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Disclaimer: I run a bootcamp in San Antonio called Codeup. While the media paints the camps as "get a great paying job", I see more people wanting a more meani

Disclaimer: I run a bootcamp in San Antonio called Codeup. While the media paints the camps as "get a great paying job", I see more people wanting a more meaningful life. They've got an expensive degree in English or something similarly un-useful and want to work on things that matter. They see coding as the path to get there.

porter 12y ago
Can you define what "matters"? What exactly are people finding more meaningful about programming as opposed to English?
- mgirdley 12y ago
  They want to work things that are used by real people. If they can help the world be better and get to see their work being used, that's a plus. Many are stuck in what they consider dead-end careers like retail or customer service. They feel like cogs in a machine.
spenuke 12y ago
There is a competing interpretation that this lack of a meaningful life you allude to is in fact the RESULT of a society built on strict financial benefit. You've conflated the terms "meaningful" and "useful". These are not equivalent terms. Meaning is a story we tell ourselves to make sense of our lives. Use is an observable action. If I help make a product that gets 16% more people to click on ads for something they didn't need in the first place, I will have been _useful_ to the advertiser (and my own pocket). But to say that gives my life _meaning_ merely displays a twenty-first-century version of the lazy and ignorant naivete that the Humanities have tried to fight against all along. I am not against having a better paying job, nor am I saying folks can't find meaning in software development (or any field, for that matter). And I'm not implying that an English degree should make you a bunch of money. It's just that this whole "learn to do some JavaScript and CSS, change the world!" technohype is just plain bullshit. Do you need to pay $100k to learn the skills to see through such bullshit? No. But the sort of things that the Humanities teach are exactly the prophylactic that one needs to guard against such existential wheel-spinning.
michaelvkpdx 12y ago
If you classify an English degree as "un-useful", you should not be involved in educating developers. I studied both CS and English in college, and got my degree in English. The communication skills and translation techniques I learned as an English major have been tremendously useful to me in my career as a software engineer. In my experience hiring developers, I've found that those with liberal arts degrees do very well, particularly when they leverage their humanities background as an asset. Anyone can write code, but it takes a breadth of knowledge and perspective to effectively maintain and engineer software that has societal value.
- mgirdley 12y ago
  I agree that CS+English is better than English and a BA in English is better than nothing. The problem is that the skills from an English degree itself aren't in high demand by employers.
- enraged_camel 12y ago
  The way I look at it is that soft skills, such as those taught in an English (or any other language) program, act as multipliers for non-soft (hard? solid?) skills. Without them, a STEM major can still be effective. But a pure soft skills major will not be very effective. Zero times X is zero. What would it have been like if you had not studied CS, and graduated with just an English degree? Well, we have a fairly good idea: just look at pure English degree holders and how they are faring in today's economy. Most of them are underemployed and overworked as they work multiple jobs in the service sector to make ends meet. You, on the other hand, were able to use what you learned in your English program to boost your effectiveness in software engineering. But make no mistake: software engineering is the real, solid foundation of your career. Not English. English was useful, but only in combination with your technical knowledge.
nsxwolf 12y ago
I like making enough money to take care of the needs of my wife and 3 kids, and I pursue most of my meaning in life with them outside of work.
scarecrowbob 12y ago
Hey, greets from Fredericksburg, TX. I'm pretty close to the guy you're talking about (though I'm 5 years down the line from quitting my English PhD program, and have already figured out how work freelance without starving). I'm not sure I agree that more users === "work that matters", though I can agree it is much more difficult to find reasonable work the relies on a BA in Philosophy than to find reasonably good paying work that relies on being able to slap together some PHP script. But I generally agree with you: the issue that the people I work with are all dealing with is figuring out how to not work 50 hours a week and still make a living, and being a tradesman programmer is a very easy way to do that (I'm finding it comparable to being an electrician or plumber without having to actually leave the house and own a truck full of tools). This fall I had tried to get some interest among the people out here in Fredericksburg for a class, but I couldn't get enough people to sign on so I put my plans on hold. Teaching folks to do this kind of work is a good thing, so I wish you great success on codeup.
- mgirdley 12y ago
  Cool. Come down and see us at Geekdom if you'd like.

porter 12y ago

Can you define what "matters"? What exactly are people finding more meaningful about programming as opposed to English?

mgirdley 12y ago
They want to work things that are used by real people. If they can help the world be better and get to see their work being used, that's a plus. Many are stuck in what they consider dead-end careers like retail or customer service. They feel like cogs in a machine.

spenuke 12y ago

There is a competing interpretation that this lack of a meaningful life you allude to is in fact the RESULT of a society built on strict financial benefit. You've conflated the terms "meaningful" and "useful". These are not equivalent terms. Meaning is a story we tell ourselves to make sense of our lives. Use is an observable action. If I help make a product that gets 16% more people to click on ads for something they didn't need in the first place, I will have been _useful_ to the advertiser (and my own pocket). But to say that gives my life _meaning_ merely displays a twenty-first-century version of the lazy and ignorant naivete that the Humanities have tried to fight against all along. I am not against having a better paying job, nor am I saying folks can't find meaning in software development (or any field, for that matter). And I'm not implying that an English degree should make you a bunch of money. It's just that this whole "learn to do some JavaScript and CSS, change the world!" technohype is just plain bullshit. Do you need to pay $100k to learn the skills to see through such bullshit? No. But the sort of things that the Humanities teach are exactly the prophylactic that one needs to guard against such existential wheel-spinning.

michaelvkpdx 12y ago

If you classify an English degree as "un-useful", you should not be involved in educating developers. I studied both CS and English in college, and got my degree in English. The communication skills and translation techniques I learned as an English major have been tremendously useful to me in my career as a software engineer. In my experience hiring developers, I've found that those with liberal arts degrees do very well, particularly when they leverage their humanities background as an asset. Anyone can write code, but it takes a breadth of knowledge and perspective to effectively maintain and engineer software that has societal value.

mgirdley 12y ago
I agree that CS+English is better than English and a BA in English is better than nothing. The problem is that the skills from an English degree itself aren't in high demand by employers.
enraged_camel 12y ago
The way I look at it is that soft skills, such as those taught in an English (or any other language) program, act as multipliers for non-soft (hard? solid?) skills. Without them, a STEM major can still be effective. But a pure soft skills major will not be very effective. Zero times X is zero. What would it have been like if you had not studied CS, and graduated with just an English degree? Well, we have a fairly good idea: just look at pure English degree holders and how they are faring in today's economy. Most of them are underemployed and overworked as they work multiple jobs in the service sector to make ends meet. You, on the other hand, were able to use what you learned in your English program to boost your effectiveness in software engineering. But make no mistake: software engineering is the real, solid foundation of your career. Not English. English was useful, but only in combination with your technical knowledge.

nsxwolf 12y ago

I like making enough money to take care of the needs of my wife and 3 kids, and I pursue most of my meaning in life with them outside of work.

scarecrowbob 12y ago

Hey, greets from Fredericksburg, TX. I'm pretty close to the guy you're talking about (though I'm 5 years down the line from quitting my English PhD program, and have already figured out how work freelance without starving). I'm not sure I agree that more users === "work that matters", though I can agree it is much more difficult to find reasonable work the relies on a BA in Philosophy than to find reasonably good paying work that relies on being able to slap together some PHP script. But I generally agree with you: the issue that the people I work with are all dealing with is figuring out how to not work 50 hours a week and still make a living, and being a tradesman programmer is a very easy way to do that (I'm finding it comparable to being an electrician or plumber without having to actually leave the house and own a truck full of tools). This fall I had tried to get some interest among the people out here in Fredericksburg for a class, but I couldn't get enough people to sign on so I put my plans on hold. Teaching folks to do this kind of work is a good thing, so I wish you great success on codeup.

mgirdley 12y ago
Cool. Come down and see us at Geekdom if you'd like.