5 ms·

Graduating engineers who studied computer science in a decent school (not necessarily at Stanford; any school that covered languages and algorithms and made stu

by ptero 3y ago

Graduating engineers who studied computer science in a decent school (not necessarily at Stanford; any school that covered languages and algorithms and made students use those in context of practical problems) will do just fine. They will not have a 7-digit bank account 5 years after graduation, but they can still find good tech jobs that, averaged over several years, pay more than enough for a good quality of life. On age, as a single data point from someone whose age starts with "5", I have not seen particular difficulties in job hunting. To maintain long-term employability I recommend broadening experience beyond the pure computer science to domains that leverage computers to build new things: medical devices, signal processing, sensors, computational biotech, satellites, audio; whatever looks fun. My 2c.

superchroma 3y ago
what has worked for me is picking a career theme. Working at companies that thematically align. You build up a host of knowledge that is not computer related but instead is domain related and this offers value too.
throwaway33381 3y ago
No. That just isn't true. Only 8% of students end up with jobs 10 years after. There's an IEE Report on this specific issue. It's much worse for minorities where job placement is nearly guaranteed to not occur. It's across almost all universities. https://spectrum.ieee.org/stem-education-in-the-us-is-more-or-less-needed https://spectrum.ieee.org/stem-education-in-the-us-is-more-o...
- HEmanZ 3y ago
  The article you linked is about ALL STEM majors taken combined. Computer Science degrees have a much much better placement. Also the above commenter mentioned that it needs to be a “real” comp sci degree, not one that calls itself comp sci but never makes you learn classes like Data structures, algorithms, etc. There are “fake” CS degrees out there, and big employers know they are no good. My university CS department has a 100% placement every. single. year. Including the last 3 years, and it’s like not even a top 100 school in the US.
  - throwaway33381 3y ago
    No school has 100% job placement. That's literally impossible. I went to a top 20 school and job placement was barely 50% but claimed it had 95%. The only reason I knew they were lying is because the one of the professors I researched under told me the statistics were falsified to make the program look good.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      That doesn't seem right. I went to a state school. I think CS grads had a marketed 90ish% placement rate. Talking to others in my classes right before graduation it seems we had at least 80% of people with jobs lined up prior to graduation.
      - throwaway33381 3y ago
        It's not. It's often due to under reporting. And sometimes the blatant falsification of data. But you don't really need to do that when only a small percentage of individuals reply to your survey. And thats how you get a high placement rate. You also need to understand that for the hundreds of thousands of CS, IT degrees that are awarded each year only a few thousand jobs exist at the entry level. You see reports of hundreds of thousands of job postings but the vast majority are just repeats of the same listing.
        giantg2 3y ago
        Please post something to back up what you're saying. Right now it sounds like you're a conspiracy theorist, or maybe even troll with that throw away. There are about 65k CS undergraduate degrees issued each year. I don't think the BLS is double counting jobs. I believe they go to the companies for that info, not random job boards.
    - HEmanZ 3y ago
      For CS grads, it’s got to be close. I’m sure it’s not exactly 100%, every year, forever, but I’m well involved in the program and can’t think of a single student since I graduated that didn’t land a job out of college, and the program advertises it as 95%. No one from there goes to FAANG, it’s not a prestigious enough school for that. But there is an endless demand in large companies like government contractors, banks, the small web dev shops, etc. that need programmers for 60k$ out of school.
- giantg2 3y ago
  Wow, I made it to the 8% mark. I'm burnt out, so I doubt I'll be in it much longer. "One area where STEM students are needed is in aerospace and especially the defense industry." One issue they didn't mention about this is the shitty work environment for many of the jobs. The people I talk to who are leaving the defense industry can't stand the politics and procedures anymore.
  - throwaway33381 3y ago
    [flagged]
- mym1990 3y ago
  Come on, that link is from 11 years ago. It says only 8% end up with jobs 10 years later in their field of study. There is no evidence presented as to the actual causation. This is a particularly funny quote given the times we live in now: “A third is that there are not a lot of exciting new aerospace or defense initiatives that spur the imagination of young engineers like there once were.”
  - giantg2 3y ago
    How is that funny? Compared to previous times it seems there aren't that many groundbreaking programs, from what we can see. Most of aviation innovation is suppressed by market demands - we want tried and true, low-risk designs. This is in stark contrast to the 50s-80s. Space is a fairly small market, but has some stuff going on. Nothing on the scale of the space race era. Even in the 90s they were talking about how space launches would become so routine. Then, if you launched a mission it was likely 70% new tech, procedures, or experiments. Now all the missions build off of previous ones. Hey, look a new space telescope! Been there, done that, barely makes the news. Defense is a wildcard since the interesting stuff is classified. There are some interesting problems in the DARPA competitions. Not a lot of freedom in those jobs - lots of politics usually.
    - mym1990 3y ago
      Seriously? I'm going to guess that it's highly unlikely that you have worked on the Hubble(or the Webb), so for you to say 'been there, done that' just show how de-sensitized you are to actual achievements. Space race budgets were only really significantly elevated from 62-69, and fell off pretty precipitously after that, so to attribute all of that spending to 3 decades is wrong as well. Aviation innovation is not suppressed by market demands, it is because the private market can now participate that innovation is happening again. But you don't seem to get that aviation and rocket innovation is indeed rocket science, and 'low risk designs' aren't just established over night.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        "so for you to say 'been there, done that' just show how de-sensitized you are to actual achievements." No shit, that's the entire point - society doesn't care anymore because it isn't shiny. Take a survey on the street of space telescopes and most won't even be aware of the Jame Webb. "so to attribute all of that spending to 3 decades is wrong as well." Much of those subsequent decades built off of the information and ideas generated in that time period. They still had regular manned missions and large innovations like the space shuttle. No more manned launches from NASA. No more prestige. "But you don't seem to get that aviation and rocket innovation is indeed rocket science, " I do get that. Now please go compare the rate of innovation and newly adopted designs today versus decades ago. Today it's all about tweaking some existing model for slightly more efficiency and running computer models.
giantg2 3y ago
This has not been my experience. I have no real career prospects (it feels like just a job now). I'm burnt out and have basically zero marketable skills. Even out of college, I had to apply to about 250 positions. I have a masters from a better school now and it doesn't feel like it made any difference. "I recommend broadening experience beyond the pure computer science to domains that leverage computers to build new things: medical devices, signal processing, sensors, computational biotech, satellites, audio; whatever looks fun." I love learning about this stuff. I really love the synergistic aspect of doing what you describe. But at the end of the day, it means nothing. Who cares if you built simple apps, have a personal website, worked on personal audio processing projects, or built some homebrew IoT type stuff? Certainly hasn't meant shit for my career. They want people who have done this in an enterprise setting.
- ptero 3y ago
  There are definitely data points different from mine. And apologies if I am offering advice where none is wanted, but I want to clarify what I meant above. What I meant by "broadening experience" is not a hobby-level stuff you describe (still very useful on a personal development level) but gaining enough depth in another field to be comparable to an undergraduate with that specialization; or at least with a minor in that area. It is a higher bar, but someone with good CS background can master the equivalent of the 3-5 higher undergrad level classes pretty quickly. I agree that software companies are not really interested in non-software hobby projects. But non-software tech companies often put a very high value on software as a secondary skill in their non-software hires and are willing to lower the bar for their primary tech competency. My 2c.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    "not a hobby-level stuff" Well, that's sort of a catch-22. Either you need a credential (major, minor, certificate), or you need work experience in it. But of course you need that work experience in order to get the job, so it doesn't really make you more employable. Plus, most would tend to lose career velocity as they jump from one domain to the next. "There are definitely data points different from mine." That was all I was trying to say. Certainly applies to me as well.
elforce002 3y ago
This. The reality here is that CS combined with other areas will open a whole world and keep you employable for the time being (at least before any big corp comes with chatgpt 7, hehe).

by ptero 3y ago

superchroma 3y ago

what has worked for me is picking a career theme. Working at companies that thematically align. You build up a host of knowledge that is not computer related but instead is domain related and this offers value too.

throwaway33381 3y ago

No. That just isn't true. Only 8% of students end up with jobs 10 years after. There's an IEE Report on this specific issue. It's much worse for minorities where job placement is nearly guaranteed to not occur. It's across almost all universities. https://spectrum.ieee.org/stem-education-in-the-us-is-more-or-less-needed https://spectrum.ieee.org/stem-education-in-the-us-is-more-o...

HEmanZ 3y ago
The article you linked is about ALL STEM majors taken combined. Computer Science degrees have a much much better placement. Also the above commenter mentioned that it needs to be a “real” comp sci degree, not one that calls itself comp sci but never makes you learn classes like Data structures, algorithms, etc. There are “fake” CS degrees out there, and big employers know they are no good. My university CS department has a 100% placement every. single. year. Including the last 3 years, and it’s like not even a top 100 school in the US.
- throwaway33381 3y ago
  No school has 100% job placement. That's literally impossible. I went to a top 20 school and job placement was barely 50% but claimed it had 95%. The only reason I knew they were lying is because the one of the professors I researched under told me the statistics were falsified to make the program look good.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    That doesn't seem right. I went to a state school. I think CS grads had a marketed 90ish% placement rate. Talking to others in my classes right before graduation it seems we had at least 80% of people with jobs lined up prior to graduation.
    - throwaway33381 3y ago
      It's not. It's often due to under reporting. And sometimes the blatant falsification of data. But you don't really need to do that when only a small percentage of individuals reply to your survey. And thats how you get a high placement rate. You also need to understand that for the hundreds of thousands of CS, IT degrees that are awarded each year only a few thousand jobs exist at the entry level. You see reports of hundreds of thousands of job postings but the vast majority are just repeats of the same listing.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        Please post something to back up what you're saying. Right now it sounds like you're a conspiracy theorist, or maybe even troll with that throw away. There are about 65k CS undergraduate degrees issued each year. I don't think the BLS is double counting jobs. I believe they go to the companies for that info, not random job boards.
  - HEmanZ 3y ago
    For CS grads, it’s got to be close. I’m sure it’s not exactly 100%, every year, forever, but I’m well involved in the program and can’t think of a single student since I graduated that didn’t land a job out of college, and the program advertises it as 95%. No one from there goes to FAANG, it’s not a prestigious enough school for that. But there is an endless demand in large companies like government contractors, banks, the small web dev shops, etc. that need programmers for 60k$ out of school.
giantg2 3y ago
Wow, I made it to the 8% mark. I'm burnt out, so I doubt I'll be in it much longer. "One area where STEM students are needed is in aerospace and especially the defense industry." One issue they didn't mention about this is the shitty work environment for many of the jobs. The people I talk to who are leaving the defense industry can't stand the politics and procedures anymore.
- throwaway33381 3y ago
  [flagged]
mym1990 3y ago
Come on, that link is from 11 years ago. It says only 8% end up with jobs 10 years later in their field of study. There is no evidence presented as to the actual causation. This is a particularly funny quote given the times we live in now: “A third is that there are not a lot of exciting new aerospace or defense initiatives that spur the imagination of young engineers like there once were.”
- giantg2 3y ago
  How is that funny? Compared to previous times it seems there aren't that many groundbreaking programs, from what we can see. Most of aviation innovation is suppressed by market demands - we want tried and true, low-risk designs. This is in stark contrast to the 50s-80s. Space is a fairly small market, but has some stuff going on. Nothing on the scale of the space race era. Even in the 90s they were talking about how space launches would become so routine. Then, if you launched a mission it was likely 70% new tech, procedures, or experiments. Now all the missions build off of previous ones. Hey, look a new space telescope! Been there, done that, barely makes the news. Defense is a wildcard since the interesting stuff is classified. There are some interesting problems in the DARPA competitions. Not a lot of freedom in those jobs - lots of politics usually.
  - mym1990 3y ago
    Seriously? I'm going to guess that it's highly unlikely that you have worked on the Hubble(or the Webb), so for you to say 'been there, done that' just show how de-sensitized you are to actual achievements. Space race budgets were only really significantly elevated from 62-69, and fell off pretty precipitously after that, so to attribute all of that spending to 3 decades is wrong as well. Aviation innovation is not suppressed by market demands, it is because the private market can now participate that innovation is happening again. But you don't seem to get that aviation and rocket innovation is indeed rocket science, and 'low risk designs' aren't just established over night.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      "so for you to say 'been there, done that' just show how de-sensitized you are to actual achievements." No shit, that's the entire point - society doesn't care anymore because it isn't shiny. Take a survey on the street of space telescopes and most won't even be aware of the Jame Webb. "so to attribute all of that spending to 3 decades is wrong as well." Much of those subsequent decades built off of the information and ideas generated in that time period. They still had regular manned missions and large innovations like the space shuttle. No more manned launches from NASA. No more prestige. "But you don't seem to get that aviation and rocket innovation is indeed rocket science, " I do get that. Now please go compare the rate of innovation and newly adopted designs today versus decades ago. Today it's all about tweaking some existing model for slightly more efficiency and running computer models.

giantg2 3y ago

This has not been my experience. I have no real career prospects (it feels like just a job now). I'm burnt out and have basically zero marketable skills. Even out of college, I had to apply to about 250 positions. I have a masters from a better school now and it doesn't feel like it made any difference. "I recommend broadening experience beyond the pure computer science to domains that leverage computers to build new things: medical devices, signal processing, sensors, computational biotech, satellites, audio; whatever looks fun." I love learning about this stuff. I really love the synergistic aspect of doing what you describe. But at the end of the day, it means nothing. Who cares if you built simple apps, have a personal website, worked on personal audio processing projects, or built some homebrew IoT type stuff? Certainly hasn't meant shit for my career. They want people who have done this in an enterprise setting.

ptero 3y ago
There are definitely data points different from mine. And apologies if I am offering advice where none is wanted, but I want to clarify what I meant above. What I meant by "broadening experience" is not a hobby-level stuff you describe (still very useful on a personal development level) but gaining enough depth in another field to be comparable to an undergraduate with that specialization; or at least with a minor in that area. It is a higher bar, but someone with good CS background can master the equivalent of the 3-5 higher undergrad level classes pretty quickly. I agree that software companies are not really interested in non-software hobby projects. But non-software tech companies often put a very high value on software as a secondary skill in their non-software hires and are willing to lower the bar for their primary tech competency. My 2c.
- giantg2 3y ago
  "not a hobby-level stuff" Well, that's sort of a catch-22. Either you need a credential (major, minor, certificate), or you need work experience in it. But of course you need that work experience in order to get the job, so it doesn't really make you more employable. Plus, most would tend to lose career velocity as they jump from one domain to the next. "There are definitely data points different from mine." That was all I was trying to say. Certainly applies to me as well.

elforce002 3y ago

This. The reality here is that CS combined with other areas will open a whole world and keep you employable for the time being (at least before any big corp comes with chatgpt 7, hehe).