable and hard-working, likely created a situation that could open professional opportunities in the future. I'll concede that the correlation between a conferred degree and the value captured by the student is not perfect, and that a degree is not the only opportunity to capture value between the ages of 18 and 22. But I largely believe the "debate" consists largely of overblown, hyperbolic rhetoric and oversimplification.