A college degree is used as a white-collar/blue-collar litmus test by a lot of people. You probably don't care about gov't or big company jobs, but the following might matter to you some day:
- Immigration, if you ever decide to work abroad
- Banks, if you need to finance a house
- Dates. Education level is one of the main filters
- Parents of women you're dating
- Universities, if you ever want to hang out for a year doing research between startups
You might think most of those people are flexible enough to realize, once they know you, that you're a bright & ambitious guy. But then, when they try justify you to other people, it's harder without a college brand name.
It's probably less of a handicap in life than, say, having "PSYCHO KILLER" tattooed across your forehead, but it's significant. You can get along, but you'll always be explaining it. People who never went often seem to turn into defensive people later in life. YMMV.
The main reason I'm usually not a huge fan of the college-no-college discussions is because they're "big identity" discussions (http://www.paulgraham.com/identity.html). Most readers of this site made a choice when they were kids or very near to it and the position that they defend tends to reflect the choice, well informed or otherwise, that they made then.
I don't buy into the identity concept as PG pitches it. My identity is that I've got a beard and flat feet -- I could care less about those issues. My identity is that I own a Jeep and love philosophy -- feel free to rag on both of those all you want.
It's just an oversimplification and not useful in the real world.
People get defensive when you call into question their competence or judgment. Some people feel that any criticism calls into question their value. Some people (like myself) are used to it. Identity != Value. I'm lots of things. I make lots of decisions. Unless you can assault the critical part of my judgment system that makes choices you're free to say about anything.
As for college, simply separate out what you want and go do it. I think college is great for forming connections, for finding a cofounder. So if I didn't have one (or a few good candidates) I'd go in a heartbeat.
If I wanted a good liberal arts foundation, which I think is crucial to living a good life, I'd go get that. Colleges do not own the monopoly on liberal arts educations, though.
So take ownership and go do what makes sense. There is no "right" or "wrong" answer here.
I think it's a good discussion to illuminate what people's goals are. People need to think about their own personal goals instead of having other people on the internet tell them what to do. You do that best by thinking about it: hearing people argue/discuss. But if it devolves into a right vs wrong thing it _is_ a waste of time.
I'd say the opposite -- it's something which is useful in the real world, regardless of if I'd use the same labels for it as Paul does. There are some topics that tend towards people talking past each other. This is one of them. How many people do you think have read this thread and changed their opinion on the worth of college? Few, if any. Most people are just rehashing decisions they made years ago -- just like every two weeks when we have this discussion all over again.
Why does a group of people who by and large have already made this decision -- and won't be making it again -- find it so worthwhile to keep debating it? Probably because explaining the choice they made makes them feel better about themselves.
The problem with that viewpoint, in my opinion, is that it's a throwaway: instead of figuring out the problem, simply categorize something as "unproductive to talk about" and ignore it.
Whether or not the conversation is boring is another matter entirely. Obviously somebody posted the article, so it means something to somebody. After a while, I'm going to stop reading all these college vs. no college articles. So will everyone else, I imagine. Nature will take it's toll.
I trust my fellow posters to come on here with an open mind. That's not out of any kindness on my part -- it's simply a practical matter. There's no point in posting anything at all if you're just talking past one another.
We're talking. See? Obviously both of us feel that there is some information that is being exchanged that is worthwhile about some tangential part of this topic.
I think I come at this from the standpoint of having to work with people all day long that have strong opinions about technology. If I had an option of simply ignoring subjects that my clients found difficult to come to grips with, my work would be a lot easier. And nothing would get done.
Yes. There are some topics that people tend to talk past each other. Those are the most important ones to talk about. What? You want to spend your time on things nobody feels strongly about? As long as the chat is productive, bring it on. If it's not productive, downvote it, ignore it, and move on. Just like anything else that's not worthy of your or my time.
EDIT: I don't want to look like I'm changing my opinion, so what I mean is that there are some topics that people tend to associate directly with their judgment and self-worth. Religion is one of those. Politics is another. But gee, it can be anything. This emotional entanglement is just a part of human nature and is part of real-world conversations.
Useful discussion is that which has the ability to inform decision, generally. Out of 54 comments here, 52 are from people who seem to be past this point and the other 2 seem to already know what they want to do. It'd be cute to think that those other 52 are really doing it for the good of the remaining 2, but do you really believe that?
If this were say, one of the many discussions about database tech, caching and whatnot -- even though we've got a lot of experts in those fields people still change their minds, are open to new view points, and use that information to make future decisions.
This is like the girl I'm dating and I arguing over which of our home countries has the best food. We're arguing over formative experiences that have just become part of who we are. It's cute banter, but really not more. Just because we're going to continually disagree, and we're both throughly convinced of our rightness, doesn't mean that it's an important thing for us to keep discussing.
I learned that college excels at helping people hook up with cofounders -- I hadn't thought of that is such clear terms before today (and I immediately stole the idea and commented with it!) Since I am in search of a cofounder, now I will begin thinking about using college as an avenue to do that. Not life changing, just yet, but it made a difference.
Others have pointed out learning things from the conversation, including the person who posted the article.
For you, perhaps, it seems like old hat and re-hash, and it has that faint whiff for me too, but every now and then a little glimmer of light shines through. That's why longer posts are usually better than short ones -- you're more likely to stumble on an area that nobody has thought about if you try to be thorough.
I know how you feel, though (I think). I get the same burnt-out feeling when I see yet another article on git, or piracy, or CSS vs non-CSS, or functional vs. imperative, etc.
Heck, if you think about it, there's a lot of topics where we're mostly just talking past each other. That's kind of my point: people get emotionally entangled with the weirdest stuff. Instead of trying to generically categorize it, I just accept it as a natural part of human interaction. If had a magic list of topics to avoid that would be nice, but unrealistic.
Actually, looking at the thread below, and on the article itself, I can see several replies that are by people who are around that age, where they have that choice, and are hesitating. I can only hope that my article will have helped them in their choice. If it helps even one, imho, the article was worth writing.
I regret going to college before I understood how real life really worked. I would've taken it more seriously, picked a major a bit more deliberately, etc.
If I ever had kids, I'd tell them I'd pay for a chunk of college-- if they put it off for 1-2 years after high school.
Agreed. It only took me 1-2 years out of college to begin to regret all the things I DIDN'T study while I was there. If I'd taken a year or two, worked, and got some "partying" out of my system, my college years would have been much better spent.
College should not be a way to delay a child's real life. It should be part of their strategy to live a good one.
My college loans are by far the best investment I've ever made. I went to a good in-state public school (Purdue), and lived very cheap. If they weren't at less than 3% interest they would have been paid off in one year from the extra money it earned me at work.
I don't understand the blanket hatred of college; it appears to come from people who spent >$100k/yr and are now drowning in that debt. If doe properly it's a very good thing; I learned a lot, made connections and grew as a person. I would say it's worth more to me than what I paid.
I found a list of the most expensive colleges (http://www.campusgrotto.com/most-expensive-colleges-for-2008...). I don't claim that this is an authoritative source but I've seen very similar lists elsewhere). There are three colleges in the US that break 50k per year for tuition, room, and board. There are quite a few more between 48k and 50k, though, and so with a standard tuition hike of a few percent they'll be over 50k next year.
My own institution is proud to be doing its own "lowest tuition hike in 41 years", at 3.8 percent. Thankfully I'm a PhD student and so I don't actually pay my own tuition.
Me too. I'd have found a way to make it cheaper. I'd already figure out how to network and how to leverage it to make it work for me and yet, I subsidized their game for longer because I wanted access to a school with small classes and personal relationships with profs.
All of that is pretty overrated, teaching quality on margin is worse and unless it's a Top 100 school, you're basically wasting time. And even if it is, you're still probably wasting a good deal of money.
Should've just left the military, gone to community college and taken a scholarship to keep as cheap as I could've. Oh well, now I know.
I regret not finishing my Master's degree... Granted, I probably still wouldn't have used the degree much (M.Ed in Higher Education Administration), but the year I spent working towards it made me a much better researcher and writer than 4 years as an undergrad.
I definitely have never regretted going to college, though.
I did 2 years of CS and dropped out. For the past 3 years I've been very successful, but I regret lacking deep knowledge of data structures, algorithms, and operating systems.
I think everyone overlooks the value of finding co-founders and ideas at top universities.
I do not have any experience at a state school, but I would posit that it is worth paying the premium for an Ivy just to meet some of the kids. I have often had this discussion of whether it was worth going to college with my friends. As I am from a small town and they are from different countries all around the world, we would have had no connection with each other. Additionally, the alumni base has helped me talk to tech CEOs and venture capitalists as an 18-year old.
Even though I think the classes are pretty much worthless for long-term success, the extracurriculars and connections you meet during your four-year experience are the shaping factors.
What I think would be cool is if somehow high school could be replaced with college. Allow people to specialize earlier, and hey, if it turns out they're not interested in their specialization, at least they found out 4 years earlier.
What happens if someone spends 3 years in a specialization they picked out when they were 12 or 13 and realize they hate it? You can't reasonably expect people that age to know what they want to do for the rest of their life.
I am now a senior in high school and this year I am taking classes in Data Structures, Assembly Language and Shell Programming. I have already taken classes in C, Unix and Java.
For me, it has been great to be able to take classes that I am actually interested in instead of just the ones that involve the least work like many of my friends have (CS is the only department with that many specialized classes).
I wasn't forced to choose a specialization, if I was, I probably would not have chosen CS at the time. I chose different classes freshman year and started to gravitate towards CS as a sophomore. There was no commitment so I could have stopped CS and focused on something else if it turned out that I didn't like it.
Do you go to a specialized school? If only such classes were offered here. I too am a high school senior but everything I know (little compared to you) is self taught. I am looking to college to supplement that.
Most of what I know is also self taught. Once you get into the more advanced CS classes at my school, it is very independent (I am the only one in each of my classes this year). I can ask the teacher for help on an assignment or have him explain something if I need him too but most of the time I work independently.
I went to a public school that had a programming track like Spencer but we started at BASIC and ended in an "advanced" C++ class.
I jokingly referred to our classes as learning "skills" since we lived so close to the poverty line. We had well taught and well funded tracks in dry cleaning, construction, cosmetology etc. I joke but they provided job placement and it probably gave many people a decent living.
I also remember how great it was have an army recruitment office inside the school.
If your mind is on your startup, partying, or you don't know what you want to do, I think you'll regret
not having the focus and direction you could have put toward college by waiting. Experiencing a couple of failed
startups or working a crappy job can really motivate you to put 100% into school. In my case, I became an airborne
paratrooper right out of HS, grew up (alot), got $$$ for college, then hit the ground running.
I agree but what I think should be done, and I'm speaking from personal experience (I don't know how education systems work in other places), is to allow those who gravitate towards some fields really start specializing more than average student in these fields and only give them bare basics in the rest of the fields.
What happens if people spend 3-5 years specializing when they are 19 or 20 and they hate it? Personally, I wish I would've gone to college instead of high school. Worst case scenario I know a little bit about something I don't like and I have a better idea of what I might like.
What I think would be cool is if somehow high school could be replaced with college.
Where I grew up there was a statewide program where you could attend college classes for free during the last 2 years of high school. I pretty much did this full time after my sophomore year. I believe this sort of program exists in many US states.
We had no statewide program to attend early, but we could get dual (HS/college) credit for a lot of advanced classes through the local community college (which had a ton of deals to transfer credits to various colleges in the region). We took the classes at our HS or in the evening at the community college.
I got my first 32 hours of math/english/chemistry/history out of the way my senior year in HS for $48 a credit hour. Definitely a great deal.
Some cities in our state, notably the ones with colleges in them, allow their HS students to attend college classes instead (with approval of professor and the university). I've seen random 16 year olds on campus in calculus III classes for instance.
I disagree. Although I love working with web technology, I would be miserable if the only things I studied were computer science and business. High school introduces you to a broad range of topics, such as history and literature, that can get you interested in pursuing a liberal arts education alongside your more vocational classes in college. Hell, those liberal arts subjects could even become your vocation. I just believe that it is very important for people to have experience outside of the field they work in.
At my HS, when you were a junior/senior they had a deal where you could attend classes at a tech institute for free. I spent two weeks learning about wiring offices (pull cables, etc) before I decided I'd rather go the social development route in school.
But for a lot of folks, a technical degree from one of these places could be a real leg up in finding a comfortable paying job without incurring college debt.
Why not both? I mean seriously at school worst case scenario you spend 30 hours a week going to class/doing homework. Thats a worst case scenario where you have 22 credits + homework.
Plenty of time to do a startup on the side, especially in the early stage where you have slow growth.
And its not like you have to become a hermit, you have plenty of time to have a social life
While I agree that university provides plenty of opportunities to explore pursuits outside of the academy, I think that your estimate might be a bit off. I'm not sure where you go to school, but for Engineering students it is not uncommon to have over 30 hrs/wk of class/lab/tutorial time. Homework in the form of assignments, lab reports, presentations and projects can easily double that number. Then, of course, there are tests and exams that must be studied for. If one is to have any sort of social life, then there not much time left for a startup during the Fall and Winter terms. The summer on the other hand is a great opportunity.
a) Interest free debt that you don't have to even think about for 4.5 years, and even then you only pay back a few hundred bucks a month and if you can't they'll work with you to defer payments or adjust them.
b) No other expenses for the 4 years(rent, food, high speed internet, utilities), nothing to worry about but school and startup.(this is if you live on campus..which you should since your loan can cover housing)
c) Plenty of engineering talent all over the campus who can take a risk with you and even work for free
d) Plenty of people who you can consult for advice(teachers/councilors)
e) Access to alumnis who you can eventually tap for angel level funding
f) No obligation to show up to classes/do homework...yes your grades will suffer(if you mess up on finals), but if you are doing a startup, you don't really need to care about grades, and this way you can be very flexible
And sure you'll end up 40-200K in debt, but so what? Everyone else is in the same situation as you. But unlike them who'll get a job at $40k/yr, you'll have a startup that you had 4 years to grow to profitability. And it doesn't matter what business model you have, in 4 years anyone can get profitable.
I agree with Vaksel entirely. I have two degrees and during both I performed well academically and had more free time than I care to mention; Certainly enough to get a side project started, and I did just that during my second degree.
I also think the article makes a great point in that you can always drop out. If college isn't for you; you can leave.
tjogin; Private colleges are expensive, but if you go to state schools it is not. You still have to deal with feeding yourself and housing, but the courses are only a couple thousand per year. You barely get a used car for that little. :)
That really depends on how you plan things.If you want to go to college you will find the means for it.
I personally planned financially for it, applied for as many scholarships as I could, hold 2 jobs and work through holidays.
Not to mention there are ways to reduce the cost of a degree. Take general ed classes at a community college and then transfer credits.
I'll be finishing my second bachelors degree in Mathematics(finished my CS degree already) with no debt.
I'm either stupid or our schools were vastly different. I took 12-13 hours a semester all the way through, and still spent 50 hours a week on school.
Of course, we had several professors that prided themselves on upholding the 2-to-1 ratio. For every hour in class they wanted us to do at least two hours of homework/projects.
Granted, if you cut out the 16-20 hours wasted every weekend on going out with friends, and the 20ish hours a week wasted playing video games, I probably would have had plenty of time for both.
Im 16 and I dropped out of school to go learn CS at a university (tau.ac.il).
1. Some of the professors are not interested in teaching- they do it because they have to. They rarely answer questions and go way to fast over the material.
2. We have to take many math courses. I was very interested in math until I got to university. Why? Because if you have a bad teacher you cant learn a lot.
3. Out of the about 300 people that learn with me in various courses there are probably less than 10 who are actually interested in CS (ie. program outside of school...).
4. Because of (1.) it is actually easier to learn from a book and much more efficient. You just need someone to answer the questions that you get here and there.
The whole thing just isnt fun at all... not even close.
I really dont know what to do.
1. Find one person who is moderately competent. When you study, study with him. You both study a topic or chapter seated beside each other. Then you discuss the chapter to see if you both understood it the same way. If yes, proceed to the next chapter. If no, discuss some more and try to work out what the prof meant. If you do not understand it, skip the chapter and move on. Sometimes it gets clearer later.
2. For some subjects, it's better to read material that is not specific to the subject. For example, let's say you want to understand electronics. If you buy an electronics book, you will have to go through 100 pages of theoretical stuff that is difficult to understand. You will lose interest and you cannot learn it well. A solution would be to buy a physics book that uses electronics as an example (Physics for Electrical Engineers, for example). This book will explain the electronics as quickly and as efficiently as possible, so that they can focus on physics. This gives you a high level understanding that you can then use to understand the denser material.
3. If you have an exam that you have to pass in a short amount of time, work backwards. Take the old exam questions, and study the theory for each question till you understand enough to solve and understand the problem correctly. Do this for a wide range of questions, and this fills in your theoretical knowledge piece by piece, like a crossword puzzle. It's not a good way to learn, but it's an efficient way of passing and exam.
The best way of succeeding in school is by hanging out with the people who want to succeed at school.
I'm going to go out on a limb, and guess that you're in your first year. Stick it out -- the first year is the worst. The classes are large, the students are just exploring (and aren't "interested"), the professors are teaching boring introductory courses, and no one is particularly inspired.
Stick through this part, and you'll find that things rapidly become more challenging and interesting.
One of the first skills that I developed in grad school was how to learn the material even when the professor hates teaching or has no talent for it. Teaching yourself things outside of school, where there are no professors, is even harder.
Be grateful for the good teachers you have, but don't let the bad ones slow you down. You can be successful despite them.
In university I made a lot of friends in the CS common room (and unfortunately played too many card games) and that helped me a lot. I became friends with some older CS students and they were sort of mentors to me.
I studied electrical engineering and I value my college experience and education. However, at the same time I think college, and school in general, instills a tunnel-vision mentality. I'm sure engineering students have heard it before from their professors and TAs, "Specialize, specialize, specialize!" I eventually enrolled in a PhD program, until I was able to take a step back and I realized that I didn't enjoy what I was studying, but rather I was still in school because while in school I believed I didn't have a choice.
I've always wanted to start my own business. It was at this point that I realized something: I don't want a PhD, I want to hire PhDs. :)
This is the exact situation I'm in. I'm 18, a high school senior, and am absolutely certain that I want to found a web company. However, I know that were I just to thrust myself into the world right now, I'd always be kicking myself because I didn't have a basic liberal arts education. While a knowledge of philosophy or political history isn't critical to what I will be doing business-wise later in life, I have a feeling that it will be critical to letting me feel like a whole person.
Do what I did - go to college, and spend every free minute working on your project. If you find college doesn't work for you, you'll have a great thing to rebound with.
There's no rush, honest. Starting a company is a big commitment -- a bigger commitment than college in a lot of ways. Your focus will become very narrow and you'll spend 100% of your time on it.
There will be plenty of web companies worth founding three, five, ten, or twenty years from now.
If you'd regret not going to college, go. And if the "founder" bug bites, well, it's not there aren't any example of college startups, right?
This is a tough one. I sometimes regret choosing to go to college, but it truly changed everything for me. I studied Materials Engineering, and now I'm doing a web startup, but I really believe the college experience, the connections I've made, and the failure in multiple ways in college (not in classes thankfully) has helped me prepare to take the leap to full time entrepreneur.
Yup... if I knew then what I knew now (a moot point, admittedly), I'd audit classes or do the cheapest possible thing to be associated with the university without paying for it, and simultaneously work on startups/projects.
I wouldn't say it is the classes though. College transformed me as a person and forced me to grow up. Maybe it helps that I go to Drexel where we have co-op (school for 6 months, work for 6 months, repeat). Anyway, I would not have been prepared to lead a start up right out of high school. Today, I think I'm ready.
I think it really depends on what kind of university you get into. If you get into a university like MIT, Stanford, CalTech, etc, there's a good chance that you'll be surrounded by a lot of entrepreneurial engineers. Even if you don't get a lot out of classes there, you'll at least meet a lot of interesting people that you can found with, or at the very least, be friends with.
Now meeting hackers at other schools is also possible, and I'd say pretty probable, if you try hard enough.
Having a network of hackers is pretty useful, especially for founding, and I think people underrate the value of relationships developed in college. There's no other environment quite like college, and even if you don't agree that the relationships built in that environment aren't uniquely valuable, I think you can probably agree that they're unique.
I'd agree you don't need a degree to be a successful entrepreneur. However, as an entrepreneur I believe (since I can't claim to be one, not yet) you take risks that may lead you into the situation where you have to get a regular job so that you can survive, even if temporarily.
If that ever happens to me, I'm betting my X number of years spent earning my college degree will help me find a better job with a higher wage than if I didn't have a degree.
That was one of my personal reasons to go to college. I positive I could do without it but I think I'll feel somewhat safer in life knowing I can still have a good career if everything else fails.
Go to a state school if you live in the US. It's cheaper and you are more likely to encounter professors who are interested in teaching, rather than their classes being a distraction from research and getting published.
I'm not saying that professors aren't interested in teaching at state schools, but I have found that pressure is as high or higher for professors to publish.
If you choose not to go to college do everyone a favor and don't have a chip on your shoulder about it and bring it up at every opportunity and talk shit about people who do.
It's probably less of a handicap in life than, say, having "PSYCHO KILLER" tattooed across your forehead, but it's significant. You can get along, but you'll always be explaining it. People who never went often seem to turn into defensive people later in life. YMMV.