February 16, 2017 at 8:33 am
Jeff Moden - Thursday, February 16, 2017 8:09 AMGrant Fritchey - Thursday, February 16, 2017 6:09 AMReading back through this set of comments is interesting. It does seem to boil down to the belief, by those who have degrees in CS, that the only true path to a successful IT career is through having a CS degree.OK. That worked for you. Cool. However, others have different life experiences that lead them to different conclusions. Evidently one of the things that is not taught in college is having an open mind.
+1000 😉 I call it the "Ring Knocker Effect" named after a military "tradition".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Military_Academy_class_ring
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20130601112114AAAns6R
You are killing me!!! Line us up with a brush in your hand...there's a barrel of tar over there 😉
And to think that the only people who have ever called me special were not being very nice. Or politically correct.
Gaz
-- Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen...they're everywhere!!!
February 26, 2017 at 11:54 am
Gary Varga - Thursday, February 16, 2017 4:00 AMAlso, much of the principles of software development are covered in the first two years of a degree. In the UK, at least.
That wasn't my experience when recruiting, too many universities were teaching people about vast lists of detail relating to a specific technology (for example C++ and the standard Template Library and its various extensions) without any discussion of the inherent defects in those technologies (eg the badly broken type system of C++, where it is not in general possible to constrain the type of the RValue addressed by a pointer LValue), of programming issues that are essentially technology-independent (for example modularity, error management, ergonomic impact of code design on end-users), fundamental aspects of computer science theory (for example recursive function theory, the halting problem, type theory), or even efficient development methods (eg the needs for unit testing, for version control, for configuration management, and for release management). Maybe things have improved since then, or maybe not.
Tom
February 26, 2017 at 12:02 pm
Grant Fritchey - Thursday, February 16, 2017 6:09 AMReading back through this set of comments is interesting. It does seem to boil down to the belief, by those who have degrees in CS, that the only true path to a successful IT career is through having a CS degree.OK. That worked for you. Cool. However, others have different life experiences that lead them to different conclusions. Evidently one of the things that is not taught in college is having an open mind.
I suspect you are reacting to only some of the comments. Quite a few people have said that degrees aren't essential although some degrees do help. I certainly don't believe that degrees in CS are essential, and anyone who does is rather obviously wrong - quite apart from people like you and Jeff being two pretty good examples of people who succeeded without CS degrees I did damned well as a professional Computer Scientist and Engineer without a degree in it, and Ted Codd did a damned sight better than I did also without any degree in CS.
Tom
February 26, 2017 at 4:44 pm
Jeff Moden - Wednesday, February 15, 2017 9:49 PMP Jones - Wednesday, July 1, 2015 1:12 AMAs an IT pro and graduate, I've been involved in the recruitment of programmers and the very first requirement on the job spec. is a degree or HND or equivalent level qualification in a relevant discipline. Candidates without were rejected straight away and HR would not allow them to be even considered.Interesting. What are the disciplines of degrees that you allow and what do you consider to be an "equivalent level qualification in a relevant discipline"?
Good question. It would be good to know what the programmer jobs concerned are, to see if the requirement makes any kind of sense. The automatiic exclusion of those without a degree suggests (if we are talking about real degrees, not current USA - or 19th century UK - 2 year Associate degrees) suggests that there is a requirement to be able to undertake serious research in CS. The acceptance of HND (or perhaps an Australian Associate degree, both counting as level 5 in the accepted UK counting system as opposed to level 4 for the current USA associate degrees) suggests something less advanced, possibly reasonable depending on the job and how it would be expected to develop over a few years, but possible still over the top as a requirement for some pogrammer jobs.
When I was first involved in hiring people to work as programmers I was happy to take on people with degrees in music, or physics, or foreign languages, or geography, or indeed pretty well anything; and I had quite a few people who had no degree at all. I had absolutely no-one with a CS degree.
Tom
February 26, 2017 at 5:10 pm
TomThomson - Sunday, February 26, 2017 11:54 AMGary Varga - Thursday, February 16, 2017 4:00 AMAlso, much of the principles of software development are covered in the first two years of a degree. In the UK, at least.That wasn't my experience when recruiting, too many universities were teaching people about vast lists of detail relating to a specific technology (for example C++ and the standard Template Library and its various extensions) without any discussion of the inherent defects in those technologies (eg the badly broken type system of C++, where it is not in general possible to constrain the type of the RValue by a a pointer LValue), of programming issues that are essentially technology-independent (for example modularity, error management, ergonomic impact of code design on end-users), fundamental aspects of computer science theory (for example recursive function theory, the halting problem, type theory), or even efficient development methods (eg the needs for unit testing, for version control, for configuration management, and for release management). Maybe things have improved since then, or maybe not.
I saw many degrees that I thought worthless and/or irrelevant so I am not surprised. Also the degrees I have done have been module based and I actively chose the theoreticals of software development (including database theory even though I had no intent of being a DBA and have yet to be one). Many chose easier and fun modules. I stupidly wanted to get value in my education beyond the certificate. Why stupidly? Because it was hard work. (Right choice in my opinion.)
Gaz
-- Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen...they're everywhere!!!
February 26, 2017 at 5:13 pm
TomThomson - Sunday, February 26, 2017 4:44 PMJeff Moden - Wednesday, February 15, 2017 9:49 PMP Jones - Wednesday, July 1, 2015 1:12 AMAs an IT pro and graduate, I've been involved in the recruitment of programmers and the very first requirement on the job spec. is a degree or HND or equivalent level qualification in a relevant discipline. Candidates without were rejected straight away and HR would not allow them to be even considered.Interesting. What are the disciplines of degrees that you allow and what do you consider to be an "equivalent level qualification in a relevant discipline"?
Good question. It would be good to know what the programmer jobs concerned are, to see if the requirement makes any kind of sense. The automatiic exclusion of those without a degree suggests (if we are talking about real degrees, not current USA - or 19th century UK - 2 year Associate degrees) suggests that there is a requirement to be able to undertake serious research in CS. The acceptance of HND (or perhaps an Australian Associate degree, both counting as level 5 in the accepted UK counting system as opposed to level 4 for the current USA associate degrees) suggests something less advanced, possibly reasonable depending on the job and how it would be expected to develop over a few years, but possible still over the top as a requirement for some pogrammer jobs.
When I was first involved in hiring people to work as programmers I was happy to take on people with degrees in music, or physics, or foreign languages, or geography, or indeed pretty well anything; and I had quite a few people who had no degree at all. I had absolutely no-one with a CS degree.
Much of what is asked for from graduates they get from any (good) degree or HND course.
Gaz
-- Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen...they're everywhere!!!
February 26, 2017 at 5:25 pm
Gary Varga - Sunday, February 26, 2017 5:13 PMTomThomson - Sunday, February 26, 2017 4:44 PMJeff Moden - Wednesday, February 15, 2017 9:49 PMP Jones - Wednesday, July 1, 2015 1:12 AMAs an IT pro and graduate, I've been involved in the recruitment of programmers and the very first requirement on the job spec. is a degree or HND or equivalent level qualification in a relevant discipline. Candidates without were rejected straight away and HR would not allow them to be even considered.Interesting. What are the disciplines of degrees that you allow and what do you consider to be an "equivalent level qualification in a relevant discipline"?
Good question. It would be good to know what the programmer jobs concerned are, to see if the requirement makes any kind of sense. The automatiic exclusion of those without a degree suggests (if we are talking about real degrees, not current USA - or 19th century UK - 2 year Associate degrees) suggests that there is a requirement to be able to undertake serious research in CS. The acceptance of HND (or perhaps an Australian Associate degree, both counting as level 5 in the accepted UK counting system as opposed to level 4 for the current USA associate degrees) suggests something less advanced, possibly reasonable depending on the job and how it would be expected to develop over a few years, but possible still over the top as a requirement for some pogrammer jobs.
When I was first involved in hiring people to work as programmers I was happy to take on people with degrees in music, or physics, or foreign languages, or geography, or indeed pretty well anything; and I had quite a few people who had no degree at all. I had absolutely no-one with a CS degree.
Much of what is asked for from graduates they get from any (good) degree or HND course.
I've seen people with a Masters Degree who couldn't program their way out of a wet paper bag. Conversely, I've seen people with zero college credits who are wizards. Of course, the opposite applies to both. I think it's more about the individual than it is a piece of paper.
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