6 ms·

Ask HN: Is university still credible?

• cranberryturkey 1y ago
  It depends. for software yes i think.
• botten 1y ago
  Yes, a degree from a decent university is still credible.
• theandrewbailey 1y ago
  Employers generally value experience more than degrees, but a degree is useful to get your foot in the door. I did that, but I graduated in 2009.
• sea_improvement 1y ago
  At least in the US - most job postings require at least a Bachelor's for software engineering so it's great to get your foot in the door. But as for standing out compared to other people experience is the differentiator.
• barnabee 1y ago
  I didn’t go to university to get a job[0]. For the reasons I went, primarily to learn for its own sake and to meet other likeminded, curious, and smart people (I didn’t grow up somewhere that was easy), university is not only credible but still seems like by far the best option for most young people. I’m not sure that’s as obviously true for potential mature students, though. [0] I’m convinced that anyone who’s done well enough to have (or have had) the option of going to university can have a successful career as long as they’re motivated and willing to go where the work is
  • scarface_74 1y ago
    And you probably didn’t have to get a job to support your addiction to food and shelter - many do and can’t afford to spend (or borrow) tens of thousands of dollars to be a better citizen of the worlds
• codingdave 1y ago
  If you feel that the purpose of higher education is just to get a job, you are already off-track. Likewise, if you think the value of your education is measured by what hiring managers think, you are off-track. Learn because you want to know more, do more, and acquire more skills in research and critical thought. Apply everything you learn to your life in order to direct it better and adapt to changes over time. Do that learning in school... or not. Whatever is best for you, personally. More specific to your question, if other people are short-changing themselves by abusing AI, that has nothing to do with you individually. And if hiring managers cannot see that, would you want to work for them anyway?
  • mettamage 1y ago
    > If you feel that the purpose of higher education is just to get a job, you are already off-track. Likewise, if you think the value of your education is measured by what hiring managers think, you are off-track. Many parents raise their kids this way though. Many people are being raised off-track. I happen to know that because my motivations for university were 50% for getting a job and 50% to satisfy my large curiosity. > if other people are short-changing themselves by abusing AI, that has nothing to do with you individually. This question is not about me. Or at least, I'm not asking this question for my personal situation. I'm asking it because I'm concerned about others. It's about people who believe that a degree proves that they have a certain form of skill in thinking and whatever it is that they studied.
    • codingdave 1y ago
      > It's about people who believe that a degree proves that they have a certain form of skill in thinking and whatever it is that they studied. Do you believe that is incorrect? That studying for 4 years does not give you that skill? Because it probably does. That doesn't make them better than people who didn't do that study, it just is a different experience. And if they abused AI in the process, there will be better and worse students from any given cohort.... but that was true before AI as well. There have always been people who deeply engaged with their education, alongside people who skated by just barely doing enough work to graduate.
• mrktf 1y ago
  It worth but for reason not directly tied for practical experience (take with grain of salt): - Working with government projects/grants, the moment R&D mentioned - you notice that master degree is requirement for contract - in any job (especially in public), when climbing ladder without degree you can quickly be disadvantaged or straight up fired - It worth maybe 2/3 times (if you final projects and marks are top notch), then your cv matter more.
• p0d 1y ago
  I am a lecturer, despite having being a very immature teen who left school with practically no qualifications. I was able to go back and fix what I had broken. Therefore, I understand the privilege university provides to those who can afford it or live in wealthy enough countries who provide it for free. There are useless programmers, most are ok, and some great. This is true of students and lecturers. A job or education provides a platform for a person. What a person does with this opportunity is up to every individual.
• fzwang 1y ago
  Overall, I think it's still credible, but less credible than before, and heavily depends on your situation. I run a program for students as a replacement for university, so I'm a bit biased when it comes to this discussion. It's useful to analyze both what a student want out of a degree and how a degree is "consumed" by another party (ex. an employer). 1. University degrees are still the "gold standard" in socially accepted proof-of-education. I think this is mostly due to social momentum. A few years of a "bad batch", ex. due to rampant cheating etc, will not change this. When I talk to other hiring managers, it's a bit of mixed bag. Some sorta understand where the students are coming from, as they also think that a lot of courses etc are arbitrary. Others are more concerned about the ethics of cheating, and the implications on a student's character, rather than the education outcomes ("I can work with inexperience, I can't tolerate lying"). 2. If you're planning to pursue a heavily regulated profession, like medicine, you most likely need a degree. 3. As others pointed out, the university criteria now more closely resembles a toll someone must pay to access higher-paying jobs. Ie. it's less about education than gatekeeping. Having it doesn't make you qualified. Not having it disqualifies you in many people's eyes. I think this is partially driving a lot of the cheating. Students sense the disconnect from the university program (and schooling in general) vs real skills. It's just another hoop they have to jump through so they will choose the path of least resistance. For many parents, it's a sort of capstone project for a parenting job well-done. And that adds more to the complexity. 4. How you take advantage of your university experience matters. I wouldn't count on the university for a durable education, ie. actually teaching you things that will make you successful. You need to get that elsewhere (thus the emphasis on work experience). But the social momentum is important, as universities are social centers for young adults, so you may get socially isolated if you don't go. In this case, the value is in the network, not so much the programs etc. The university experience, despite it's flaws, is still the status quo and definitely the safer "bet". Unless a person have clear understanding of why they shouldn't go, they should probably still go.
  • mettamage 1y ago
    How is this better than simply trying to get a dev job through a portfolio at a startup as a young adult? If experience is the differentiator, why go through education at all when you can simply learn it yourself? I know I'm assuming a lot, but enough people are like this, and I don't think they're aware of the dynamics right now. Moreover, my bias here is tech. I understand that for many professions it's different.
• deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
• deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
• bjourne 1y ago
  Yes. To be equally blunt, sour grapes. Yes, cheating is a problem in higher education. Cheating is a problem everywhere. However, university education still requires three to five years of concentrated effort, whether you cheat your way through or actually learn stuff.
• muzani 1y ago
  There's other anecdata that 1 in 7 of students are attending classes. This is a little extreme, but it looks like even the students have lost faith in it. Students are using ChatGPT for assessments; professors are getting better at writing assignment-prompts that trip it up. When people drop out, the ones with a complete degree will be the outliers. It hasn't been about what you learn, uni's main purpose is a form of certification. You can cheat in every other kind of certification too. Assignments aside, universities at least certify that you have spent time with peers in the same field, both students and professors. Unless you took an online one.
• Ocerge 1y ago
  Credible in terms of respected by people who want to pay you money for work: yes, absolutely. The reality is a random person who watches too much youtube who thinks college is useless now (not saying this is you OP but it's a real subset of people) is not special enough to overcome the advantage that having a degree gives you.
  • mettamage 1y ago
    Haha, I have 4 degrees. So even if I did think that, my 4 degrees will follow me wherever I go :') I am just afraid people will think that virtually everyone has cheated with AI and therefore not making it credible anymore.
• mettamage 1y ago
  I just saw this video coming out that touches the issues in this discussion [1]. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTiBF2Hq40I&ab_channel=JaredHenderson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTiBF2Hq40I&ab_channel=Jared...
• firefax 1y ago
  I never was able to self teach myself math. One of my big regrets is I wanted to keep the door open for law school so I didn't take calc I/II as electives + a CS minor. I think having that expert who will give you problem sets + classroom instruction where you can ask clarifying questions is extremely important, and a lot of self taught coders flounder on anything quantitative if they lack it.