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How Important is a Well-Known CS Degree?
syynnapse asks: "I've been interested in computer science since my mother taught me how to program in QBASIC when I was eleven, and I've wanted to be a developer ever since I learned C++ in AP Computer Science while in high-school. Now I'm in my sophomore year of college studying CS at a state university that isn't particularly known for its CS program, but I'm quite happy and personally think I'm learning plenty. My father thinks otherwise, and the deadline for transferring successfully is approaching quickly. What chance do I have in the real world with a not-so-prestigious degree? Am I likely to be learning what's important? Am I looking at a series of awful jobs if I don't transfer?"
I honestly don't think it matters much. I imagine there are a few organizations that it does matter to, but I think those are few and far between.
...or equivalent experience.
The most important thing in the market today is experience. Go look on Monster or any of the other sites right now, and you'll see one phrase quite a bit -
In other words, a degree is a bonus now rather than a prerequisite if you have talent and experience. If you have no experience and no big certifications, then a degree is something (and perhaps the degree from a bigger school could help a little), but the jobs available to you in this boat are not all that appealing for the most part anyway.
The great jobs go to those with solid experience, and for those people (and the people hiring them), the degree they have is considered decoration rather than the meat of the resume.
Perhaps this is different in the development field, but I doubt it; I'm coming from the infosec side of things and I imagine things are much the same for programmers.
In short, degrees and certifications are "get you in the door"-oriented credentials; the big jobs rarely go this breed of applicant.
dmiessler.com -- grep understanding knowledge
Here's my general rule on quality of college:
Unless you want to go for an ivy league type of degree (MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, etc.), as long as the college offers a strong program, where you go to school has ZERO effect on your life after your first job. I went to a average school (Cal State University, Chico), and got average grades. (3.0 average). I found a good starter job when I gradiuated, and started progressing on *merit* after that. Now, I am in a top design position at a huge networking company, and no one looks at my degree. When I interview people, I never look at the college, other than to verify that they got a degree.
The only caveat is if you want to get a high profile degree from a top of the line college. All the Phds I work with come from top drawer schools, and went to top schools from the bachlor stage on. It is more of a pedigree at that point, and it clearly matters.
Go to a school that has a good CS program, has energetic professors, is fun to live in (you can't beat Chico), and just do your best. Once you get a job, your accomplishments will distinguish you from the rest.
I am sure to be flamed by people who went to well known schools and swear by it, but none of the people I work with who have BS desgrees went anywhere recognizable. It is all about how you perform.
Good luck!
Todd
I have a CS degree from a state university that's not especially known for it's CS department.
I graduated in 2000 and didn't find the degree to be a hinderance at all. Granted this was at the tail of the bubble, but I was hired ahead of a Purdue and a U-Wisconsin graduate, both of which I'd consider to have far superior programs.
Why? First, because I interviewed well. I was able to interact with my future bosses and coworkers, I didn't lie on my resume, and I was eager to learn. Second, because I had relevent experience gained while I was a student. I found that working as a programmer for the campus IT department 15 hours/week and volunteering as a lead sysadmin for a student government / organization webserver to be far more relevent to the job then anything I learned in class.
Since that first job, I've found references and contacts to be the key to getting other interviews and offers. I don't feel like a state-U degree hurt me at all; college is what you make of it so learn to socialize, volunteer or take a part time job relevent to the field you want to work in, and concentrate on getting a good broad education. Take liberal arts classes and business classes, etc.
If you are learning, stay exactly where you are. You don't want to discover how horrible it is to attend class after class, year after year, and be learning nothing. I'm currently studying at a well-known university that's crashed a probe into Mars. But reputation and content are two very different things. As long as you're learning, stay where you are.
Besides, your university credentials are mainly useful in getting your first job. After that they are more interested in your previous jobs. So at worst an unknown university will just add one stepping stone on your career path.
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They make Counter-Strike Degrees? sign me up!
Remember: *Learning* is what's important here, especially when we're talking about an undergrad degree -- I went to a small state school where there were 10-20 people in my classes and I recieved a much, much better education than my peers who went to large universities. Why? Because I could walk into my professor's office and spend an hour talking to him about class material, advances in computing or the state of the industry or whatever.
In my experience, the sort of jobs you'll get with an undergrad degree tend to value understanding and skill over who your degree is from -- if you can do the work, you're their person. If you're going to a job that requires a graduate degree, well, you can go to a high-profile school for your grad work, eh?
Aside from all of that, I've learned the hard way that you should follow your instincts. Follow yours on this one and stay put.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
And money is money, but if a company doesn't hire you because your degree says Univ. of Random and not MIT, it's probably not a company you'd be hapy working for anyway. Though admittedly MIT is an exception; it WILl stand out. At least I think it would.
I know nothing
Your first job is all about who you know.
My college math prof.'s wife had a computer programming company; that's how I got my first job.
You're not going to be rich. You're just going to be a working stiff like everybody else.
Still, I'd listen to your dad. A really boring degree is a plus. It communicates to the rest of the world that you are willing to do will shit boring things, which is the value they're looking for.
Major in Business and take a lot of programming courses.
this allowed me to get a job at the best convenience store in the state. Highly recommended!
well i mean if you go to podunk community college, then year it may. but any major college, you will be fine.
i had one of the worst graduating GPA's in my CS class, but i managed to get one of the best jobs out of college. why? becuase of what i knew and what i did on my own time.
college simply teaches you how to teach yourself. if you are basing how you will do off how you do in class, then you are in for a suprise.
if you can teach yourself the new technologies and get your name out there somehow, you will be set.
but then again i am planning on getting out of the tech field in 2 years so take it for what it is worth.
Short term, your school. Long term, your knowledge, experience, and skill.
"They've canceled the show but we're still here. What does that make us?" "Big Damn Junkies, Sir!" "Ain't we just"
It all relates to who you know, going to a larger school, and meeting more important people because of that would be the only benefit you get out of a more noted school. In all honesty, the people who are going to get you a good job working for another person or entity will have nothing to do with computers. If you know what you are doing, it is simple, just meet the right people and you will find someone who needs your services, and since they know you... A lot of people in the IT world don't know anything but people.
To answer the question, I don't think it really matters much. While a degree from MIT would definitely put you above the rest, most of the rest doesn't have an "elite" degree either.
What really matters is that you can show you know your stuff, that you actually fo know your stuff, and that you get real-world experience.
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. --E. W. Dijkstra
WORK EXPERIENCE
Seriously, take a look at my resume (http://www.codesweep.com/about.cfm) you will see that there are plenty of interesting jobs on it (and I haven't throughly revised it in awhile, I could state more). While my college degree is a footnote at the bottom. While Cal Poly Pomona is a good school, it doesn't matter based on what's more attractive, the work or the school.
Bottom line: Find a good (even if cheap) job NOW. Failing that, grab an open source project at http://www.sourceforge.net and contribute something to get your name on the developers list. Something, anything for your resume besides a degree (whether Ivy League or State U) is paramount to a good job. If you can accomplish this, it won't matter if your degree says "WTF Coding University".
...in bed
Not as important as having some kind of experience. Have you tried looking at job requirements these days? They expect you to have written every program since the dawn of time.
Not that my CS degree from UCF is all that prestigious.
-- Having a Creationist Museum is like having an Atheist place of worship
If you company you are looking at thinks your CS degree is the most important issue, you probably don't want to work for them anyway. I wager they've already missed the point.
The fact is that today a degree is becoming more important. Most of the InfoSec jobs are asking for certificates(CISSP), BS degree, and experience. I have only encountered a handful of organizations that really care where you got the degree as long as it is from a reputable school.
Basically, keep going where you are if you are happy, but finish the degree! As more people have degrees out there, it will be an item the human resource departments filter on.
I graduated with a BS in CS from "Metropolitan State College of Denver". I had no problem finding work. Remember, in the end it's not WHAT you know, it's WHO you know.
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It does matter for your first job.
Unless you know somebody, it's hard to get in to the truly cool jobs. Most companies only recruit at a relatively defined set of universities, generally where the founders and a few of the early employees came from. Which means you have to seek out companies more if you want to avoid being a coding grunt.
Once you are out for a bit, it matters far less.
Oh yeah, and a good CS degree is not about being taught. It's about being tortured into learning because your professor is really bright but can't teach. So he gives you hard tests and you have to teach stuff to yourself in order to pass. At least, that's the shared experience amongst most of the grads from top-10 CS schools that I've talked to.
Gentoo Sucks
The company that can't look further than the name of the college you graduated from is not likley to be the company you want to work for anyway ;-)
Second vs. third tier schools don't matter as much. There aren't that many people who know whether University of New Mexico is better or worse than New Mexico State, etc - or even how they compare to the non-famous members of the UC schools.
With a Stanford BS, I've gotten offers "requiring" PhD degrees.
It does make a difference, especially early on, to have a degree from a top-tier school.
So at least try to transfer to one of the best schools.
Test your net with Netalyzr
The funny thing is that everybody in the planet knows someone with a CS degree. It's kind of sad but a lot of times to get the better jobs it's more of WHO you know...
From my experience where your degree is from and even what your degree is in have little bearing on programming jobs. People with chemistry and mathematics degrees are just as likely to get the job as people with CS degrees. It comes down to skillset and experience. If you really want to be a programmer, while you are still in college be an intern or assistant or something or get a part-time job programming so when you apply for your first job you have experience and references. Those will be far more valuable than any degree.
I never got any degree, have been in the industry for over 20 years and am now at the executive level at a small publishing company. When I hire, a degree from anywhere is nice to see, and a prestigous one more so. It's never a stand alone criteria though, more of a risk management factor.
Listen, I've worked with people who had degrees from prestigious schools, and people with degrees from state universities. I've seen little correlation between where the degree came from and the skill of the person.
If you are a moron, you will not learn at the best of universities.
If you are gifted, you will learn at the lowest of universities.
You would be FAR better served by going to a school you can afford, that you may spend your time learning rather than working to earn enough to go to school.
If you want to build up your resume, work on projects that you can point to - being a contributor to, or better still the maintainer of a well known project will look much better on your resume than a degree with no other experience.
I'd be more concerned about trying to find a good internship during your summers off - that counts for a lot more when looking for a job.
www.eFax.com are spammers
I got a BA in CS/Math from a liberal arts school and had a job developing a 3D modeling software package within two months of graduating. And that was last summer.
This signiture copied from somewhere.
Just move to India, and you will be fine, otherwise ......
no god is good
Employers weigh up the total sum of what you present in a CV. Other issues can outweigh you having going to a top school, e.g. track record. Additionally, going to a top school is no guarantee that you're a top student. However, when the employer weighs things up, a better school adds to the overall point count that leans in your favour, especially in comparison to other equivalent candidates (similar experience, different schools, for example). Even if you are "fresh paint" as a graduate job seeker: other issues count (e.g. you could come from a mid tier school, but you show that in the last 3 years, you've a passion for software that meant you contributed to multiple F/OSS projects, and you know your way around CVS, tools, unix, etc: employer will know they are getting a really capable and hands on person, not just someone who did well at exams).
Like most things in life: do your best to work at the highest level (i.e. going to the best schools, etc), but don't deprive yourself of a life in doing so.
You can learn a lot and have a challenging career in Medicine. You need an advanced degree to practice medicine.
You can pick up all the skills you need in computers by working hard at a paying job. You don't need a degree.
I look for the degree and experience... not the institution that gave the degree. Of course, a CS from Berkeley would have more clout to me than one from U of Phoenix, but only because of the UNIX roots. Otherwise, a degree is a degree in that the main basics are the same.
If you want to work for a big name corporation (whether it is IT oriented or not) a well known degree helps. ;).
On the other hand I agree with the person who posted above, experience is key.
Also there is a supposed "glass ceiling" that prevents you to get the top gun job if you are not from a big name U. This tends to be true, but you can easily circumvent it with good contacts
If you are not crazy about the corporate world (and believe me, you SHOULDNT) stay where it feels good and enjoy.
if you picture yourself going to grad school and becoming a cs researcher, then by all means. you have to. its a very status-conscious discipline.
if you just want to go into industry, then do whatever you want. the kinds of things you need aren't what they teach in school (although some of them are very cool and can be helpful). you will rise to your natural level in a company and no one will ever think about your credentials at all. work on projects, school is incidental
Something I wish I had known.
Youre not in college to get a degree.
Youre in college to get a job. Which normally means you need an internship or some useful contacts for when you get to the work world.
Most good employers don't have to hire someone with out experience, people want to work for them. So get some experience soon!
As long as its not from Boris College you will be fine :D
There is no sig
From what I have seen, there is the ivy league and there is everyone else (at least for the first job you get).
:)
From then on, it is mostly whom you know. Most of the job offers I have got is through my contacts. Having you name known also helps.
So concentrate on learning, write articles, code for projects so that you name shows up on google and you should be set
To me, a degree is not supposed to teach you how to program something specific, its supposed to teach you intuition and theory about why your program works the way it works. That intuation can lead to more efficient ways of programming because you know how the computer executes what its programmed to do.
That, and they teach you tools that can be used in any language for many functions. That is, they teach you algorithms to complete a general class of things.
Also, the college experience is one that shouldn't be missed. The friends you meet get you a lifelong connection to parts of industry you never knew existed.
If you've been interested in computers for this long, and are learning fast enough, then just teach yourself. You're wasting valuable time and dollars in college that you could be using towards getting job / life experience.
College was the best party I ever paid for, but because I consider myself to be ultra-elite and the smartest person in the world, I've gotten myself way past where I could have if I completed college. (I still haven't).
Having 4 years of helpdesk experience, assistant LAN adminstrator experience, or even doing side jobs as a contractor (fixing friends/relatives PC's for a couple bucks) is worth more than a college degree, IMHO. Sure, it doesn't necessarily teach you programming skills, but if you pick the right company to start with, you can work your way up, and have the COMPANY pay for your degree. Although I haven't gone the degree route (yet, and not sure if I will, and if I do, it looks like I'll go for MBA, not CS) I have spend several thousands of my companies' dollars on training, instead of my own.
This worked for me. Maybe it won't for you. But as a 1-year college student making nearly 6 digits, (and I'm not in Silicon valley where janitors make that much) I'm just saying it can be done.
Check out the best P2P sharing website: MEDIACHEST.COM
It does and it doesn't. Its not so much the name of the institution, it's what's in the program. I went to a pretty prestigious CS school and I know people who have gone to less prestigious schools. Some of those are pretty good programs, others are not. I think some of the top schools get that reputation because their programs are more demanding and you will learn more. This will, however, show in an interview by the knowledge and skills you posses, and less on a resume because of the name of your school. Try and get some information on other school's programs and see how rigorous your school's program is in comparison.
If your dad's willing to pay the application fee,why not apply to a few top-tier schools? If you don't get in, you get to stay and continue enjoying yourself. If you do get in, you've already got everything you've learned already, plus you get to put the shiny new school on your resume.
The question of whether you should transfer or not is one you make AFTER you get accepted.
I would recommend you don't transfer to a slightly better school. If it's not top 5, I'd stay where you are.
When I was trying to decide what to do everyone told me that the "better" college would only help with my first job and after that its all about what you have done, what you know and what you have expierence in. The fact that you have a degree is good enough that they mostly don't care where its from.
Now I have a great job at a leading risk management company working in the malicious code department. Its not at all what I envisioned for myself heading into college but I LOVE it all the same. I only just graduated last year so I can't tell you if the expierence bit is true or not, but I can tell you that where I got my degree didn't even come up in my interview. They mostly just wanted to know what I knew, what courses I had taken, and how well I worked under pressure (viruses make for rather short deadlines sometimes)
If you can get into some Super Big name Schools, Harvard, Yale, MIT ... the Snob factor of those schools could make it easier for you to get a job, and those are usually High Profile Jobs in NYC for some bank or something. But for most jobs a BS in CS for any college usually does pretty well. What really helps is if you are involved in your professor's research projects and/or do some independent work on your own and get some good internships doing real work. Many times going to smaller CS Programs allows you to be a Big Fish in a Small Pond allowing yourself more opportunities to get involved in these activates. Buy going to the highly completive Schools could actually hurt you because you will be a small fish in a big pond and unless you are truly best of the best and can prove it to the department you will probably leave with less then if you went to a smaller program. When you get into the real world the school that you went to usually only matters for about 3-4 years then after that your work experience matters most. So unless you are really best of the best (Like helping write to the Linux or BSDs Kernels) and you can truly impress your professors. Then I would suggest that you stay the Big Fish in a Small Pond where you can learn more and have more opportunities then if you are at a big school.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
I've been interested in computer science since my mother taught me how to program in QBASIC when I was eleven
No you haven't. You may have been interested in computer programming since age 11, but you didn't even know what computer science was, let alone have any interest in it.
Not that there's anything wrong with this; the world needs plumbers and electricians (and computer programmers) as much as it needs writers, mathematicians, and computer scientists. But this is one way the well-recognized undergraduate computer science distinguish themselves from the programs at the College of Upper Podunk. A good university will teach computer science, and expect you to work out how to write code on your own; a bad university will teach you how to program, and not even admit that there is anything more to learn.
Decide what you want from your years at university, and pick your university accordingly.
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Another thing that I have not seen discussed is the money part of the better college/university. Sure it would be nice to have the little better degree but there is money involved. You said your father is saying that another university has a better program. Make sure your father understands that most likely you will be set back a year because not all transfer credits go through, it will be a little more expensive, and that HE has the finances to get you through it. Because you dont want to end up with enough credits at the new university to make you a junior and find out that you will have to swtich back because of a money problem. Also along the same lines, tell your father that your applying to MIT and see if he can fund the difference in cost.
They really don't care what university name is across the top of your diploma. My CS degree is from a southern state school and I had no trouble getting a job at Lockheed Martin right after graduation. How you perform on your interview is far more important than where you went to school.
Realistically, if you can get into a better school, and can afford the tuition etc. to do so you really should. The question is not "Should you transfer?", the question is "why are you going to a mediocre school?". Is it money? Is it a matter of admissions? Is it friends? If it's the last if those, I highly suggest you buck up and head somewhere better. You can stay in touch with friends easily these days, and you could well make more at any new location. If its money of admissions... all the desire in the world isn't going to get you there, so what's you father worried about?
Jedidiah.
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Yes, I think it's important. Not that it teaches you talent, but that it is a right of passage that companies take into consideration to a large extent.
You could be the most talented person on the planet and one of the best code hackers but how do I know that when the great projects dry up for a bit and I have some aweful ones you'll stick through it and get it done just as fast as an unintresting one?
Most of what I use on the job is what I learned outside of the classroom. But my schooling shows that I can stick with something that does suck and my good grades show the amount of effort and/or intelligence I have.
Asking a questions like this on slashdot is pointless.
People who have a CS degree from a well known school will say "most definitely!" so they can justify their own.
People who have a CS degree from Arkansas Community College will say "not really" because they got a job just fine with theirs.
People who have a computer-related degree from DeVry will say "nope" because they have a bottom-rung tech job.
People without a degree will say "most definitely not" because they have a job based on experience.
I'm trying to hire three developers, a project manager, and a business analyst where I work. We ignore the degrees they put down, unless it's for the pm spot where a MBA from anywhere will work. Some of the applicants have a BS in CS from places like Berkeley, but it doesn't really matter because they got it ten years ago...with an emphasis in cobol.
Having a degree on your resume will just help it get through the automated resume grabbing filters big companies use when fielding hundreds of applicants.
Oh, and I don't have a degree.
I agree to an extent, but I do have a CS degree from a small, unknown liberal arts college. I was lucky enough to have incredible instructors with a lot of experience (my main CS professor worked at Bell Labs when UNIX was developed).
I found a good job as a Software Engineer after a short contracting/freelance period. Where my degree was from seemed hardly important, what's important is that you have a solid CS conceptual base (which it sounds like you do). Then smart employers will see your abilities. I don't think the institution matters as much unless you are trying to teach, do research, etc.
Which school you go to is of little importance. What matters is how you find your first job. It took CS graduates from UT six months to find their first job when times where good. Now most are skipping the market and going for their graduate degree. If anything, go to a school near a job center where you would like to be. Going to school in the middle of nowhere is practical suicide.
Best things you can do: intern, network, run your own business, or get your foot in the door. A degree isn't a guarantee of a good job. You also need to accept when you get your first job that you won't make enough to live off of, many can't accept that.
Here's to losing my Karma Bonus again....
Ok, so you're at a decent-not-great school and learning a lot. That's good--learning is important. But what's also key here is experience. We get a lot of resumes looking for someone with "1-2 years experience" getting people wanting to count classwork in college as "experience." In general, not impressed.
What you might want to look for is practical experience. Are you able to get some real commercial experience, like with a part-time job? Do you have access to internships or other real-world work in the summer? Do any of the professors (or, for that matter, people in the career cneter)have industry contacts they might be able to use to help you get a job? If so, stay. If not, well, something to think about.
People are right by saying "where you went to college matters most for your first job, and is less important after that." But make sure you get that first job. And, more to the point, make sure you can get a first job that's actually doing what you want to do. Your first job doesn't have to be Microsoft, but you should make sure you feel confident in your chance to latch on doing real development with a quality company.
Experience is way, way more important. If you're truly concerned, take a year and co-op or intern over the summer at some CS related corporations (SAIC, Northrup, Lockheed, Mitre, etc, in the D.C. area). Not only will this get you professional (sorta) experience, but it's also the first place you should be submitting your resume. Any school with a CS program worth a darn should have a co-op program as well, maybe even a co-op fair.
Working while you're in school helps as well, and if you don't go to school in a city, work for the department. I worked for the Engineering Computing department at Virginia Tech while I was there, and I got a few job possibilities from people the teachers/staff knew. You'd be amazed how impressed employers are when they hear you've actually DONE things as opposed to just LEARNED how to do things.
--trb
IMHO, take as many classes OUTSIDE of CS as you can. A well rounded education means that you will have a better appreciation of someone else's viewpoint. For instance, if you know something about manufacturing or retail then that should translate to actually solving a problem. Employeers like a CS grad who 'speaks their language'.
I wouldn't worry a whole lot about the college. Heck, even the degree doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot.
My example: I went to school for secondary english education. Got all the way to student teaching and realized that while the kids were great and I enjoyed that part, I hated the idea of documenting every little thing that I said to an unruly student because the school system was paranoid about parent's coming in and raising a ruckus that so-and-so teacher is "picking on" little Johnny. I'm sorry, but little Johnny is a butthead!
Anyway, I graduated with my pretty little diploma and immediately went to work in the IT field. I've played with computers since a little kid and the Commodore Vic-20 days but I never enjoyed programming too much, so I mostly did tech support type things for people (and played DOOM, which did more for preparing me for computer support than anything else!).
I had odd jobs at college, such as the computer lab, networking group, newspaper webmaster, etc. THAT experience is what got me my job. The diploma just proved to my new boss that I could learn new things.
I was programming computers when I was 10. It was a PDP of some sort. I wound up with a degree from CMU (which I think is fairly well-known) and I've done well since then. I've never had a resume and no one has ever asked about my degree, other than in a social way.
It seems to me that companies want to know what you are capable of and will look to see what you've done in the past. In my case I was courted by companies for having worked on a public domain project for several years (CMU/Tek-IP). Having an academic education really takes a backseat to prior experience. And I don't think anyone cares about what school your degree comes from, aside from the fact that a good CS school will have more opportunities for you to get involved in interesting projects.
I recommend getting seriously involved in an OSS and putting that on your resume. project
You may see "or equivalent experience", but that's not most employers first choice. In most cases the degree does have significant weight, and given two people who are more or less equal, the guy with paper will win. Likewise, between the guy with a second tier state university CS degree will lose to the guy who went to a big name public university or well know private university.
Sorry, but it's a tough market out there, and if you ever want to be more than just a coder making half decent monkey money, you better go for the well known school.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
It does not matter. Maybe if you want to get into grad school at MIT it matters, but companies will take a CS degree from most schools, no problem.
:)
Its really what you know, who you know, and how well you work with other people.
On the other hand, there is nothing wrong with Ivy
I'm in my mid 30s and have a masters degree. What I studied in both my undergrad and graduate work I am not currently doing. Currently, I work in the IT field and am successful in it.
The most important thing is to get your degree. Even if it's in cornflakes, get the degree. After that, I have found that people skills are the most important aspect. Learning how to survive, and then thrive, in the corporate world takes a lot more than they ever teach you in school.
Some of the best stuff I ever learned about success in a corporate career came from people who actually worked in it and had years of experience. Not a single professor relayed any such information.
Now, focusing in an area and then actually carrying that into the work force is keen, and I commend anyone for that, but simply getting an education, period, and then learning how to "survive on the street" in the work place are the first two priorities IMHO....
"All great things are simple & expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope." --Churchill
Maybe I'll get flamed, but here is my take: take a look at the program your school offers and compare it to that of a "top shelf" school. If your school offers a solid CS cirriculum then you should find that your cirriculum nearly matches that of any other school offering CS.
I went to a state school as well, but if I take a look at MITs undergrad classes, they cover the same topics and use the exact same texts. Certainly the faculty at MIT may be much better than the faculty at my school, but when it comes down to it, it is the student who needs to make the most of the education they are getting.
Your college placement office should be able to answer the first question, your department should be able to answer the second, and you'll have to do some serious, personal research to figure out the answer to the second.
If your college doesn't draw recruiters who want you, you're probably better off going to a college that does.
See what I've been reading.
I is not going to matter too much...
unless your degree is from the University of Pheonix.
[n8.r0n] http://petesweb.spymac.net/
.... as long as you're learning and doing well, and enjoying the experience, and the school is appropriately accredited and adequately equipped and staffed, I would stay.
Your undergrad 'name' doesn't mean _shit_ after your first or second real-world job, except if you network with alumni.
The biggest problem with public universities IMHO relate to the massive, impersonal undergrad study halls taught by distracted English-as-third-language grad students while the person whose name is on the course listing is off doing research or conference junkets and avoiding the paying rabble. Public research universities are the _worst_, unless you are actually researching. Great for grad school, but worthless for the first three years of undergrad.
And of course, if Daddy wants to shoulder the loan payments for the 'name', by all means, keep it in mind.. Who knows, you may end up writing for the Simpsons..
This is honestly the best advice I can give you:
First of all. Every day when you get up, look through the paper, or online, for jobs. Keep an eye on what kind of stuff people want. Read job markets. Know who's doing what, who needs people, who's laying off people, or (much much more likely) who's outsourcing. Know the market, don't learn about it after the fact.
Secondly, when in school try to develop skills that you can use even if you don't get a job. Learn stuff that you can potentially use as a self employed freelancer, becuase if you're graduating with a CS degree, that might be all you really have. Now don't get me wrong, working for yourself can be a huge payoff, but if you graduate and all your skills focus on stuff like writing compilers or working with mainframes, you might end up kind of disapointed.
Thirdly, focus your path on a few, related things. Don't try to know everything about all the different aspects of CS. The "jack of all trades" is out, and the specialist is in. When you have to chose projects, chose something in whatever area you want to focus. Study that subject heavily outside of your normal coursework (whatever you do don't ever rely on coursework to teach you anything, use it as a supplement to your own independent study). Find a project for yourself that's not school related, but related to your focus area, and work on it.
Fourthly, build up your portfolio - don't forget it, don't neglect it. Make it sharp and easy to understand. Put everything you do in there that has any significance. I would try to make sure and focus on stuff from your specialty area instead of trying to show diversity, but that's just me. A diversified portfolio is also very appealing.
Finally I would suggest reading tech news every day. It's not just a hobby, it's not just part of your job, it's part of your life as a "computer person". You have to be on top of things all the time, because they move so fast.
As for having a degree from a more popular place, I don't think it matters that much at the end of the day. Don't use namedropping as a crutch to get a job. It always comes down more to your own personality and how you can handle yourself in an interview in addition to which of the CEO's is currently sleeping with your mom/sister.
No. If you know your shit, you'll get hired. There are plenty of guys getting good jobs in computing fields without any formal education. Don't sweat it. Just know what you need to know.
What is your penile percentile?
I had programming job offers after undergrad work in 1990 in physics at a state university not known for its CS or physics programs.
The bigger question you need to ask is: how good is the placement program at the university you're attending? If businesses come by the truckload to recruit, it doesn't matter that the place is a tad short of ivy.
If your grades and such are top-notch, then another criteria becomes important: how the businesses and placement office chooses who gets to interview. At my undergrad school, anyone could apply to interview with for any given job, and the businesses doing the interviews chose the interviewees. This helps top students at the expense of the so-so students. Where I went for my MBA, anyone could apply, and the university doled out interview slots, with no apparent input from the firms, benefitting everyone equally and thereby reducing the value of your grades.
After you get your first job, tech jobs tend to be far closer to a meritocracy than a sheepskin-ocracy, so the importance of where you went to school tends to decline. What you do in your jobs, or what sorts of projects you undertake outside your jobs (e.g., open source), will count for far much more than where you went to school, or even how well you did.
Of course, IANACRNDIPOOTV (I Am Not A Corporate Recruiter, Nor Do I Play One On TV), YMMV, etc.
The Busy Coder's Guide to Android Development
If you're planning a career in academia, a "brand name" degree may be slightly more beneficial. However, your school's reputation credentials are likely to be as important as the impressiveness of its name. My little college (within the large university) is jointly accredited by the IEEE and ACM, and therefore quite adequate to get its graduates into grad school if they so chose.
So, unless you're really bent on being a professor at CalTech, a BSCS at a well-accredited state school should get you where you want to go. Frankly, after more than 5-10 years or so after graduation, your diploma will be a check-off item on a potential employer's list of job requirements. I've never had an interviewer ask about the details of my educations, other than to confirm that I actually had one.
Don't get me wrong: it would be cool to have a diploma from a big-name university. However, don't let that be your litmus test. An additional factor to consider when picking your educational path? Sure - why not. The deciding factor? You'd be crazy.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
I must admit, when I see a degree from CMU I do trust the person more. In the long run, of course, work matters more but it does make a difference getting started.
Same thing was true when I was hired. I got talked to because of the CMU degree. After that, no one cared that much.
I have virtually no formal CS training, other than a fortran class in college. I'm pretty much self-taught, working with computers since I was 8 in some capacity or another. My formal background is in Biology Education, though I quickly discovered that teaching high school biology wasn't for me.
What led me to my current position was a lot of persistance and being able to demonstrate that I was a smart, capable person. I started as an entry level programmer (mostly hired to teach the occasional Access class), caught the whole "web application" wave, and ended up in a well-paying position some eight years later.
The trick in many cases is just getting in the door. For that, being able to say you're certified with a particular skill or have a degree is good enough. Once you're hired, the key is to show that you really know your stuff and can make your customers happy.
I have the same case as your , and when I graduated from a college known for it's girls which is called RFC (Rich Fools College) , but you have to be special and unique to overide this bad reputation. for me , I started learning Linux/UNIX which later let me learn OOP,PHP,... easily. After graduating , I found job a good job easily ( the magic word was Linux/UNIX).
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Probably the biggest thing employers look for when you graduate is your attitude and ability to work within a team. The actual work you did in school is somewhat important so when you interview have a portfolio of your projects.
At least that's been what I've seen...
If you want th really good CS jobs, you'll get them best by going to a presigious grad school for (at least) a masters.
It's a little chauvinistic of me, since I went there, but I'd say get two-three years of experience and then get into UNC-Chapel Hill. But there are other good schools -- CMU, MIT.
Almost as good as UNC.
I have staffed up quite a few R & D departments in my years and I can honestly say that a degree only means something on the 1st job you get when you have no experience. After the 1st job its all the relevant experience sections on the resume that gets them an interview. I am usually more interested in the actual interview and the answers to the technical questions than I am with the resume itself. In fact the best programmers I have met either didn't graduate, or didn't take software engineering is school at all. I am a Human Machine Interface and Design major I have been programming, designing UI's, and managing programmers of over 10 years now. I taught myself to program on my C64 as a kid in the 80's, and read an Amiga book on C in 1985. I have been programming daily ever since, and will usually hire a motivated self taught guy like myself over a 4 year degree if the interview shows him to be more knowledgeable.
Ask the placement office or the undergrad advisor for the dept about the placement rating.
I've found that the only place where the school really has much impact is if you want to continue to graduate school. I know for a fact that people from my masters program got turned away from phd programs because they get so many apps one of the easiest ways of culling the herd is to simply skip "bad" schools. Of course I'm in the humanities, so something like CS might differ.
Like it or not, the old rule of "It isn't what you know, but who you know" still applies in many cases.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
What chance do I have in the real world with a not-so-prestigious degree?
A prestigious degree may get people to notice your resume, open doors for you and give you a few opportunities you wouldn't otherwise have for your first couple of jobs. After that, your previous jobs are usually more important.
Another important aspect of where you attend college is the people you get to know: those will be part of your Rolodex for the rest of your life.
Am I likely to be learning what's important?
Probably not, but that's the same with every degree. Ultimately, you yourself are responsible for learning what's important.
Am I looking at a series of awful jobs if I don't transfer?
Maybe, or maybe not.
Overall, it's probably better to do well and learn a lot at a less well-known university than to be unhappy, do poorly, and/or learn little at a prestigious university. Prestigious universities are prestigious for a reason, and they tend to be highly competitive even after you get in.
Computing is a field that has little tolerance for snobs. As long as your degree is not from a known joke school (and yes, I'll even exclude Wilfrid Laurier University from that category), and you are competent at what you're hired to do, your career prospects are as good as anybody else's.
More important than the school is the type of program. For a junior position I'd prefer to hire someone who has come through a co-op program or done an internship than one who has not.
If you've learned the material, are conversant with some of the literature, can learn beyond the material presented in the classroom, and are willing to keep your ego in check on team projects, you'll do just fine in industry.
The Seventh Rule: Take others more seriously than yourself, particularly when you are leading them.
I've worked with a lot of programmers in a fair number of companies, and it's not always the case that the leads come from big-name schools. I've found that employers are far more hung up on results and winning personalities ( really! ) than diplomas... and as far as getting a job, your connections are likely to matter more than your degree. Which, honestly, might be where a big-name school might give you the biggest advantage.
Learning how to run an interview and having good references are really key to a successful job search as well. Experience counts probably more than anything.
Still, I suppose your dad does have a point. If you can 'trade up' to a better school ( even if not more well known ), why would you not ??
I'd say that it might help you get a job faster to have that prestigious degree. You'd be more likely to be on the 'top of the pile' as my employer called it. But in all honesty, a year's experience will make up for that and maybe even then some. So if you're worried, find an internship in your field before you graduate and you shouldn't have a single thing to worry about.
I think it could matter in two respects (I am a hiring manager and do not consider myself a school snob ...)
1) A better program may be, in fact, better. Your may learn more. It may be hard to understand the benefits of a better program while immersed in one that feels adequate. Many people do not have the option of transferring to a 'better' program because of their past performance, not because they choose not to.
2) There can be a benefit immediately after you graduate if your goal is to join a large company, as they tend to focus recruiting resources on a few schools and right now it is a bit of a 'buyers market'. After your first successful (or unsuccessful) experience it will matter less.
Go ahead and finish your degree where you are. Then get your Masters at a more well known school.
Experience, experience, experience.
Having reviewed many resumes from college students, both with BS and graduate degrees, I've found that experience is what stands out the most. I could care less which school you went to if you have taken the right classes, spent your summers working an internship and taking on extra-ciricular activities in your area of technical interest.
Just make sure that you use your time wisely. When you interview, you should be able to show that you already have experience. The experience clock does not start once you graduate. Presumably, it has already started. Have you had good internships? Do you have specific areas of interests that are substantiated by independent study? Or did you just attend class and received a degree. I would never hire someone simply based on the paper their degree is printed on.
*looks out his office window at the lawn*
I don't have a degree.
*looks at the flat panels and the laptop on his desk*
I don't even have a highschool diploma.
*looks at his security badge*
I do, however, make more money than even my parents do, by doing contract work with a large west-coast company who will remain unnamed. (Starts with an M...)
You'll be fine, kid, you'll be fine.
It's how you are in an interview that gets you a job and it's how you perform during the first few weeks/months that ensures you keep that job. Worry about your interview tactics more than the name of the institution on the piece of paper you're going to get in another few years. If you're shy and you suck at conversation and there's no way you could display enthusiasm for a project, then yes, I concede, go to MIT and let the degree do the talking. Otherwise, let your lips do the talking and your fingers do the walking, and code your way into your position of choice. If I can do it, so can you.
Reinvent the wheel only at either a lower cost, greater effectiveness, or your own personal enrichment and satisfaction.
The first job search. A lot of companies that use human resource firms (recruiters) will specify what credentials they want an applicant to have before the recruiting firm even considers forwarding the resume. In many instances, the company will specify a range of schools (and the recruiters have a pretty good feel for what the companies mean) that an applicant should have a degree from. Recruiters will then use this list as the "first cut" for potential resumes. If you make the first cut, then it doesn't really matter where you went. It's just a way of separating the wheat from the chaffe.
As others have said, after your first job, where the degree came from is of less significance. The only place I disagree with some other replies is that the level of "beginner positions" available to you as a graduate from a bigger name school is generally a notch higher than it would be otherwise. That is to say, a degree from a better known school may open up positions for you immediately that someone from a lesser known school will only be offered after a year to two years of experience. As always, YMMV.
Most of the time, it doesn't matter where you received your computer science degree. If you are looking for a job, what matters is what you know and your experience.
:-) You are considered to be an key expert in your field of research.
If you have done any research and have published a paper to a major journal or conference (regardless of where you received your degree), then the computer science degree *really* does not matter, never mind where you went to school!
One benefit of receiving a computer science degree from a famous computer science school is job networking and connections.
I have a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from SUNY (State University of New York) at Brockport, and an Associate's degree in Computer Science from SUNY Alfred. This arrangement has served me well enough.
SUNY Alfred is known for engineering, but it is still a state school, and a two-year school at that. Worse, it had a reputation as a party school at the time I atended it (I think it was like #3 or #4 on MTV's list).
As an aside, I believe I learned more for it being a party school. Basically the party environment had two side-effects. First, the professors were willing to put a greater investment into the students that actually gave a shit. Second, the serious students didn't end up suffering from burnout from trying to keep up with their peers, because we were usually the ones in the lead.
SUNY Brockport is a full University, but is better know for its sports (for reasons I haven't been able to figure out.... we always lost).
Despite that, I am doing fine. Since my graduation in 1994, I have worked for a factory automation company, a software developer, a systems integrator and a utility. I have enjoyed all four jobs. Maybe I could have done better with a degree from RPI, MIT or RIT, but I'd still be paying my student loans, too.
www.wavefront-av.com
How about those programmers with a B.A.? Do these folks, with as much experience as some B.S. counterparts, have equal weight?
Currently bidding on sig
I agree that unless it's Ivy League, it doesn't really matter. I just graduated from a little-known college in Arizona: Northern Arizona U. But I got hired on right away with one of the bigger mainframe companies. Here they hire based on past experience with a particular college and it's graduates. So this place has quite a few people from NAU and NIU and UofA, none of which are particularly known for their CS degrees.
-nb
What chance do I have in the real world with a not-so-prestigious degree?
Actually with the job situation as it is right now, if you are truly interested and talented, you will be fine.
Am I likely to be learning what's important?
No. That doesn't really reflect poorly on the school or its CS program, but in reality you seldom learn "what's important" in college. Once in the field you will realize, "what's important" is specific to the industry that you are employed in.
Am I looking at a series of awful jobs if I don't transfer?
Maybe, but again this is not specific to the school or its program. You may land the dream job right out of college (very rare). I wonder how many people at EA have degrees from prestegious universites?
The best advice I can give you is to GET A JOB NOW. I graduated in 99 with by BS in computer science and I worked ANY CS job I could get in college. I remember going to class with people who made more than me working at the local gas station. But, now that I'm back for my masters, I still see them, struggling to get ANY position. They are JUST NOW getting entry level positions and are quite happy with them, I on the other hand am closing in on 6 figures. YMMV.
Haha, what a moma's boy!! I learned to program Commodore Pet BASIC at computer summer camp like all the other cool 11 year olds!
You said you are going to a state university. I can't imagine how that would be a problem. Now, if you were attending some fly-by-night start-up non-accredited online college thats only been around for a few months and likely won't be around much longer, than yes, that's a problem. For instance if you had said University of Phoenix online (which remarkably is accredited), I'd say you should transfer...to a state university. I have to think that employers look down on online universities if anything.
I spent less than 4k per year going to U-Mass Lowell instead of a 30k/ year Northeastern or such.
I bought a brand new subaru impreza WRX when I got out of school with the money I saved. I have no debt from college.
It took me a year to get a job, but I blame that on my poor planning (I didn't have an internship) and crappy market (got out of school 2002). Now I've been working in the Boston area as a software engineer writing web-based apps for about a year.
Keys to a good job are usually location (Boston, great; Boise, eh), interview / personal skills, and prior experience. No one ever really asks about college so much, as long as they know I did my time.
As far as what you get from the quality of professors, I find that varies. There were great professors and horrible ones. What I did learn is that if you put in the extra effort, you'll get way more out of it.
Reason, free market capitalism, and individualism
you better keep him happy. If you are paying your own way then make your own decision.
I found my inner child, then I got caught abusing it...
I heard the section on crate-bashing at MIT proves to be quite handy in the real world. Maybe that's what you're talking about.
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Here's how my six year old software company does its hiring:
1) If your resume mentions that you majored in CS at an Ivy, MIT, Stanford, Caltech or Berkeley, you get an in-person interview, no matter how little job experience you have.
2) If you do not have a degree in CS from one of the above schools, you get an interview if you have five years work experience in the particular area we're hiring.
We know that many smart people go to other schools, but it's difficult to do the narrowing down for hiring, so we use a school's brand as a proxy for who to talk to.
This is pretty common hiring practice in certain areas of corporate america. For instance, people who are accepted to Harvard Business School are not allowed to take paying work from other companies while they are in school -- the reason is simple: Companies care more about the quality of person that Harvard attracts and gets to attend than they do the particular classes these students take in Business School. They'd be happy to hire someone who was accepted, even if they haven't attended the classes yet.
In summary, do something that will make you happy.
But, don't kid yourself -- a better college brand will open doors to you that may stay shut otherwise. Keep this in mind reading posts from people who either went to a low-brand school (and therefore may not be aware of closed doors), or those who are currently going to a high-brand school (and therefore do not have substantial job market experience).
I suppose you'd want to weigh this against the connections that your professors have at your local school, and their willingness to recommend you as a 'star' to the people they know.
Best of luck!
Gaining a degree from a school with a small C.S. program has it's share of benefits. A smaller program might offer fewer courses, but consumes less of your courseload. This allows you to branch out, even later in your college career to gain a diverse education.
This is not only valued by employers looking for well rounded employees, but can open you up to careers where computer science has more recently made inroads.
I'm thinking specificaly of the need for computer scientists with a backround in biology and vice versa, but i know there are other examples.
The fact that I was able to branch out and explore other departments helped immensly in my job search.
~clearcutting prevents forrest fires
If you have a rich relative offering to pay, and you can go to MIT without going into debt, then yeah, of course you should transfer. But if, like most of us, you're going to pay for college, you should choose the best accredited undergraduate education that will leave you financially stable (read: debt-free) afterward.
You'll hear lots of people telling you about the value of name schools, the need for "networking" and other such hoo-hah. And often, they'll try to convince you that it's worth $30,000 in debt to get a top-tier undergraduate education. Don't buy it.
Remember -- at the undergraduate level, most schools will teach you the same things (oftentimes, from the same books). So why pay out the nose for an education that can be obtained for a fraction of the cost of a top-tier university?
Save your money, keep yourself out of debt, and you'll have more options later on. That's doubly important today, where Punjab's willingness to work for 30 cents an hour will almost invariably trump an expensive diploma....
Let's try not to let fact interfere with our speculation here, OK?
As other posters have said, It doesn't matter much after you land your first job. Your transcript won't be looked at.
I do know that my employer has a very strong preference to those who have co-op experience.
After you land your job, it is what you accomplish that really matters - However, it may still make a difference - not that you will be choosen becuase of your school or your grades, but I think it may make a difference in what you produce and therefore your success. Many of our senior technology staff come from one of the top CS schools - I don't think that is a coincidence.
The kids from the big schools (Stanford, Cal, etc) might have an edge in terms of name-recognition but that does not necessarily make them better and more talented than someone at a smaller, lesser-known school.
I think it is important to have a degree but it is even more important to have the self-motivation and drive to succeed. Networking with people in industry and writing well are also key. Raw technical knowledge is important but that alone is not enough to carry you through a career.
Success will come if you work hard and make it happen for yourself.
(At least this is my experience and what I look for when talking with candidates).
I suppose that depends on how much of an ass you want to be. You could either say "I have a degree in Computer Science/Engineering, so I know x, y, and z. I worked hard because I was interested in the material. Computer Science is a passion for me -- I would enjoy any job related to [programming|software engineering|etc]" or you could say "Don't even ask what I know, it should be obvious that I am an excellent employee because I chose to get a degree from [Cornell|Berkelely|etc]. I am interested in the highest-paying job you have -- I deserve it because I went to a school with a good reputation."
Note that the above is a blatant stereotype to make a point -- obviously the sentiments expressed are not exemplified by the majority of CS students anywhere.
Are you going to school in order to create a career for yourself that you enjoy and are passionate about? Are you going to school to impress friends, relatives, or potential employers? It cannot be said enough that the school's reputation has little bearing on the competency and attitude of the students. Employers are looking more for a positive attitude, appropriate skills, and a good investment for their company.
I know some folks who are currently in their undergraduate CS study and say things like "I could teach these classes! The only reason I am doing this at all is because the 'stupid' rules say I have to get a bachelor's degree before I get that Ph.D." Meanwhile, they are getting C's in those "easy" classes because their goal is the piece of paper and prestige (ego) rather than pursuing an activity or career they can be passionate about.
My best professors (in CS and otherwise) were those that began their careers in 'industry' and had a passion for engineering or CS and had excellent communication skills before moving into teaching/academia. Real-world experience is so much more useful than 'book-smarts' most of the time. (That's not to say that these professors weren't book-smart, too!)
I think it is impressive if you're coming out of one of the top 5-10 programs - CMU, MIT, Standford...
Once you get past that point, there is a really big tier of "good" programs. Unless your school has a reputation as being particularly, bad, I just wouldn't worry about it. You may have to sell your learning experiences as part of your interviews, but that should be natural anyway.
Regardless, once you've been in industry for a short while, your experience there becomes far more important than your technical education.
Besides, your university credentials are mainly useful in getting your first job. After that they are more interested in your previous jobs. So at worst an unknown university will just add one stepping stone on your career path.
There's one flaw in this line of reasoning. It's true that your degree is the most important thing for your first job, and less so for later jobs.
But what is it that most gets you your SECOND job? It would be your FIRST job.
You're absolutly right that after 3-5 years the school you went to is a footnote on the resume. But the work experience isn't. And if you're coming out of college to a less-than-impressive job, and worked out to a somewhat-better-but-still-not-impressive second job, then THAT'S what interviewers see.
A less-than-impressive school isn't a huge deal IF you feel confident of getting a decent first job.
Look at recent grads--where are they working? Now look at recent grads from where you're looking to transfer. Where are THEY working? Is there a big gap?
And now I have a kick ass job. Not only that, I just recently received a massive raise. I think it's true to say that most companies with programmer-unfriendly policies are the ones that are going to care about degrees. In my case, the company I work for is very open-minded and is more interested in the skills and merits I possess rather than whether or not if I have a sheep skin hanging on the wall at home. So, do yourself a favor: quit school and become self taught. People who learn on their own initiative are much better developers anyway.
Why bother.
getting your foot in the door is the first step. When people see what you can offer, they'll be coming to you.
I know I'm going to be modded up on this
Is it high? A 4.0 perhaps?
I started at a non-too well known state school and after the first two years my GPA was 4.0. I was very proud of this, until I told someone I worked with and they asked the obvious question. Why wasn't I at a better school?
If the school your at isn't stimulating you and pushing you to your limits, then by all means go somewhere else. If you're having a good time and learning a lot, then you're at the right place.
The work at a "more well known school" is going to be harder. Especially in CS. I don't know how well-known your thinking about, but if it's top 10, then the curiculum is likely to be much more theory intense. Since you probably don't have a strong background in theory (a generalization, I know), it's going to be even more work for you. In the better programs, abilities like formal theorem proven are just taken for granted in the upper division courses.
So far it probably sounds like you shouldn't transfer. However, yes, it does matter what school you are from. It doesn't matter if you're school is 34th vs. 35th per-say, but it certainly matters if it's top 10 or top 100. You will be competitive for jobs from a top 10 school that you probably won't be in just a top 100 school.
Sure, tons of experience is often a trumph card. I can attest to this. However, if you've got that ton of experience, all the more reason to get a deeper education that exposes you to things you won't learn on the job.
At this point too (you're junior year), it's too late to get that "ton of experience" if you don't have it. Everyone has an internship these days. It's not uncommon to have 4 or more either. I think "tons of experience" today constitutes somewhere on the order of 10 or more internships or a heck of a lot of Open Source experience (like large-project maintainer-level). Yes, this means internships back into high school. And yes, there's quite a few folks that have done that.
At the end of the day too, that the pace of the university your at will often match the types of job you can get. If you really like your university, you probably want the type of job graduates of your university would get. You really don't want to get a job you're not qualified to do. You're life will just be miserable.
Programs that offer or even require co-op experiences are the one's that pay off.
Take the University of Cincinnati. Not an Ivy league school, but all of their engineering students are required to co-op(cs is in their college of engineering). They come out with 15-18 months of REAL WORLD experience. That's what gets you a job.
If your university offers a co-op program, enroll in it... today!
Not sure if CS would be similar, but from an EE perspective,
It doesn't seem to matter. It mostly depends on
your experience, how you conduct yourself in the interview,
and the hiring manager's prefrences. Personally,
I got my ECE degree from a large state
university that usually has been ranked around
25th for engineering in that USNews
survey, for whatever that's worth.
Also, my grades were nowhere near spectacular, but
through some good experience in IT support
and a good interview, I got a job at
a large, very successful corporation and in the last 4 years have had the
chance to work on several high-profile,
fantastically interesting projects, one involving a certain
groundbreaking upcoming microprocessor
and a very highly ranked supercomputer . .
I think to succeed, you mainly have to prove to
hiring managers that you are genuinely interested
in the work and that you want it more
than other candidates.
Candidate: "Yes, I have a double major in Mac10 and Scout with a minor in Aug."
Employer: "Great! You can start immediately."
(Employer takes a desert eagle out of his desk)
FORTUNE FAVORS IRONY
geeks have real-life experience?? wtf!?
By reading this, you have given me brief control of your mind.
Since you're going to receive more than your fair share of personal anecdotes, I'll throw my own story into the mix.
Short version: I've got an A.S. in Computer-Aided Drafting from the local community college, but due to luck for sure, skill I hope, and good management, I'm a senior systems analyst for a company that writes tax software -- the most steady programming gig possible. Go figure.
I was planning for an Electrical Engineering degree, but I had near-zero study skills. I spent a semester at Okla State and quite utterly failed to distinguish myself.
After a summer delivering pizza, I got a job through Manpower -- proofreading phone books. But instead of just marking errors, I figured out the patterns, and got hired.
Next was the big lucky break: Texas Instruments, flush with Cold War defense contracts, had a program where they put folks through school to become CAD draftsmen. I applied and got in. Got paid to go to school for a semester, then worked full time with a full-time school schedule. By the time I got my A.S. in Computer-Aided Drafting, I was the software support person for the drafting group, writing Lisp extensions for AutoCAD.
Cold war ends. Layoffs begin. I bail out for American Airlines... start out as 2nd level support, taking calls from Australia and Japan in the evenings, the Middle East at midnight, and Europe in the wee hours. Transferred around, picked up VB, ended up leading a small project. Bailed out in the mid-90s and just missed the downturns.
Got the current job when it was a family-owned company with a tradition of "get it done" over "show me your diploma". The owner also didn't like to lose talent, so they kept up with the dot-com boom wages. Owner sold to a conglomerate, but clueful management remained in place.
So here I am, a high-level programmer, with an A.S. in Drafting from a community college. Put that in yer pipe and smoke it.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
I have a marketing degree from a state university, nothing else.
I am now a PHP/MySQL programmer/DBA. The job is good, the money is good.
Experience and a BROAD knowledge of languages and technologies are the important things. Being a nice person also helps. People remember when you do favors for them.
I used to think state schools might hinder me a bit, as I went to a small regional school with a tiny CS department. By the magic of the CS gods, I jumped from there to Carnegie Mellon for my masters degree. I consider myself just another average joe, and was worried my school would hurt me on jobs and grad school. I realized people look at you, not your piece of paper.
QBasic isn't included in the MS-OS anymore.. how are the next generation supposed to tinker with 'basic' programming at all?
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
I wonder if the same goes for colleges vs universities in Canada. That is, if the diploma/degree become irrelevant?
My understanding is that in the US, college and universities are very similar. Here in Canada, or at least in Ontario, College and Unis are very different.
College trains you to get a job (and is mostly practical work in my experience), university on the other hand is mostly theory (with far less practical).
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You're in for a series of awful jobs whether you transfer or don't. The computer field is almost dead. The only good that can come out of transfering is networking with the kids from a more presteigous school. If you think what degree you have counts for a BS in computer science, think again.
My college has a strong CS program, and requires a year of co-op (aka internship) experience as part of the degree. It's been my experience when job hunting that the 2 things companies seem to care about were grades and experience. Far too many companies tended to have a 3.0 GPA cutoff for co-ops, which hurt me. Fortunately, I also had a lot of programming I'd done out of class that I could point to when applying and interviewing for a job, and that experience was responsible for finally getting a co-op. If you are doing well where you are, I'd stay there, and program stuff you can talk about in a resume/interview in your spare time.
I have an Associate Degree in Computer Programming Technology from Vincennes University, Indiana. Five years after graduation, I am a Senior Developer and Team Leader for a Fortune 500 company.
You need to cultivate three things (listed in priority): A social network in the industry, a positive reputation, and a passion for computer science. A prestigious degree will likely help, but it is not necessary.
When I was a CS major I found it very insulting when people would compare it to IT. IT is a skill and a valuable one, but I see it as blue collar compared to actual programming. Its a blurry line, ubt administering a whole lot of windows machines and installing the everpresent (?) patches in no way compares to analyzing algorithims (for spelling maybe :).
"brxref
what you know, what you want to learn and your present/past work experience.
It's not like doing an MBA where one college offers a stronger program than another. We're talking about a program where work experience matters more than where you studied and that is IF you studied (a bunch of selt-taught employed people out there).
At the beginning when searching for a good job in that field, it might be a bit harder because they will see that you don't have much experience and pay attention to your past educational experience but once you're in a job and that you get experience and that people know you're valuable to the company, it will be easier and easier to find another job as you can the work experience. Then again, that applies to many programs but its true in C.S
If you're going to school just to learn to program, by all means, stay where you are. You'll do fine there and get great programming jobs.
If you're planning to continue as a Computer Scientist and get advanced degrees, than TRANSFER NOW. Especially for PhD programs, it doesn't matter one rats ass if you have a 5.0 from Podunct University, it matters if your advisors and recommendation-writers are well known and well respected.
At whatever "elite" university I attend, the few PhDs they accept per year basically have all worked with someone in the faculty before or studied with one of the faculty's peers at another fine institution. Let me tell you: if you want to get a PhD from a great institution and get paid to do it, you NEED to have a great undergrad degree and work with the biggest names you can latch onto in your particular field. Internships with big, important labs help with this. If your advisor or recommendation writer has their name on papers presented at big, elite conferences, you'll go far.
Trust me. I was a hot shot from a good but underknown liberal arts school. I am NOT in the PhD program here, and would never have gotten into it. I simply didn't have enough ties to the elite academic world.
When was the last time you heard the phrase: I wish I DID NOT have a _____(fill in the blank) degree. However the oppisite statement is heard all too often.
So when in doubt, stick it out, and attend as much school as you can handle because you will never regret it.
I vote with staying where you are, if you're happy there.
I was in a similar situation; my school wasn't terribly noted for engineering, so after 2 years my mom convinced me to transfer to Virginia Tech. The biggest reason is that I was looking for a co-op job and no one would hire me from the previous university.
VT was very different from my old school. It did seem like the program was a little better academically, and the school definitely had a much better intern/co-op department which made it much easier to find internships. Also, I think the big name on the resume does help a lot in your first job or two; this may be more important now with the terrible job market than it was when I first got out of school in '98.
However, I paid a terrible price for the change. First, it was much more expensive. My family wasn't exactly rich, so while I was doing ok at my first school, where I paid in-state tuition, costs went up greatly at VT, leading me to build up a large debt in student loans. Secondly, and possibly more importantly, I never managed to build a network of friends at VT like I had, and lost, at my first school. Being a not-terribly-outgoing person, I had a very hard time finding any new friends at the new school; I found that I believe that most relationships are made in one's freshman year, when you're living on campus and everyone is new. After everyone's been there a few years and has a circle of friends, it's not so easy to break in. And maybe it's just me, but the engineering students at Virginia Tech seemed to be a bunch of snobs compared to the students at my old school. Not having many friends in college isn't bad just because of the social aspect, but those relationships can also be rewarding to your career: look how many companies were started by people who were friends in college.
So, in summary, if you're happy where you are, don't screw it up. Personally, I don't believe in making changes to anything unless there's something wrong, or there's something else that's obviously better in sight. I don't see any posts here so far in favor of big-name schools (unless maybe you have your sights set on politics).
I don't have one, and I get along fine as a ++C programmer
It depends on what you mean by a "not so well known" state college. It also depends on what you teach yourself in your spare time and how activately you are in pursuing available internships and lining up a job BEFORE you graduate. If you go to a relatively unknown state college, don't use their placement program, don't learn anything in your spare time and then start looking for a job after you graduate (in particular if you limit yourself to the area you graduated in) then you may very well be looking at NO job not just a string of crappy ones. So just how crappy is this state college? What area do you hope to become employed in? I suggest that you check the paper every week as if you're looking for a job already and see what kind of skills employers are really looking for. In my area they want skills and experience more than anything, not just a degree.
As long as you move to India a top quality CS degree should get you at least $4 per hour. All the best my friend!
When I saw 'CCNP for Dummies' and 'Solaris for Dummies' in my local Walmart I knew then for sure that a CS degree is the only qualification or certification worth the time or expense.
Managers have no interest in experience!
If they hire a minimally-certified but highly experienced person, and that person fucks up, the manager's boss will scream at him for hiring an "unqualified" person.
But if the manager hires some completely inexperienced zit-faced 21 year-old who blew the trust fund on MCSE, etc, and that kid fucks up, the boss can say "How was I to know? He's fully qualified...!"
At least an inexperienced CS grad has some useful knowledge, whereas a clueless dickhead with MCSE et al is utterly useless.
Disclaimer: I have been in IT professionally since the late '70s. I have enough certificates of competency in various systems to wallpaper my house. But they are now worthless. The one thing I never did was complete my CS degree, and I still regret it. Watching 22 year old Indian kids taking all the jobs at a quarter the salary is not fun.
But the likelyhood that you are educated without even a grade school education, is slim at best. If you are worried about your future, well, there are individuals who work in high tech without grade school, but I am willing to bet that I can count on my hands all the ones in any high positions.
You may be able to get good jobs without going to one of the top schools (Stanford, MIT, Berkely, Carnigie), but the school will ALWAYS pay off in the future.
Something to think about; I was number one in all of my classes at Colorado State. In fact, I would absolutely destroy the curves. But I did notice that others from the top 4 schools (with average grades there) were my equals esp. when it came to job promotions.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
When we hire, I don't pay much attention to the degree granting institution. However, I consider fellowships and internships as very strong indicators of ability. If your school does not have relationships with industry (due to size or location) to provide these opportunities, then your job search may suffer.
I was in the market for a fresh grad, someone who is a good programmer, but also a solid investment, because as a company, we would be dumping a load of effort into someone.
Without any significant experience, the only thing that differentiates people is their pedigree, ie. the school them come from. It is a differentiator. If I get a resume from San Jose State or Chico and then someone from Berkeley, I will be much more interested in someone from Berkeley. It takes significant amount of effort to get into Berkeley, so it already shows something about the person. Sorry, but that's how life works.
School projects are mildly interesting, but you have to realize that no matter what you do in school, it doesn't matter because it doesn't hold a candle to working in the "real world".
The primary reason for this is that in a real-world environment, you have to work with and get along with a large number of people, and intangibles count. Being organized, being easy to get along with, etc are pretty damn important, too, and this comes out with experience.
Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
If your goal is to work in a company,
where your degree is from is less important
(and your work experience is more important).
If you're considering post-graduate education,
then where your undergraduate degree is from
is more important, particularly for getting
into a good PhD program.
on whether you want to be a programmer, or a Computer Scientist (tm).
If you really want to do software engineering, work in industry, etc., then wherever you're at, as long as is a moderately competitive program (i.e., not Southeastern County State Auxillary School), will be fine. I've got friends at Penn State who IBM is chomping at the bit to hire. While it's a solid school, it's not known nation-wide as a CS powerhouse like Stanford is.
If you want to go the academic route, then yes, where you go for undergrad certainly does matter. If you're going to get hired as a professor, you'll need a Ph.D. from a fairly top-tier place; and to get into one of those, you'll need your B.S. from someplace decently notable as well.
If you're really convinced that your bachelor's degree might hinder you, though, don't worry too much; you can get an M.Eng. degree in a year to a year-and-a-half and as long as you did well in undergrad, you've got a good chance of being accepted into a master's degree program someplace better. Then you'll be all set.
Check this out. I'm 27, and i've been a CS major at San Diego State U. for about 7 years now...
I take one or two classes per semester and i've never taken a Summer class. You might want to laugh at me right off the bat, but i've got good reason to be in this situation. I have 6 years of real experience, from the start up that enticed me to join many years ago, to the established engineering company i work for now ($72k...which is near poverty level in San Diego). I've got a few tough classes ahead of me...mainly a physics that i sidestepped years ago and still haunts me. It hasn't been perfect, but i'm grateful that i made the decision i made. Most importantly don't give up on the CS degree...even if it's from SDSU. Why everytime i go to class I've got a grip of 22yr old "green" graduating seniors begging me to help them get $13/hr internships at my place. I tell these young pups to take advantage of google, msdn, codeguru,codeproject and familiarize themselves with the great Satan(tm) a la SQLSERVER, VStudio.Net, and XML that they don't cover in our CS classes. It's what will make them most marketable. My apologies to the hardcore white-bearded CS professors who might expel me for speaking of a MS-centric workforce. Experience is very important and can make up for a lousy CS degree, not to mention even a lack of a degree like in my case. Also...to you graduating CS majors, for God's(tm) sake work on your speaking skills, hygiene, firm up that handshake, shave that peach fuz and appear "corporate", depending on the company you're trying to get into. I have learned to morph into the culture. When I worked at HP, I was more hippie than Cheech. Now i work for an FDA regulated bio-engineering company, learn to adapt immediately...before someone asks you to. Don't show up in your Linkin Park t-shirts for the first week of the new job, learn to work the system later on.
Just my 2 cents, only meant to help.
If you think
followup question:
how important is gpa?
i'm attending one of those purportedly high-falutinosity institutions and my CompE gpa aint so grand. i have a good deal of experience. how maskable is my low gpa?
i'll report back in May. thank heavens, i'm out. at least i know the meaning of the word academic now.
thanks
Myren
My two cents is:
;-)
1. A big name helps with recruiters and MBA types. I have met plenty of idiots from schools big in CS too, so having gone there does not exempt you from flipping the bozo bit.
2. You probably don't want to work for the people that do care about where you got your degree.
3. A degree is a bonus, not a ticket to a job, since it's really hard to build a company who care more about pedigree than capability. I have worked at a few of those, and it sucked.
4. If you came and applied with me, I would ask you the following question: "what did you learn other than a (couple of) programming language(s)?" Once you have experience, the question will be "what value have you provided to your previous companies? where did you win, and what did you learn from your failures?" Note that there is nothing about your school in there. I would thank you for your time if you stated that going to MIT exempted you from answering that.
For pseudo-sciences like computer science (asbestos suit is on), especially computer science where things change so quickly, what you get from any university is a leg up. Typically what you learn is subject to Heisenbergs Uncertainty Principle, where profs tend to err by focusing on location. In plain language, you will gradute with exactly what you needed to know four years ago. Be prepared to catch up
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I think it matters the most for the first job you get. I ended up working for a similar lesser-known state university right after graduating from there. That gave me the experience I needed to land a "real" job. So experience is most important, but the underlying education is what can get you into the door with your first job or a good internship. I suggest taking an internship even if it isn't paid, unless you work to support yourself.
Very few people, employers or otherwise, care about where you got your degree. All they care about is that you have it. There are times when an MIT or Harvard degree will carry more weight, but they're the exception, not the rule.
Doubt it? Try this little experiment. Your post implies that you're somewhere in your teens, which probably means that you've had at least a few different doctors (pediatrician, dentist, and GP, at the least). Do you know where any of them got their degrees? Do you care? Probably not... all you care about is that they did get an education. And these are the people whom you entrust with your health, your well-being, and potentially even your life. For most of the rest of society, it's the same way.
I have BS in CS from a major state university, but they're not known to have one of the top CS programs out there. It hasn't hindered me in finding a job, frankly what did was experience. My career track's been in systems administration and a good 99% of what I do on a daily basis I did not learn from any classes I took. I learned far more in a summer fellowship that's been directly related to my career than I ever did in classes at the university. Unfortunately after the dotcom crash it became hard to find sysadmin work without having a much longer work record (and with different systems) than I had.
Frankly I'd recommend you stop worrying about where your degree is from (and your Dad should as well, although I realize that may be hard to get him to do). What you really need to do is start preparing for post-graduation now. Look for fellowhips and internships, don't be afraid to put graduation off a few years to do Coop even. Once you graduate having that work experience (even if it's unpaid) will make it far easier to get a job. You also need to be sure you're doing things outside of just taking classes. Get involved in some organizations, consider student government or other ways to get involved on campus. By all means join your professional organizations now while it's easier and cheaper (frankly I wish I'd joined the ACM while in school, although it hasn't really hurt me). If you have good grades seek out honor societies to join, and accept any offered. (These can really help on a Resume, especially at first, as they show you not only got the degree but that you excelled at what you were learning.) I actually got invited into (and accepted) honor societies outside of CS and general academia, and yes they've helped, particular the history one since it shows I'm good at research.
You should also consider doing a semester or year of study abroad. Not only does it help when hunting a job (you'll be considered more wordly and for International companies it can be a deal maker), it's the best chance you'll ever have to spend time in another country.
But bottom line, enjoy college while you're still at it. You'll have far less free time once you're out and working a job. :)
FWIW, I helped teach first year studies classes at my university. I also learned most of this firsthand, both through essentially going to college twice (and learning what not to do the first time) and from experiences since I graduated.
I should know, having been out of college for 7 years with a B.S. degree. I have not yet had a job that requires a degree. It all boils down to who you know, not what you know.
I just recently graduated from a small state university and right out the door I had interviews when my fellow graduates didn't... Why? Because of the work experience. Get into either an internship or some paid position while you do your schooling and you'll learn more then you can possible imagine. The benefit is that it looks awesome on your resume & employers look highly at it. I got lucky in some regards; I got hired on at the place I interned at. Keep working at it!
That said, the timing of your question suggests to me that you haven't thought things through. Apply first. Odds are that you won't get in to a top five program even if you are qualified. Transfer acceptance rates are so low that getting in is a crapshoot.
Your best bet is to finish strong at Chico State or whatever it is and then apply for a strong graduate program. You have a much better chance of getting in than you do by transferring and you won't get stuck with massive loans for a half-baked undergrad experience.
Lasers Controlled Games!
From my experience - I went to University of Waterloo, which is fairly well known for their CS degrees - it does make a difference, but not necessarily because of the program itself.
I have worked closely with people from other Universities and compared what we learned and what courses we had to take. The programs all taught you roughly the same thing and you could, in theory, learn as much anywhere.
However, schools with a reputation for good graduates tend to attract good students. This means you'll be challenged more by your peers and will be able to learn from each other a lot more. I know many students who came to Waterloo who were used to being the top students in the class and rarely challenged, then had to scramble to keep up with a class full of students who were used to the same.
That produces both good and bad things. At Waterloo, I personally feel that the way they tried to allow "only the best" to graduate was by working everyone to death. Those who weren't 100% dedicated to CS (like, by having a life or extra-curricular activities of any sort...) tended to move elsewhere, as did bright students who weren't code-machines.
One perk is that students from a well-recognized school tend to spread out everywhere across many sectors and countries. The networking potential from that is really helpful. Another is the exposure and opportunities for research. A "good CS" school tends to be that way because of a good graduate program. Though the profs may be horrible teachers, the opportunity to be exposed to some really neat research and maybe discover a passion you never knew is a huge benefit of a good school.
In short, I think a "good school" will probably teach you the same material, but will force you to work harder at it and challenge you more. You'll also get a few more opportunities (though not directly related to a good job) at a good school that you might not otherwise.
Regardless of all of that, a really good student can probably get as much from any program. There are also many people who graduate from Waterloo and other good schools who get the "crap jobs forever" Code machines don't always make the best employees. Coders who can't design, can't work with others, don't document, can't communicate, or who just aren't that driven simply won't do well.
Hopefully that is of some help to you,
no clue
There are two types of canidates a business hires. "College Hires" and "Experienced" hires. Your college only matters for that first job. And even then, as a person who's done a couple dozen interviews with college students, we're really only looking grade, and how well you'll fit into the enviroment. You don't get many education questions after you've been doing the job for a while.
However, this is not to say the college you choose doesn't matter, it does. But not for the reasons you think. The key to landing a good out of college gig is targeting employers, and finding out what college job fairs they attend. And it's not all about an ivy league school either. Plenty of state institutions attract some good employers.
Final thought for you. In many markets, there are more open positions for experienced IT professionals than people here to do them. This is NOT the case for college hires. In fact it's a very bad thing for the long term viability of US IT job market. We're not added new blood into the system. We're off shoring the lower end jobs.
Get in on a college hire at a company that's willing to make an investment in you. It's the best thing for your long term career goals, and honestly, you're make a lot more than you would working for a start up or small company that expects a college hire to do experienced employee work.
I have worked at several places and right now I think I am the only one with a college degree. The rest never even stepped foot in a college, including the owners of the company. Nobody has ever asked me for any credentials of my college or even considered it. Heck, the place I am at now I never even turned in an application or resume. I just showed up for the interview, sold myself to them and they hired me on the spot. That's the way its been wherever I have worked.
If YMMV, tell you story on this thread.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
When I look at resumes, I could care less whether the applicant's degree is from CalTech or East Podunk Community College -- but I do care that they have one. It (generally) shows that they've got the ability to function alone in an environment away from mommy and daddy, and to supervise themselves for an extended period of time in order to reach a lofty goal. In a corporate environment, that ability is just as important as the skills assumed to accompany a degree.
Nobody is going to toss your resume simply because your degree isn't from an Ivy League school. The interview is where you have to prove your worth, not the "Education" line of your resume.
So basically, what I want to know is, can an applicant function effectively in my environment, and how well do they know their stuff. The origin of your schooling determines neither -- it's completely up to you.
First, you need the degree to get into just about any door these days. Yes, after a few years working the degree means less, but you're at a point where you need to get through the door first.
Second, if you have the means to attend a top tier school (Dad is pushing, so I assume that means he's paying) why not?
In todays market every advantage you have over joe-blow means you have a better chance of finding a better starting job. Take advantage of every opportunity
G....it's the students. Any moron with half a brain can lecture from a textbook on algorithms. If anything I'd say that the classes at the big name schools are worse because the faculty are judged based on their research rather than their teaching. I attribute a large part of my understanding of cs to interactions with other students.
Disclaimer: I got my undergrad from UC Berkeley, where this effect is magnified due to a high student-to-teacher ratio.
What fellow programmers want in a co-worker (experience!!!) and what hiring managers want (paper!!!) are obviously two different things. Hiring managers hire, so go for the more well-known university paper if you want a well paying job.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
It doesn't really matter unless it is an Ivy league school. Most employers would hire an MIT grad over a South Overshoe State grad. But would anyone put much credence in South Overshoe State over South Overshoe Tech?
I hate sigs.
Nobody admits they once programmed in QBASIC, even if it is true. Just like virgins don't admit they are, even if it is true. Of course, this is Slashdot, so anything goes.
This seems to depend on the state. University of Virginia is, at least with the total tallies of what I have seen friends spend, cheaper than University (college? who knows) of Richmond, for example.
Like anything, shop around, and you don't always get what you pay for.
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The answer is entwined in getting to the next level. If you aspire to teach college, ensure that you can get into a top-tier graduate program. If you aspire to go into industry, get the experience relevant to the jobs you seek. If you can't do that at your current school, transfer; if you can, stay and have fun.
No one cares about where a bachelors is from decades from now, no one who is worth much. Look at the current Commerce Sect., who came from a Monterrey Tech. in Mexico. He worked his way up in Kellog's. It's about the character of hard work, self-discipline, etc. that matter in the long-term.
"It is practically impossible to teach good programming to students that have had a prior exposure to BASIC: as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration."
I'd imagine this goes double for anyone who "learned to program" in BASIC as a preteen.
Have you considered dentistry?
Ok, seriously, I'll go with the consensus here. Unless you're talking Ivy League it doesn't matter, and even then it will only matter to other Ivy Leagers and the terminally insecure who find that sort of thing innately impressive, and unless you already have an Ivy League first job connection it probably won't do you any good anyway.
Hell, some terminally insecure potential employers swing the other way and will automatically make themselves feel superior by denigrating your "special" education. The whole prestigious college thing can cut both ways, and you never know in advance which way it's going to go.
Life's a crap shoot. You just have to take your best shot and see where you end up.
And I know plenty of people with Ivy League PhDs who ended up places like in insurance (or plastics, but that's another story). Be prepared in advance for that possbility too.
KFG
While I would love to agree with everyone here on Slashdot, I can't.
Does you father want you to switch to a different school, but yet stay in I.T?
If that is the case, then I probably agree with most of the other posters. However, if he is saying to switch to a better school and look at a different career path, then I would agree with him. I.T. sucks bad now and won't change in the near future. There is a stong possibility that you will not find a job at all after college, or the one you do find will pay little more than what you could earn delivering pizza. If that thought doesn't scare you, and you would rather code or do help desk support, rather than deliver pizza then I say GO FOR IT.
I don't want to imply that you can't make a ton of money in any profession, but the odds of it are far less.
I somehow think you Father is talking more about I.T. in general and not a specific school.
The more I learn about science, the more my faith in God increases.
It may be different elsewhere, but in NY, even the the city colleges have strong CS programs. They may not be world-famous, but the content is there. Being so similar to a mathematics curriculum, it is relatively easy (especially in the undergrad) to find qualified faculty. And honestly, the meat of a CS program doesn't change frequently.
Don't get it confused with an engineering degree. At that point, facilities matter a lot more, the field itself is more fast-paced, and there is a large amount of undergrad research opportunity. A good engineering program is hard to come by.
ascii art
Like some other people were mentioning, unless your transfer to school is at the very top (MIT in particular) it won't matter. If you're transferring from a middle of the road school to a higher, but still middle of the road school then the pain of transferring will far outweight the negligable gain you'd get from having a different name on your degree.
I have a friend (up here in Canada btw) who transferred schools halfway through, and he's had to work his ass off for a year before they agreed to transfer most of his credits. Even still its pushed him back a ways from graduation because some credits don't transfer. I personally think that if you're just going into the same program but with a different name, then it would be better to not have to take extra semesters because the bureacracy decided not to let some credits transfer, and use that time working instead.
Really, work experience is what counts, a started job out of university will be much more beneficial in the long run.
This is not a sig.
A degree gets you an interview. Ability gets you the job.
The only thing I can say that might be a benefit is that well known schools tend to attract high calibre Profs and have more connections in the industry. That's why they're well known. Schools like Berkley, MIT, Waterloo, etc. are well known because they have these crazy profs doing research, and because they have a lot of people who are again well known who have gone to school there. However: That stuff happens at the Grad level, Undergrad honestly doesn't mean anything to anyone, everyone learns the same crap, and whether you get taught Linked Lists from Prof. Joe Blow or from Knuth doesn't make a huge difference from the standpoint of the material, but it is neat to meet people who are well known like that, and get their prospective on things. If you're happy where you are, stay where you are.
First, thanks to slashdot for hosting this discussion.
I have a two year degree from a community college as an electrons technician. I have been writing softwawre (C++, Java, TCL, etc.) for over eight years. I have also participated in many interviews for programmers. My not having the four year CS degree is a serious shortcoming; when they want to lay-off and they look for a criteria, schooling seems to be one.
My short answer, any CS degree is far better than no degree. And, although a big-name-school degree sounds more impressive, in my personal experience, you can learn more and learn it better at a small school.
My advice would be to stay where you are and get the degree. If you want a big-name-school degree, get your Masters degree from the big-name-school.
If you want to come work in canada (or USA) under NAFTA then you need a CS degree. Although you can get equivalent status after N years of work, people I know who have done this find it WAY harder and have regretted not getting a degree. If you consult in Europe having a higher level degree is expected for the higher paying IT consulting gigs.
Wherever you choose to study, don't forget to learn java (yes, it's necessary where i live - even the basics), the MVC framework (multitier programming), UML notation, RUP, programming "good practices", etc.
If you can find a college where they have this material, well done! 50% of programming is having a good design. That's what makes the difference between a senior software developer and a... (despective)programmer.
A "programmer" can plug bits and pieces of code, drag some icons and have a visual basic program. A developer knows how to abstract data, ENGINEER applications, frameworks, and make a very good job, saving time and money.
This will give you a huge advantage over your competitors, when you start looking for jobs.
Also, do NOT be conformed with what you learn on school! If there are additional courses at college, say, a new programming language, or a new framework from X or Y company, do NOT - repeat, do _NOT_ ignore them just because they're not required for your grades!
This mistake costed me 2 long years of unemployment (and the subsequent stress and stomach aches) after graduating.
Having 5 years of collage and no degree I would say the most important thing is that you get the degree. John Belushi in Animal house I was not just too many Majors--alas impetuous youth I still regret no getting it maybe I'll go back, na to much money to be made. I am now a Network Engineer for an Airline and have to say it is all about Networking and I don't mean computers. Having my own company I went to work for this airline for the Y2k bonanza and then stayed on. My advice is to you is to be happy and get some experience in what you want to do. Another option is that you could start your own company and then no one will care where the boss man went to school. I think a guy named Bill dropped out.
John Anthony Hartman
It can certainly make a difference early on in your career as well as determining what types of opportunites are available to you both in and out of school.
A school that is better known for their CS program is more likely to put money into resources that will be available to you. This includes the latest and greatest of whatever is widespread and happening in the CS community - but it also has to do with being invovled in the development of bleeding-edge technologies.
In my experience, it seems that schools with 'the best' CS programs are much more involved in the research and development of new technologies and offer many ways (even for undergrads) to get involved. Why graduate with a degree in CS to become a simple web monkey? (like me) Pick a place that you feel you will be able to have diverse experiences in many different aspects of CS as possible so you have a clear direction (hopefully) by the time of your senior year.
When it all comes down to it, it's just data in / data out all the live long data. er. day. Why not have the best opportunities to make the data something interesting.
A masters will do nothing for you in the job market except keep you out of it. I will hire someone with a couple years of job experience before somebody with a masters everytime.
Masters students usually expect to earn more coming out of college (and with some reason since they just spent all that money on more schooling) but generally have not learned anything relevant to make them worth it.
Better to start making money now and get experience on top of it.
Seems like an obvious answer (question) to me. Are you getting good grade? Grades are important. Also, I think it depends some on where you want a job. You lookin for a job at Google? Experience will play a big role too.
All these things play into it.
- Kevin
The less confident you are, the more serious you have to act.
I don't live in the USA, and from your question I got a bad feeling, thinking -- what, don't say it usually works like that over there?? :-)
Thankfully it doesn't seem so from all the replies.
I also have a CS degree and it didn't matter for me where I got it. It seems to me they were being more interested in how I'd like the job and so on, and trying to see that if I would suit the company well. I think there are much more severe problems if the chemistry don't work between you and your job, being hard to work with, not prepared for the job and what it will take from you, being overy lazy, and so on, since this can be much harder to fix. A company might also be more willing to train a person in something if the guy is full of energy and really interested in the job than a more laid back guy, in case there would be differences in educations.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
The school name on your resume gets you on the interview pile, that's about it.
The more important decision IMO, is what kind of education you want from your CS degree. I've been to both stateU and a big name school. I hated every minute of my time at the big name school because they were more research oriented, and I could care less.
Sometimes it's hard to determine from the school, since my stateU was also well known for research as well, but also it's teaching excellence, but decide which you'd prefer, and base your decision on that.
I did a co-op as an undergraduate that taught me many things (source control, new programming languages, team projects) that made it far easier to get a job. The CS degree is vital, of course, for you to learn how to approach complex computational problems and reason about various solutions (is this the right data structure for this problem? how to I optimize the common case in this system? what are the invariants for objects of this class?). Its the two together -- real experience and the CS background -- that will make you an attractive job candidate. The name of the school matters far less than your mastery of the fundamentals and your experience applying them.
How much does the degree, or lack of, mean? Can one get a first job without it? Advance without it? Is it much help after getting in the door? I'm wondering if four years head start on job experience isn't better than the degree these days.
-Tim Louden
It might also be best to allow for travel in your last semester before graduation, you might easily spend a week on interviews and travel if you interest enough recruiters. I didn't realize that and was unable to complete a project in one class - that cost me a grade.
You can increase your chances by maintaining a high grade point of course, its also very good to participate in corporate internships if possible. Working on interesting independent projects with full documentation and high quality code practices would give you something to knock there socks off when you show it to them.
They look at your GPA the a lot. Companies like Raytheon and Vanguard won't even look at your resume unless your GPA is 3.5 or higher. Remember, you're competing against everyone else. So if you think you're going to do better at a new place, go for it. I transferred from a school I was doing horrible in GPA(under 2.0) to a better known school. I graduated from there with a 3.7. This was the best decision I've ever made. EH-VER!
Whether or not you have a degree is going to be far more relevant than were it is from to most employers. If you are in CS, there are only about 5-10 schools whose names would really stand out to most employers. If you are not trying to transfer into one of those 5-10 schools, you are completely wasting your time. Even if you are looking into one of those schools, the benfit you see will most likely be marginal, unless maybe you want to get into research or teaching.
When you graduate, your work experience will mean far more to most employers than the name of the school on your diploma. Rather than filling out applications and jumping through the hoops required to transfer to a new school, your time would be much more wisely invested looking for internships and summer job opportunities, which will have much more impact on your abilities to find a job when you graduate.
This, by the way, applies regardless of your degree. I knew several mechanical engineers who had a really hard time finding work when they graduated even though they finished near the top of their class at a respected engineering school, because they didn't have any work experience. One took a sh*t job doing Java programming at Accenture before eventually moving into a much better job, another did substitute teaching for a while before becomming a stay-at-home mom.
If I don't put anything here, will anyone recognize me anymore?
I have a CS degree from a no-name University. Never been a problem for me. Getting that first job is the biggest issue (unless you're from the _most_ prestigous CS schools). Once you get that job and a couple years good experience there, no one (or close enough that you won't notice) cares where your degree is from.
By the time I had 3 years experience, everyone looked at that and the fact I had a degree.
Now getting that first job, if you're not from MIT, Standford, Carnegie Mellon, etc (basically the top five or so CS schools + Ivy League), you'll be lumped in with everyone else in the world. Moving up from a backwater (but accredited) University to a major state University does next to nothing for you. If you can't make the top schools, don't worry about it. I doubt anyone will notice what school you went to. They'll want to see GPA, internships, and work experience while in school.
Now, speaking as someone who is occassionally responsible for interviewing and making hiring recommendations, all I look at for new grads is GPA, internships, work experience and personal projects. I never look at what school you graduated from.
Can I send you my resume then? ;)
I find your viewpoint refreshing. I have worked too many places where people place a high importance on the degree. I have a degree in a Electronics Engineering and Industrial Engineering and worked in those fields for 10 years, (very successfully too). I liked it, but I found that I loved coding even more. I have coded now for ten years since then and have been quite successful. I have feared that because I don't have a degree, a job change would be next to impossible. Although I have changed jobs twice in the coding field, I think I am short changed at times because I don't have a degree. It is more likely that I am short changing myself though. I know that I can run circles around most schooled coders, whereas they think they know, and I know I know, (does that make sense?).
The thing I have found important to understand is that most collegate degrees in CS do not reflect a knowledge in systems that are out there today. The degree does reflect an ability to learn the necessary knowledge to understand whats going on today, but anything you learned in school is already at least 4 years old and is probably been 'upgraded' or replaced since then. Things simply change too fast for any college or textbook to keep up. Surviving in the industry speaks volumes more than that degree ever will, IMHO.
I did exactly what you're doing know. I went to Central Washington University, which isn't a well known school, and it's CS program is tiny and even less well known. Nevertheless, I got a great job not long out of college, largely due to my experience with hobbiest programming. At long as you're happy with the college you're going to, don't change schools just for a bigger name. I honestly don't think it matters much. I know it didn't for me.
Here is what I did: I created an online portfolio site that had several of the personal projects I'd created as well as the class projects I was proud of, as well as source code and documentation. I listed some of the projects in my resume. In my cover letter, I talked in depth about one of the projects in particular (my senior SE project), what I learned from it, and what skills I gained. In every job interview I had, I was always asked about at least one of the projects I had listed. Most employers seemed really impressed with the projects. I was rarely asked about the school I went to. I eventually recieved a couple of job offers, laregely on the basis of the projects I'd worked on in my spare time for fun, and took an offer with a great company that I love working for.
More important than your education is you're experience, skills, and enthusiasm. Since you're a college student, professional experience is hard to come by. Instead, get involved in your an open source project, or you're own projects (what I did). When doing class projects, really put a lot of effort into them. Put your personal and class projects on your resume. In my experience, if employers can see your code and see that you're enthusiastic for programming, they'll hire you, no matter where your degree comes from.
Stupid like a fox!
As someone that's hired many software engineers, I know that one easy thing you can do to increase your chances of getting hired anywhere is to do a large project outside of your classwork or current job. Talk about this project (or several of your projects) with a passion during your interview, and the job will most likely be yours.
Attitude counts more than aptitude in many cases, and I'd far rather a motivated graduate from a non-name school, than a lacksadaisical graduate from an Ivy league school (and I've worked with both).
In my experience the number-one determinant of whether a person gets a job or not is who they know in the organization. A personal recommendation goes a long, long way to getting someone hired. So if you're happy and you're learning where you are, STAY! But while you're there, fill up your rolodex (or Palm) with as many contacts as you can and KEEP UP WITH THESE PEOPLE. Some of them will end up in good organizations and you can follow them in. Since the dot-com collapse, this is the ONLY way I've been able to find work, and I'm a pretty good candidate.
So get networking! (and I don't mean TCP/IP)
Unless you're at one of the extremes (MIT or Phoenix Online), it shouldn't matter much to your employer. Doctors and lawyers worry about such things; I hope CS people never get caught up like that.
I attended (1980-1984) a respectable, but not top-of-the-line, school. At that time, for a 20,000+ person university, the CS program size was 30 people per year. You had to have flawless grades to get into it. I would expect that things aren't that bad any more; universities have realized that they need to have bigger CS programs. Nevertheless, the bigger-name the CS program, the harder it is going to be to get accepted as a CS major.
And you may find that, in a battle for admission into the program, your transfered grades don't count as much as the same grades for someone who took all their classes at the big-name school.
Bottom line: Unless you are absolutely guaranteed admission into the CS program, don't transfer!
Having said that, I can honestly say that people fail that test whether or not they have CS degrees and whether they came from a prestigious school or not. The only difference I have seen thus far is that, when it appears that a candidate is failing, we will all go back to the Education section of the resume and say "Where did this person go to school?" and if we know it to be a good program, it will be a surprise and a disappointment. But it's not like we started by looking at the resume and only MIT guys get to be interviewed or anything like that.
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
Sounds like somebody went to Waterloo....
I went to a State School, graduated with a CS BS, and a Math Minor. I am currently making 50K+ (and only working around 40 hours/week at the office), and I graduated in 2004. I really think it is all a matter of what you know, regardless of where you go.
Those who don't have it are the majority so that will be what you hear most often: getting a degree from a top school doesn't matter.
I strongly disagree. Transfer to the strongest school you can. It cannot hurt you in any way if you don't mind what comes with transferring. Better universities will give you more opportunities, better contacts, a smarter student body to learn from, amazing research programs, etc.
Just do it. I went to Stanford, met brilliant people, got some nice connections, and definitely had many job opportunities come my way because of the school recognition as well as getting good grades. Can't beat the weather either... now if we could just get a good football coach...
It is sometimes difficult to transfer midway without losing credits. My school in particular said they would offer credit for the courses, but the department wouldn't let many courses count towards my major. I ended up graduating with 240 quarter units. I only needed 180 to graduate. =) The financial aid office nearly pulled me because I was only a sophomore but had the standing of a senior. They accused me of screwing around. =) I had to jump through a ton of hoops to get the units dropped.
If you're learning something, and you're happy, you might want to stay with it. I can say that the name recognition does matter, but not as much as what's in your head.
In my experience, good university and company names help make your resume standout from the hundreds of others a prospective employer receives. It helps when you have little or no experience. The more experience you have, the more you are going to be judged on the type of work you've done.
I hate to say it but the more resumes I receive for a particular position, the less and less time I have to review each of them. Most entry-level positions draw people with little or no work-experience. Hence anyone from a better university and/or a year or two of internship or work experience is going to stay in the pile longer than people who don't. It's draconian, but it's the only way to get through 100 resumes for 1-2 positions.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the job that you will want when you graduate will be offshored long before then.
and have managed not to have bad debts or drug busts on your permanent record, even a good performance at a mediocre school will get you a job at a defense contractor these days. There are only jobs...whether you enjoy a job is as much you as it is the work or the conditions. The defense jobs are not going offshore and the bush league never saw a defense appropriation they couldn't borrow to pay for. Besides, if you can pull off good grades [not easy but easier at a less competitive school] you won't have much trouble getting internships at defense contractors that will pay for your more advanced degree. Elbo your way into the classes of the most widely published faculty in your CS program and make yourself known. A reference or two is worth the sucking up, assuming you care as much about career outcomes as your question implies. The advanced degree is what gets you into the more rewarding job and your better grades get you into the MS/PhD program at some pretty decent schools these days...we have managed to scare off some of the competition for grad school that used to come from abroad, esp. the middle east:(
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
I would say this all depends on the type of classes that your univ has to offer and what kind of industry connection it has.
I graduated from a state univ which has a rep of teaching students on pratical side of CS rather then the theoretical side. Granted, the univ has no name brand status like MIT, but it has a special engineering/sciense career department that does nothing but connecting to the major industry players. The univ is able to get local companies and big companies like Intel/AMD/HP to come on campus to do interviews. In addition, we also have CO-OP programs avaialble. This allows us to have internship (paid and count as course credit BTW), with different companies before graduating. Most of time students get hired by the company they CO-OPed with or use it as part of their resume.
Besides, now that I have few years under my belt, I noticed that the people graudated from named brand school are not necessary smarter then me. In some cases I found a few that are dumb as a rock.
You might learn by yourself, dozen of languages.
l .ox.ac.uk/~mike/zrm/u b/Zforum/zglossary.ps. Zp vs.csl.sri.com// ltrs/dublincore/2 003/cr/NASA-2003-cr212418.html
;-)
But that do not mean that you are proficient
at writing "good code" or "good design"
or "proprer and COMPLETE documentation".
One thing you might want to look at are some books on software engineering,
requirement and specifications, formal specification and design.
You might want to look at RUP:
Rational Unified Process
Gamma Design Pattern book
Anti-Pattern book
Z, Object-Z, Larch, PVS specification language.
http://www.afm.sbu.ac.uk/z/
http://spivey.orie
ftp://ftp.comlab.ox.ac.uk/p
http://research.compaq.com/SRC/larch/
http://
http://techreports.larc.nasa.gov
Anyone can learn how to program, and code lots of stuff, [I learned myself most of the things],
but that doesn't mean that the code doesn't
sux somehow...
Also, are you proficient in data structure?
You might also want to get few books on
how to design proper database table.
3-tier design layers, MVC design and similar.
Unit testing, component testing, integration testing?
Another thing is that a degree will give you,
some proper background in math and other stuff.
Younger, I was very proficient in programming
and I "taught" I could programming anything.
The fact is you learn a thing or two at university. I got a bit stronger in Data structure
and proper architectural design, component design
and class design and testing.
Of course, you might say that you are already better than most people, but that doesn't mean
that you are done "learning", in fact, no one is never done learning ever,
the field is just way too large to be covered entirely. =P
But it might give you a better clue on how to solve more complicated problems that you might encounter in the field.
To conclude, let say worst case,
you gonna get very good grades at university and it's just gonna be an easy thing for you compared to others.
Also, you might also get few grants,
once you get good grades, so it shouldn't be that much of an issue.
As a manager of a software development organization I will look more favorable on someone from a lesser known school but with coop or intern experience than someone from a well known school but without any actual experience.
While I'm at it, what you've done and what you are capable of is so much more important to me that if you've made a 4.0 rather than a 3.55.
I go to school at Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh, PA. I'm an MIS (Management Information Systems) major and if I want any type of tech job in Pittsburgh, I have to compete with Carnegie Mellon and the University Of Pittsburgh, schools with more money and resources than my university could ever hope to have. One of the biggest internships in the area is the US Steel internship. It's a incredibly well paying (pay of any form is really rare anymore) internship and has a ton of credibility to go along with it. During my freshman year, there were 54 openings and my school filled 38 of them.
The point is where you go to school has little to no bearing and basically gets you in the door to a job. Your degree doesn't do your job for you, you do the job yourself. I know a lot of people in the industry who went to small "unknown" schools or community colleges and are doing fine right now because they showed what they could do once they got the job. If you like where you are and you feel you're learning a lot, stay there. Businesses like to see enthusiasm about the job and if you have that, you won't be stuck in a long line of crappy jobs.
How well can you solve a problem and get the solution to work? Can you convince someone else that your answer is better? Or do you fell that it is the only way? Can you convince the company that you can do in an interview?
Good luck
wb
Contrary to what most here have said, a good school will open doors for you that a mediocre school won't. You will probably start out making more money as well (and you don't want to be underpaid -- its very hard to EVER recover from that). OTOH, if the school your father wants is only slightly more prestigious, it won't help much, but if you're talking a typical school vs a school thats really well known and thought of, it will make a big difference.
A common theme among all of the replies is that "Experience is more important than the name of your university". This is definitely true. If your goal is to get a good job, then yes, employers do care more for what work you've done, not on the school you attended. Granted, "better" CS programs generally give more opportunities for cool projects to work on. For example, I'm in my last year of CS at UW and I've developed a compiler, a ray tracer and a toy operating system. Add the experience that the co-op program has given me, and there's a lot there for employers to drool over.
This isn't a "Look-at-me" or "UW-is-great" rant (in fact, there are a few things that I do not like about my program). The point is that I am kind of alarmed that everybody seems to think that if you have a CS degree, you are slated to become a code monkey. If you wanted to be a programmer (ahem, sorry, software developer) then you should go to a college (FYI, most Americans call any post-secondary institution "college"... Canadians maintain a distinction between college and university, with the former being more skills based while the latter is academically based).
The choice of school for your undergraduate should not be based on whether or not you will get a job as a programmer after you graduate. If that's all you wanted, you could have saved many thousands of dollars by not attending university at all and just hacked on some project for fun building while acquiring experience. Your decision on whether or not to transfer should be based on the quality of the education you're receiving and the quality that you expect to receive. If you are content with the curriculum in your school as compared to other schools, then there is really no reason to transfer.
/<en
IMHO, I feel that in the long run, your college degree really only matter to your mother. There are a few exceptions - MIT being one of them. What really matters is the person. I didn't finish college, left in my sophomore year to take a job paying 85K. Turned out to a be a dot-bomb, but it was still good money. I've gone on to own several business's, work for several large companies, and currently own two ISP's, and work a security analyst for a hospital. We recently hired a new graduate, out of a well known university. In doing this, I've seen that what you learn in college will not apply in the real world anyway. Your first real employer will have you forget everything you've learned, and re-teach you to do things the way they want them. This will continue with every subsequent employer until you reach a position that has Sr. in the title, at which time you will be the one making your new-hires forget what they've learned, and have them do things the way you (or your company policies) want them to. So, in summation, my long winded point is this: It really, really, does not matter what education you have listed in your resume, as long as you have a good work history, a good work ethic, and are capable of doing everything you say you can. And if, by chance, you don't finish college - YOUR MOTHER WILL BUG YOU FOREVER ABOUT IT - especially around the holidays.
http://www.accelerateglobalwarming.com
Well, that's not 100% accurate, ofcourse a degree helps you program better, but so will a physics degree, a maths degree, and other degrees. CS and real-world programming are very indirectly and loosely connected.
The main points that separate good programmers from the bad:
Experience, experience, lots of experience.
Talent/Intelligence (These matter less for most (but not all) programming work). However, its that difficult task here and there that even an experienced programmer will fail, unless he also posseses the talent.
:-)
Ofcourse experience will help a lot less if you are gaining it without talent and far from a talented environment.
But you were probably not asking about how much a degree will help you be a better programmer, but how much it will help you get a better programming job. I'm sorry, but I've not seen enough job interviews to know that one
Well, the way I see it, as long as you do well in your CS degree it shouldn't make a difference to the person that is hiring.
The only time I would imagine that it would make a difference is when you have either a IVY league/prestigious university degree, or you happen to have graduated from the same school as the interviewer thereby getting favourtism.
Live forever, or die trying.
Unless the school you are transferring into is Stanford, MIT, or Berkly it doesn't matter.
what do they pay for coffin caretakers these days?
I got a math degree from a highly regarded undergrad school, and a Masters in CompSci from Rutgers, which at the time was not an elite school, but not exactly bottom of the heap, either.
I think the importance of the school you attended depends more on what you plan to do after graduation. If you're looking into graduate school, postdocs, research, etc., then I think it matters more than if you're heading out into the working world.
And, in many cases, who you know will turn out to be more important than where you came from, even for graduate studies (e.g., getting into the clique surrounding a particularly well-known prof, for example)
What I really want to do is shatter this common perception that a degree will automatically result in success. It won't. In fact, the opportunities they open are sometimes crap. (If I had a degree, I would likely be a corporate drone somewhere rather than a largely autonomous developer in a small shop.) The other point is that great success is certainly possible without a degree. In otherwords: aspiring developers need to consider all possible paths, not just the one that society typically says you should follow.
Why bother.
In my experience, it really is your resume and interview technique that are key. Be sure to write a good resume, specifically highlighting your skills, experience and plus points. Be succinct. Then fire it off to as many job postings as possible. Even if you don't care for the job that much, it might be the only offer you get, and it will be good interview experience if nothing else. Interviewing really is key. You can have a ton of experience, but if you have no social skills whatsoever, that may well count against you. On the other hand, even if your resume is light, a good interview, impressive social skills, good preparation and professional behavior can secure you a position.
Your learning environment should make you push yourself a little. If you're able to go through your program doing homework only Monday through Thursday, spending the whole weekend smashed on recreational pharmaceuticals, and still maintaining a 4.0, your current program isn't pushing you enough. (This is not a random example.) A transfer might help with that, although other methods might be more economical. Most professors can find a ready (if unpaid) nitche in their research for a bright student looking for a chance to stretch themselves. Doing so provides a chance to challenge yourself, put some useful padding onto the resume, and possibly even get someone who would be delighted to give you a recommendation. If a miracle occurs, you might even get some money in the process, but don't hold your breath.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Well, to be honest, you're looking at a series of awful jobs no matter what.
Very few people are lucky enough to find a job they want to spend their career at on the first try. Usually it takes a few years of working in the trenches, dealing with horrid management who doesn't understand you, and otherwise being miserable before you find a company that treats you right and where you truly enjoy working.
You're going to need the experience no matter what, so my suggestion to you is to stay where you're comfortable and enjoying college.
I can tell you that as a potential employer for you, the company that I work for will not care where you went to school nearly as much as the fact that you did go to school.
Sorry, but it's a tough market out there...
I think this is a very important point. Right now, the market for coders is very, very tough. I see a lot of people posting here saying that grades don't matter after your first job and how the technical interview is way more important that how you did in school and all that jazz. I humbly suggest that all those comments might be true in a decent market. But the market is pretty bad right now and if you want any kind of a decent job, I would suggest that you make yourself look as good as possible. And that involves getting as impressive a degree as you can. As someone else noted, your academic credentials are going to be used by HR as a bulk filter to cut down the 100s of applications they receive down to a manageable number they can forward to the technical people. You may have lots of impressive experience and may be great in a technical interview but how is some overworked secretary in HR going to figure out what a genius you are?
You think the degree matters? I think you'll be lucky to get a job regardless of where your degree's from. The only thing going to a better school will get you is a better shot at a good grad school... And unless you really want to spend 7-10 years in school getting a phD, I'd just stick with wherever you're happiest.
Only thing a better school will mean is more work and less beer/fun!
Take it from some one who has been in school FAR too long and has a crappy job...hell the one moron here with no degree, no training, and no skills whatsoever makes more than me simply because...well no one really knows why...I think it's just cause the "Director of Operations" "likes his hussel"...I think those were the exact words...
Ok done venting...yeah focus on having fun and getting by with "good enough" grades...you'll be happier in the long run...
In terms of coursework and knowledge, I don't think there's a huge difference, at least at the undergrad level. But a large part of what gets you a good job when you leave school is who your friends and professors are. Said friends and professors are likely to have much(!) better industry connections at a prestegious school than they will at a lessor known one. This particularly important if you want to get a job in another state.
I believe one element we left out from most of the responses is the importance of human/job networking different schools provide. Better schools (or more prestigious schools) tend to attract better students or students from well-to-do families (either politically or financially). It's not unreasonable to predict 5-10% of your classmates at MIT/Harvard will someday be CEOs or CFOs of certain corporations. It's definitely in your favor to start fostering your network as early as possible. Not to say merit alone is not important, but merit+human networking is a killer combo.
Mizzle
Get the paper that says you've finished school. Trust me, experience doesnt always get you the interview that gets you the job. I have no degree, and I think I make pretty good money, but I would like to go back and get a damned peice of paper that says I can be trained.. thats pretty much all a degree is. No one Ive worked with has ever really put much of their education to work. Any peice of paper is good, unless your going to work for company that everyone is appling to work for.
IMHO, undergraduate CS programs really only teach you what you don't know. Unless you go to a slave-driving engineering school, where you do a ton of programming, it probably doesn't really matter where you go as long as you get a solid grounding in the fundamentals.
I would strongly recommend going to graduate school. From my own experience, the two years I spent in grad school were FAR more valuable in my development as an engineer than the years I spent in undergrad.
I'd view your undergrad education as a chance to become a well-rounded individual, a good citizen, etc. Take some history, philosophy, english, etc. classes. You're going to be staring at code for the next 25+ years, so have some fun now while you're young.
As far as getting a decent job when you get out, a degree from Stanford, MIT, CalTech, etc. may help, but a cheaper, easier, and probably better way is to get some industry experience while you're in college. Look for summer co-op/internship positions at your college's career center. I did several internships during undergrad and grad school. The more industry experience you get, the better idea you'll have as to whether you really want to be a programmer, what kind of work you want do to, and what kind of company you want to work for.
Remember that, in the long run, it doesn't matter what school you went to. 5-10 years down the line, employers will be looking at what jobs you've held, what experience and skill-sets you have, and so forth, not where you got your BS. Your intelligence, drive, ambition, and choices will govern your career, not your choice of university.
Getting an MS is also a good idea. It sets you above the rest of the candidates and, IMHO, gives you a level of professional maturity that takes years to develop in industry. You also get exposed to more advanced concepts and technologies, and you have the opportunity to start specializing and yet still maintain the option to change your mind.
The other factors that employers look at is your GPA, regardless of where you go to school. I'd rather hire a guy with a 3.9 from a state school than someone else with a 3.1 from an Ivy League-class school. We want to see smarts, consistency, and the ability to follow through on committments. The fact that you didn't take classes with some wazoo-famous professor is really irrelevant in the big picture.
Stay where you're at. Look at MS programs at top-25 CS schools. Do some internships. Work at the UNIX lab on campus. Look at undergrad research internships in your CS program. Keep your GPA up. Read, program, and do things on the side to broaden your skill-set. And, most of all, have fun!
Top schools pre-screen individuals for smartness and potential far better than any recruiter I've ever hired to screen resumes for me. I don't care if it's a computer music degree PhD dropout or a electrical engineering BS -- if it came from Stanford or MIT, I know the guy's smart.
However even with a BS from U of Springfield, a MS from U of Old York, and a PhD from North Virginia; and the best recommendations of a recruiter I have no clue if it's a smart guy or not.
... not because they've necessarily learned more at that school, but because it shows they're highly motivated and want to be the best. Of course they have to get through my grueling interview as well. Still, the top school on the resume is what gets them into my office; when I get a hundred resumes with similar work experience how else am I supposed to decide who to interview?
A top school definitely has more foot-in-the-door ability, how you perform in the interview is up to you. BTW, I'm posting anonymously so this doesn't come back to bite me, but I have a BS from a top school and am making 200K as an architect at age 28. Food for thought...
I graduated from Carnegie Mellon and have found it makes a significant difference. Strait out of school I was hired into an "experienced" position and it has continued from there. Four years out of school I am working at a job advertised as requiring 8+ years of experience, with the salary to match.
I would estimate that a degree from one of the top five CS schools counts as about 3 years of experience to employers. A lot does depend on the individual, I know someone who went to school with me who started at $110,000 and others that only started at $35,000. In my case the extra money I have made due to the degree has made up for the cost of the degree.
Yet there is a diminishing return on a top ranked degree. Programmers with 15 years of experience don't make much more then those with 8 years of experience. Eventually those with a state degree with catch up in salary.
I haven't seen anyone mention the main thing I regret in not having a degree: The social advantages.
Look at your classmates. Are any of them people who are likely to get all fired up with you and want to start a company come middle of your junior year? Are any of your professors people you'd want on the board of directors on that company?
Flashing forward a decade, how many of those people do you expect to see at the cutting edge conference you're attending? Are you going to be introducing yourself to people you haven't met before, or are you going to be saying "haven't seen you since..."
I think it's fairly well established at this point that as an educational system, college mostly functions as a low-pass filter. The advantage of grinding in a better school is that you'll be doing so with peers who you're going to have contact with for professional reasons for the rest of your career.
My regrets about degree aren't a bit about what I would or wouldn't have learned, frankly most of what matters you'll learn out in the real world anyway. The regrets are all about the social connections I've had to make later in life.
Unless it is being jolly old Bombay Tech, there will not be any job for you when you are doing the graduating, my wery dear American friend.
In lots of jobs there is a baseline required education.
You might not notice it, but if you start to move up, eventually the lack of formal education may start to hold you back.
Take a stack of resumes.
The first thing I would filter by is
education/equivalent experience. If you lack both, why bother.
Sounds like your father is the whole problem here. Tell him to shut the fuck up.
Don't try that "protecting the children" shit you people use to keep the tits and bad words off my TV. --Seanbaby
If you love CS by all means persue your desires. Paper MAY get you past the HR dept. but experience and attitude count for more with most interviewers.
If you can land a summer gig in a co-op program that has tremendous benefits when interviewing.
But consider this. CS is a lousy career choice. The work is being outsourced at an alarming rate.
Soon core competency will be lost to overseas corporations. Now if you LIKE the idea of travel and living overseas in a foreign culture that could be something to consider.
But if not, stick with CS as a hobby. Play with free software all you like. IF you can land consulting gigs all the better. But for breadwinning, I strongly urge you to go into banking, insurance or the best self-protecting profession there is, law.
One with 20+ years in the biz...
That's what I get for trying to carry on two separate conversations on irc and post on slashdot at the same time...
Greylisting is to SMTP as NAT is to IPv4
"my mother taught me how to program in QBASIC when I was eleven,"
:) I'm assuming she's a teacher at a university of some sort?
I wish my Mom did that for me.
There are two things at issue here. First, do you get a sustantially better education from a well-known institition, causing you to be a more qualified candidate? I don't think you do. Second, is there the *perception* that a degree from a well-known institution makes you a more qualified candidate? That's a more lengthy ansswer.
One thing I've come to learn is that there is a huge difference in getting a job and getting an interview. In order to get the job, you need to have a solid background, a good head on your shoulders -- you need to be *qualified* for the position. But you can't get the job without first getting the interview. In order to get the interview, you need to *look* qualified (more to the point, your resume needs to make you look qualified).
The person with the power to give you the job is generally the manager. In order to talk with the manager, you need to get past HR (human resources). HR receives litterally hundreds of resumes a day (possibly thousands). No one can actually read through all of these things, so they use keyword searches and the like to narrow down the field. Having the name of a well-known institution might bring your keyword count high enough to get noticed.
But, sometimes you can side-step HR. For example, you might have a friend in the company who can put your resume directly in front of the manager. The manager is more likely to pay attention to your technical merits than HR is (remember that HR doesn't have a deep understanding of the specific qualifications of an engineer). In this case, names of well-known institutions tend to be less important than statements about your background.
In any event, once you get in for the interview, your resume is irrelevant (well, so long as you didn't lie on your resume). Once you're in the interview, you have to sell yourself -- the names you have written on yoru resume have already served their purpose.
I dare say that an 11 year old just finding out about QBASIC may indeed become interested in how those lines of code become translated into whatever shows up on the screen, and THAT, indeed, is Computer Science. Programming is a tool. Just because a person deems to use a wrench doesn't mean he isn't a mechanical engineer.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
...are you from India?
FLR
If you are planning on a career in academe, then you will find that having an undergraduate degree from a Top Ten Computer Science programme will give you an advantage over those with degrees from less prestigious schools when applying to graduate programmes. Which will then give you an edge when looking for a professorship.
If you are looking for a career in industry, a degree from Stanford is not going to help you much more than a degree from Upper Podunk, or any four-year school. Unless, of course, the person doing the hiring also went to Stanford. As other posters have pointed out, interviewing well and having actual experience tends to be more important.
Granted, there are companies like Google, where a degree from a top school probably carries a lot more weight, but that is largely because of the fierce competition for Google jobs.
I got a B.S. CompSci from a fairly large, state school (Southwest Missouri State University). I was working as a network admin while I was in college, so I had some experience on my resume when I got out. That kept me employed, for the most part, while I transitioned from network admin to development.
.NET, Perl, Java and SQL. The beauty of a CompSci degree is that you get so much theory in there, that you can implement complex data structures and sophisticated logic in just about any language. Today, I use a mix of ASP, JavaScript and SQL on a daily basis, as well some Perl and MySQL for my "after-hours" projects. I didn't learn learn ASP (VBScript), .NET (C#) or JavaScript in college; I picked those up afterwards. I learned Perl as part of my employment during college (comes in real handy when you're parsing multi-megabyte logfiles looking for real, pertinent stuff to troubleshoot a webserver). I had a formal class on databases, where we covered SQL in the course of a week. I taught myself Java so that I could complete one class, my final semester (the main teaching language was C/C++, which I haven't used since, but they were transitioning to Java). I feel sorry for someone who spent two semesters learning Visual Basic (done some of that, too), but doesn't have enough theory to be able to adapt to a different language.
Since then, I've worked with ASP,
Get some experience while you're still in college (internships are very helpful); this will get you off the ground when you get out. Get the knowledge from the CS degree; the piece of paper is an important credential, and can get you in the door, but the knowledge will keep you adaptable and employable for decades (hopefully, a lifetime). As long as the school does a good job of getting the knowledge into your skull, I wouldn't be too worried about name recognition (I'm assuming you're NOT going to ITT Technical).
... by the Dew of Mountains the thoughts acquire speed, the hands acquire shakes, the shakes become a warning
I go to a state school (UMass Lowell) that is by no means prestigious. However, we've got a large CS program and a lot of students get hired right out of school or for internships at major firms. Why?
1) The curriculum is solid (only a handful of CS programs in the state of MA are nationally accredited).
2) The department focuses on the undergraduate program and enough of the coursework is practical to get students ready for a job outside of academia
3) The school is located in eastern MA where many of the top technology firms are.
As a result students go and work for local companies or start their own companies. When they look for new entry-level employees, they're apt to go recruit at their alma mater, which is right nearby.
"...today consumers have been conditioned to think of beer when they see a bullfrog..."
As someone who interviews and reviews resumes regularely, I barely look at what the degree is in little lone where it is from. Experience is tied in importance with your soft skills. Lessons in programing, troubleshooting or configuring a network are secondary to being able to work well with an end user. Uou will learn more in your first week on the job than you did in 4 years of colledge.
I went to a school that was not known for its CS program and it didn't seem to matter to anyone I interviewed with. What did matter was my grades. With a 3.0 average I was getting offers 30-40% below what the 4.0 students were.
Otherwise it depends on what you plan to do with the degree. If you want to work in the MIT AI Lab, then you better go to a name program and get perfect grades. If you will be happy being a developer somewhere writing financial software, then I don't think it matters.
I also think that showing people the practical things you did while you were in college, not just class work, matters. I wrote a FORTH compiler (while, interpreter, really) from scratch and I think that impressed people that I could apply all the theory I had learned.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.
If you're happy and learning, stay there. Getting a good job is a function of experience, interview ability and education. Start interviewing early, definitely before you graduate if possible...my school (UMass) had a good career center that was very useful. Your school probably has one, use it.
Internships and co-ops are way useful, really worked out for a couple friends of mine.
While making an impression is important, having a "big name" degree is not as cracked up as it is made to be. Others here have suggested getting real experience in a co-op program. That is probably the most important thing to look for in a school. Schools with good partnerships can provide you with real-world experience which will open more doors.
Almost as important however is the which path within the IT world do you want to pursue. If you're looking to do more than code then finding a school with an IT department within a school of business might be helpful. If you want to specialize in graphics then look for a school with a good program involving fine arts or engineering.
So don't get downhearted about being at a so-called "second-tier" school if that school offers unique or interesting paths to follow.
I went to a small state school and my first job was at a Fortune 50 company! I've transformed that into a very good upper management job at a well-known international company in less than 10 years.
Of course we torture people, we need the information --Gen. Pinochet
Do you have any interest in going to graduate
school? Is there some research area of computer
science that you really like?
If the answer to both is no, then, like others
have said the school you go to is not likely to make a big
difference. For people with an undergraduate
degree experience is far more important than the school.
When I interview candidates that only have
a bachelors degree I am more interested
in finding out if they have a solid grasp of
some of the important areas of Computer Science:
complexity theory, and data structures. And I
usually concentrate more on recent work.
But if you have any interest in exploring
research areas of computer science or you want
to get a Masters or PhD - then the school you
go to could matter a lot.
I have no data to back up this claim but I guess
that most of the professors at the second and
third tier schools are not really contributing
much to the current state of the art. For
example if you wanted to look at advanced topics
in computer networking or operating systems
or optimizing compilers you really should go to
a school where the professors are defining the
leading edge in those areas.
I think it also matters what kind of work you
ultimately want - in the industry I work in
(Electronic Design Automation - basically
software that helps engineers build chips) I
have found that more often than not
the senior technical people for most products
have PhD's closely related to the key technology
areas for their product.
Some companies will care about a big-name degree and others don't. Generally it depends where the boss has his degree from. Your chances go up when yours is from the same place. Like others have said, interning is very important to breaking into the job market, no matter what and where your degree is. Finally, you have to make contacts that can help you get where you want. Want to get into grad school? Find faculty with degrees or contacts where you want to go. If you want to work for a company that doesn't recruit at your school, it's going to be much harder.
As far as education, I was all ECE, but I got a BS from a top 25 school and MS from a top 5 school. On graduation, the job outlook was about the same for graduates from either. Educationally, there wasn't much difference, but you can tell that different companies are interested in different universites.
If you want to get a job doing computer science (the more rare abstract work - designing algorithms, researching their efficiency, writing papers, etc.) - then your father may be right. If this is what you want, you want a degree from the best university you can find, and you may want more than a B.S.
And if you want to do a job that combines both, you need the qualifications of both. So...get busy.
People have a better chance of joining up as an officer if you already have a BS. They'd rather not have to go through the extra effort of putting you through college. Plus, don't think about joining if you have a family or anything, they can send you where they want you to go because you are government property.
I go to school in Norfolk (Old Dominion University) and since we are the headquarters for the US Navy in the Atlantic, they have a big presence in town and on our minds. When ships in the middle east come back home, it always receives local attention.
Which school you attended can be very important for getting your foot in the door initially. The company I work for only recruits at a handful of top-tier schools (MIT, Duke, UVA, Penn, Harvard, etc.). If you didn't come from one of these, getting an entry-level position is difficult (not impossible, but it is usually based on personal referrals). If you are not planning on transferring to a top shelf school, it's probably not worth the hassle. A lot of companies allow college to be a 'pre-screening' mechanism: if you can't get into a good school, you're probably not worth considering for their positions.
I would suggest looking at companies you might be interested it working for, and checking out where they recruit. It's not too early - get a jump on your peers.
Software development is no different than any other field out there. Having a degree from a prestigous institution opens a lot of doors. In that regard, it doesn't matter if the school has a great CS program. Now just because it opens doors, doesn't mean you will actually get a great job. That requires you to be good at what you do, progress as you gain experience, communicate well, etc. Again, this is just like any other field. Now there are also not-so prestigous schools with programs that are really good and are even known to be really good. It is unlikely that this will "open doors" for you though, at least in my experience in hiring developers. A lot of people in software development didn't study CS or did their studies outside the US. So they don't know that Rensselaer or Illinois-Urbana has a great program. But they have heard of Yale, and will give you extra consideration if you went there.
Unless you are in with a really cool group of computer people already, I would transfer.
Connections are everything in life (unfortunately), and you are more likely to get better ones in a better school.
Perhaps more objectively: ask your current profs where their ex-students are working and what they are working on. Then ask the same of your new potential school's profs. Pick the ones where you would rather be.
Perhaps things are different between CS and music (my field) in this respect, but I doubt that things are so drastically different as for these rules to apply differently: good work ethic, honesty, good references, and a strong experience base are what will get you jobs. A better school can definitely aid any or all of those, but it's not necessary.
That's exactly my experience too.
I don't think a degree is terribly important, as everyone else states, experience is important.
I recieved a BS degree from a small state university in chemistry, then went into a Ph.D. program in chemistry at another state school. After a few years in grad school, I decided chemistry wasn't for me, and I am bailing out with a masters degree. I was able to find a job as a "Software Engineer" at a great company, and my job doesn't involve chemistry in anyway. It probably helped that in the past couple of years I participated in a couple of open source projects.
For an entry level position, I think employers care more about having bright, energetic people.
A really bad college will keep you out of jobs. Here in the Detroit area, there are a number of Michigan schools that feed into the job market. I know that UofM and Michigan State are often held above some other smaller schools. Another state school, Oakland University, is often looked at as poor. I know one employer who refuses to look at graduates from that school, because they have had a history of wasting the interviewers time... their program is pretty well known to fail to yield programmers with the proper background to be a good developer. Other than that, I think experience and the interview will tell employers more about you than the school you go to.
Now there is a slashdot MILF, if i ever heard of one!
Also, due to the large volume of resumes some companies receive, recruiters will toss your resume directly in the trash if you do not meet a certain GPA. They have to make cuts somewhere. Keep in mind two things. Think of it like poker... the GPA and school name will deal you in at the table, but you still have to play your way through the interviews. If you fail at interviewing, then GPAs and school names don't matter. Also, the school you went to grows less important over time. Once you're in the real world, what you've done at various companies is what matters.
"Oh dear, she's stuck in an infinite loop and he's an idiot" -Prof. Farnsworth (Futurama)
All of the advice listed here is absolutely right on. Unless you are going into an area that is very specific or you want to improve your chances of getting into that grad school, stay where you are at. Get all of the work experience that you can through internships, co-ops, etc. Many employers are now only looking at grads that have such experience, so where the degree is from isn't a high priority.
Your parents probably care more that your future employer. I work with many people from very well known to unknown schools, they sit right next to eachother and are doing the same job for the same pay. They are likely to advance at the same rate as well.
I personally spent almost 10 years going through to a PhD, so I've seen a lot of school. By the way, the title doesn't help much either in the big picture. It is what you do with it that counts.
Good luck and print out all these comments and show them to your parents.
I doesn't matter which medical school you go to, all of them will try to pour so much information into your head that it's like taking a drink from a fire hydrant. You can't possible take it all in. That's why you have to keep learning and studying on your own after you graduate. At least that is what my dad, who is a doctor and professor at a medical college says when people thinking about becoming a doctor ask him what school they should apply to.
Bottom line is, having a diploma from a better school never hurts, especially if you think you want to go to grad school at some point. I say if you can transfer to a school with a well known program, go for it. It's impossible to know whether it will get you a better job, but it will certainly give you more options.
Having a degree from a big-name school will help you in two cases: getting your first job, and if an employer ever has to choose between you and an equally-qualified and equally-likeable applicant with a degree from a less-prestigious school. The first hurdle is one you only have to go over once and which you will get over one way or another, and the second is not terribly likely to happen.
I don't have a degree, and I'm the most senior and highly paid developer at my company. I won't tell you that not having a degree hasn't hurt me -- it has, mostly by making it much harder for me to get that first "real" job, and obviously, there are some companies that won't consider me. But I also do a lot of the hiring around here, and I can tell you that I don't pay too much attention to where new hires got their degree; I pay a lot of attention to prior work experience, code samples, references, and demeanor during interviews. I've worked with some people with degrees from prestigious schools who were terrible programmers and horrible coworkers, and I've worked with great programmers who were fabulous to get along with who had two-year degrees from local community colleges.
If I were you, I'd stay put. Of course, if your dad is going to foot the bill for a fancy school, you might consider it. Otherwise, the massive burden of student loans for that sort of thing might be a lot more trouble than it's worth.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
I'm graduating this semester from a little known CS program at the University of Missouri in Rolla - so I have some experience with little known programs.
In my experience it's all about effort. I put 100% effort into each and every aspect of my college career and I'm coming out on top. I have a 4.0 and have interned / co-oped EVERY summer with a different company. These two things have combined for getting me around 6 job offers at some of the top institutions in the US (including National Labs).
For me - if you work hard enough at it - you will achieve it. It doesn't matter what school you go to - as long as you aren't ok with mediocrity. If you want more than just a mediocre job you need to put more than just a mediocre effort into it.
Just my $0.02
Friedmud
And don't just get a major. If you can handle it, go for the honours program, and study finite automata, formal languages, analysis of algorithms, discrete mathematics (in fact, all the mathematics you can handle), artificial intelligence, and so on.
Computer science degrees should be far more than just learning how to program. Go to a technical school if that's all you want. Universities present one of the few rare opportunities in life to forget about practicalities and really change ourselves.
I pity those who view universities strictly as a path to a job. They are the seeing blind, and I try not to hire them.
Evidence: Average salary of BS in CS from NMT $70,750 Source, versus $38,000 for LSU Source
This obvious is affected by location, parterships the school has, connections professors have, quality of program, reputation, etc..(doesnt really matter what affects it, this is the bottom line) My advice to you find the school that has the highest rate of successful placement of CS majors and the highest average salary and go to either one or the one if they happen to match and I expect they will.. MIT anyone?
I think there are a couple advantages to a top-flight program.
First, you'd be in the company of much brighter, more driven, higher-achieving students. If you're really into computer stuff, then this could be fun, motivating, and extremely educational-- classes and professors aside.
Second, stronger programs are more likely to focus on ideas beyond mere software development: the theory of computation, algorithm design, and mathematics. Now, if you just want to build mundane user interfaces, this would all pretty much be a waste of your time. However, if you're interested in doing work that involves some level of challenge beyond just structuring the software itself and getting algorithms out of a book, then this stuff can be really useful.
You could graduate from your current school, work for a while, and-- if you decide you need deeper knowledge-- go get a master's or PhD somewhere else.
If you REALLY love programming, then go ahead and be a programmer.
Damned be the consequences.
If you really put all your heart into it, you'll ALWAYS rise to the right place for you.
If, on the other hand it's just something that doesn't really interest you, and you're only expecting a decent salary, STAY AWAY.
Simple.
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
I went to a small school in Florida, and got a good education in computer science, in part because I could more easily get more time from my professors because of smaller class sizes than they have in the big leagues. Also, in the big schools, there is more publish-or-perish pressure on the faculty, while in the small schools, it's more about the actual teaching. Of course, you do need the degree, but I'm saying you don't need it from the ivy league if you are in computer science. No employer has ever shown an interest in where I went to school. It's what happens on the job that interests them. At least in this field. Pursue your own self-motivated goals and don't look back. --Phil Zimmermann
One, if you are from a not well known CS program you've got an uphill battle. Sure once you're got 10 years of experience no one looks at your degree, BUT those 10 years might end up being painful. Look at it this way, right now you're competing with off-shore resources who are at most $25 an hour (high end) and about $10 an hour on the bottom end. How do you compete? By not being a commodity!!!!
Screw realty just hook me up another monitor!
There are some companies where the hiring manager has a bias towards big name schools, but it's more who you know and what you know than where you learned it.
The last company I worked at had a hiring manager that kept two folders of resumes in his desk. One with MIT resumes and one with all the rest. I still got a job there, but it was because of who I knew, not where I went to school. Talk to everybody you get a chance to talk to, because your social network is what gets you hired. Also, when you ask people for references, make sure you ask if they're going to give you a good reference first (this goes for applying to colleges as well as interviewing for jobs BTW. Don't let your teachers submit recomendations that you haven't read!). If you're not good at talking to people, try contributing to open source projects. Last time I went interviewing, more than half of the people I interviewd with had a pile of printouts from websites listing Open Source work I've done and they all were eager to hear about it.
Unless you're transfering to about 3 top schools (with MIT being one of them), then its a pointless exercise.
Seriously.
..of your life? Then go transfer to another to another school just because it has a better reputation. If you have no ability or interest in this field whatsoever, then maybe you can use the degree to mask your lack of ability and character when you are out looking for a job. Your father (like mine) has no idea what he is talking about.
Work hard in college, be willing to go the extra mile, follow your own genuine interests. It is not enough to just do well in your classes. You need to go beyond that. Try to get involved in research. Talk to your professors about how to do that. You'll find that they are far more helpful than you might imagine. If you do this, I can practically guarantee you that you will have job offers lined up by the time you graduate. If you don't do that, then you might be SOL no matter where you go to school. But then, all of these things (research, etc..) are the reasons that you want to do CS in the first place, right? All of this matters far more than where you go to school.
There are people who go through life thinking they can impress people with their credentials. It is this same class of people who are actually impressed by credentials. The rest of us actually do awesome work.
The importance of the 'well known' University is the strength of their career services department. More companies go to these Universities so you don't have to hit the pavement and compete against guys with 1,5,10+ years of experience. Just my 2 cents... signup for our FREE training tips newsletter today WillingtonKarateClub.org
Yes! Companies love portfolios and enthusiasm. They prefer most of the content to be of things you did outside of school. From what I've been told by a hiring manager, they don't value class work that much. Personally, I used it as a filler, but they only looked at the stuff I did during internships and outside jobs.
Some choice quotes:
Personally, as a person who contracts and hires hackers, my experience is similar to Norvig's. The best people I've worked with have often not gotten a degree or gone to a "no-name state school."
On a separate point, the worst developers I've ever had to work with were MIT grads. Arrogant pricks who neither understood engineering nor teamwork. People who have been in the industry longer than I have said MIT hackers have long had reps for not playing well with others. Other "top" schools aren't that much different.
If you're -positive- you'll stay in the field of programming for the rest of your life, it may not matter too much. If there's any chance you'll develop other interests - I left my programming job to get an MBA, for instance - then you bet it makes a difference where you got your first degree. The reality is that many hiring managers are brand conscious - in Dec 2001, at the lowest point of the Silicon Valley job market, I got an interview and a high paying job off monster.com (!) largely on the basis of my two degrees from fancy schools.
A degree from a brand name school is a form of insurance. You may not need it - other posters will argue that you shouldn't need it - but in my experience, it's nice to have.
Also consider that at a better school, you'll be interacting with smarter students and (perhaps) tougher professors, who will push you further than you might push yourself. You'll also have access to a more powerful alumni network for life - something State U doesn't provide.
I think I've revealed my bias. Whatever you choose - good luck!
I have a CS degree from a top-20 school that focuses very sharply on undergraduate education. And that degree really did open doors early in my career. Even though some of my friends that went to "top-tier" engineering schools, I had more opportunities starting out because people knew the institution on my degree produced (mostly) high-quality Bachelor's recipients. I won't name my school specifically, but here's a hint: we just fired our Football coach on Tuesday and hope to steal a new coach from Utah.
Anyway, my point is, a lot of the top-tier universities really don't give a rats ass about their undergraduates. They're there strictly to pay the bills for the grad schools, and they're given short shrift when it comes to resources and faculty time.
I chose my school over quite a few others because a neutral family friend, who is a professor, said it was the best undergraduate institution amongst those where I was accepted - even better than a few that were ranked higher that I could have attended. I only had one doctoral graduate student as a teacher during my four years, for a freshman English seminar. The rest were all full PhD professors, even the "lab profs" we had in chemistry and phsyics. That is very uncommon at most institutions, even others ranked in the top 25.
So if you feel your current school has a good overall undergraduate program, people doing hiring and acceptance for graduate schools probably know that. Even if your school is not known as an "engineering school." If the school you're at now focuses on its graduate schools, chasing grant money and all that, it might be better to move on. IMHO.
A displomic pedigree will only make your employer think you're more costly.
Experience is more important. You'll get just as fat on off-brand candy bars and soda as you will on an equal amount of Coke and Fritos. If you take the effort to undertake projects and such on your own, you're helping yourself more than a mere sheet of paper would any day.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
I graduated in 2004 with a double major in Computer Science and Music from a relatively small private liberal arts college. I can be pretty much guaranteed that potential employers or grad schools have never heard of it. If they have, the CS department definitely doesn't stand out compared to other schools.
However, I did what I could to distinguish myself. I got internships every summer. I did an independent study and a senior thesis. I co-presented at CodeCon my senior year. I graduated cum laude and got honors in both my majors. I would imagine that I got pretty good recommendations from my professors. Finally, I worked a lot on open source, learning and making connections.
My senior year I applied to six grad schools: Princeton, University of Washington, UCSC, University of Minnesota, University of Michigan, and University of Oregon. I made it into all but Princeton (inevitable -- not all my application materials got in on time) and University of Washington.
By the end of my senior year, I decided that grad school wasn't what I wanted right now. After graduation I started working at a company I had interned at the previous summer. Within a few months, one of my friends I met through open source said that he had been contacted by an Amazon.com recruiter and asked if I was interested. I said sure, why not? A few weeks later, I had an interview and a job offer.
There's no way for me to know for sure what effect my school's name had in these outcomes (grad school and job offer), because I don't have a control group to compare against. However, I would make these observations:
- The school you went to, like anything else on your resume, is mostly going to affect whether you get an interview or not (if it affects anything at all). Once you're being phone screened or interviewed on site, the only thing that really matters is their direct impressions of you. The interview process is designed to cut through all the BS of misleading qualifications and figure out what's really left when it's just you and the white board marker.
- That said, I have heard remarks from people who do interviews to the effect of "wow, we really get lots of good people from school X." However, that doesn't mean that you will be presumed to be good if you are from school X, or that you have to be from school X to be considered. It's just a noticable trend.
- I know everyone says this, but it's so true: connections are everything! It's really surprising to me how many times in my life I have heard either "if you know any good people, send them our way" or "we're looking for good people; are you interested?" I don't quite understand how this can be true when I always hear stories (especially on
/.) of smart people being unemployed. The only hypothesis that makes sense to me is:- good people are in demand, but
- the cost of weeding through bad people is too high (believe me, I've heard my manager phone screen lots of poorly qualified people, which wastes his time), therefore
- by far, the best way for companies to find good people is to get referrals, which gives a much higher success rate than trying to weed through resumes
Finally, I should mention that I don't tell this story with any hint of entitlement or condescension toward people who have had it rougher than me. I feel very lucky that things have worked out so well for me, and I wish anyone who is facing tough times the very best.I have to weigh in on this one (although, as poster #3xx on this thread, I'm not sure you'll ever actually see it)... I obtained a 4-year degree from an unknown university 10 years ago, and I don't know that it ever held me back, but I've also worked for a lot of no-name companies (not bad jobs, but never companies that anybody would ever have heard of). I'm with a non-no-name company now (one I automatically assume you've heard of), in a pretty high-profile position, and I'm surrounded by people with degrees from non-no-name universities. That made me start to wonder if I missed something - wonder so much that I've returned for a master's degree (in CS) at a non-no-name university (my employer is picking up the tab, so all the better). I'm noticing a couple of things:
Of course, I remember interviewing at a large Telco back in '99 and the woman I was interviewing with looked at my resume with disdain, mispronounced the name of the college I got my four-year degree from, and said, with a snotty tone, "... I've never heard of it". I didn't get the job. Although I have no way of knowing, I wondered if there was a connection there.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
is not which school. What I look for is experience. Great schools produce their share of below average students. Unknown schools have produced stars. I wouldn't keep a manager that used choice of school as a hiring criteria. When was the last time someone cared which high school you attended? Even in the most biased situations, your alma mater won't matter after your first success or failure. That's experience, that's what counts.
I don't think the name of the school really matters. What does make a difference is the kind of education you get. Is it tech school oriented, where the entire point is to get a stack of certifications? Or is it theory-oriented, where the thought process is more important than the technology?
I went to the University of Utah and majored in CS. It was extremely competitive to get into the program, and there were a lot of weed-out classes. But by the time I was done, I had written an OS, built a compiler, and designed and built a CPU on FPGA chips from the gate level. Some classes were taught using Scheme, some used C++, and others used Java. Most of the time we weren't even using up-to-date technology, but it didn't matter. The emphasis of every class was learning the theory and concepts.
My brother-in-law is going to Utah Valley State College, and he's getting somewhat of a mixed bag. Several of his courses have been glorified (and expensive) study guides for Microsoft and Novell certifications. In my opinion this is a waste of time and money for a CS degree.
The value of a formal CS degree is in learning how to think about technology. Most people can learn how to operate technology, but this kind of training often does not transfer on to the next generation. It's relatively easy to train people to push buttons and make them look smart. And it is this "surface-training" mentality that has lead to the dilution of certifications. It didn't take long for employers to find out that an MSCE doesn't mean much.
Don't sell yourself short. If you don't feel your current school is giving you the fundamentals, move on. Memorization and monkey-training are a waste of time, you'll be doing plenty of that during your career. You should be learning theory and exploring hows and whys, not learning which sequence of dialog boxes gets you to the IP configuration screen.
IMHO, the most important thing to come away from CS studies with an understanding of the fundamentals of CS, which you can get at any good place. As many other have mentioned, in terms of getting a job experience is the best thing, the next best thing is being convincing in your application & interview. A fancy-name degree won't help you if you seem uninterested or uninformed, but there are things a good CS school will teach you that real-life experience will take much longer to. Vice-versa, of course, but if you can't get a job without either experience or a degree, in your position a degree is obviously easier.
For that matter, I would beware of places that explicitly look for big-name degrees, as that means they put more stock in formalism and paperwork than in actual merit.
In short: Stick with your place, learn stuff -- both practical and theoretical, and get involved with activities that can further your knowledge and give you some of the experience that the courses themselves don't offer. Oh, and have fun.
-Lars
As a former hiring manager of software developers, I can say that I never gave a lot of thought to which school the candidate came from. It was important to me that the GPA be good, but anything 3.0 or better was okay by me. I did look for a well-written resume, because half of a developer's job is documentation, and if they can't write a good resume then there's a better chance they won't be a good writer in general. I also looked for good social skills in the job interview, because my developers all worked in teams.
I didn't care much about what programming languages the candidate knew, so impressing me with the quantity of languages and operating systems was moot -- as a former software developer myself, I know it doesn't take as long to learn a new language as it does to learn a new development environment, and odds are you've not used my development environment anyway.
I did look for participation in co-op programs and summer internships, because real-world experience is important. Why? Because it is so-o-o-o difficult to convince new developers that I care less about the quantity of code being generated and more about the quality of the documentation that accompanies it. Former co-ops and interns seem to understand that better, sooner (but never well enough or soon enough to really make me happy!).
During the interview I tend to ask a lot of questions about non-CS courses. Did you like history or literature better? Which non-CS course surprised you most in terms of enjoyment of the material? Here I'm looking to see if the person likes learning things in general, rather than just writing code, because during the first year on the job especially the person is going to have to love to learn in order to succeed.
Bottom line: I don't believe the choice of school matters much for your first job, and it matters not at all for all your jobs thereafter (experience counts more, as indicated by numerous prior posts), so if you're happy where you are, then you might as well stay.
I hope that after I die the one word people use to describe me is "resurrected."
Getting the degree won't matter without much experience; however, it's important to get you past the HR folks. Now, on top of that, without much experience, you won't get far either. Catch-22 it would seem.
Well, there is a solution: get work experience while you're getting your degree. Go slave and be a grunt for the CS department. Offer to work for free. Do whatever it takes to get on board with some decent work study program where eventually you can get your hands on what you like. Start small, do it for free or for peanuts, be a grunt. It will be painful at first, but eventually you will get to work on better things, and you will have something on your resume the day you graduate. You will have an edge over all the other folks who at your age may: a) have degree and no experience, b) have experience but no degree. Trust me, it worked for me, and it will work for you.
--- d'oh
Hey, that was my favorite! Don't bash it until you've tried it!
experience = time_spent_on_job
c e
hiring_prospects=school_quality+grades+experien
school_quality and grades will decrease over time
experience will increase over time
For any field: having a degree in it, from a well respected university is probably helpful (but not necessary) to land the first jobs, think of it as a shortcut to experience. After a few years on the market your job experience is much more important.
I remember in early job interviews (10 years ago) all they asked was about my schooling. In the past few years it is rarely (if ever) mentioned.
So, if you already have some experience, don't attend school just to get the extra line on your resume. Though there are other reasons to get a "formal" education.
If you are just graduating, and you think that your experience is lackluster, then take a few tests from major IT corporations to add resume window dressing. Ones you might consider:
* I have this credential.
UMCP=University Of Maryland, College Park.
It doesn't matter if it's a state school. Honestly, however, the fact that I got a degree from a well known school in the area has only opened a few doors.
If you're talking about job prospects, it's less about where you went or what you know than it is about WHO you know. If you're talking about Academia (i.e. you want to be a professor) it's more about where you went and how well you did.
Just my experience.
GJC
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep
Quickly skimming through previous discussion, I see people have been talking about experience, which is definitely more important than a degree I would say.
That said, a bachelors is becoming the minimum an employer expects of a potential employee, aside from interns. If you really want to succeed or are interested in computer science, you should look into going to grad school and getting at least a Masters degree; that way you can get your CS bachelors degree wherever and then you can go to a more prestigious grad school.
Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
The commentators that say experience is key are correct. That is why you would do well to get a programming job of some kind -- as an intern possibly -- before you graduate. Getting the experience is harder in the current environment, so getting started now will help a lot later.
Also, it is important to finish your degree in the current environment. Some jobs, particularly those involving govenrment contracts, will require that you have a CS degree or a degree in a related field. But any accredited program will work for that purpose.
i ended up going to http://www.gmu.edu/ which, when i applied, wasn't exactly well known for its cs program. on the other hand, it's /the/ up and coming university in the greater area. i'm just about to finish my m.s. c.s., so i've been applying for my first "real world" job. so far i've had a lot better response than friends who finished their undergrad degrees at far more prestigious universities. the differences:
* i had two years experience with a local firm. i started off as an intern and worked my ass off. i was recognized for my effort (including being recognized as most valuable employee) and the internship quickly turned into a part time associate software engineer position.
* i (almost) have a master's, my friends don't.
* my undergrad degree is far broader than the degree requirements suggest: i was one advanced calc sequence short of finishing a double major in applied math. as it was, i finished with minors in data analysis and math. the people i've interviewed with and spoken to at career fairs have consistently commented on the math minor. there seems to be a shortage of people who can do cs and math well. my friends who didn't develop this kind of latitude are now mostly webmonkeys or low level grunts.
* i've been very involved. i'm a member of the acm and participated in several icpc regionals (placing in the top 11 the last two years i competed). i was involved with the robotics club until ta-ing sucked away all my time and will to live.
* i've worked for the department as a t.a. (at the grad and undergrad levels) and as an r.a. if you can find a professor doing work on something you find interesting, ask and see if they'd like help. almost all the interviewers i've had were far more interested in the research stuff i did, even though my internship experience was far more relevant to what they were recruiting for. none of my friends had this kind of experience.
i'm not quite sure how these individual factors are affecting my prospects, but overall it seems that i'm better off than my friends with the fancy degrees (and equally fancy loans) from fancy universities are doing. i'm getting my foot in doors that my friends can't. now, whether or not i'll be able to step through the door is another question (haven't landed a job yet), so caveat lector and all that jazz.
And work history, as has been said repeatedly, is an important key.
I managed to get my foot in the IS door as a college dropout, because I knew a little something about computers, and the construction company where I worked needed an assistant programmer. Through the vagaries of business, that position wound up morphing into being a developer of software sold into the educational market, and that was good enough for my move into corporate slavery.
Six years later, I emerged calling myself a 'consultant', and I now get to sit here making wise-ass remarks on Slashdot while charging relatively ridiculous amounts of money. However, this would not be possible if I did not meet my commitments, and if I did not perform well in the inevitable crunches which are endemic to the industry.
It was a joke! When you give me that look it was a joke.
He switched majors his sophomore and the school he was attending didn't have a very good CS program. He emailed maybe 50 or so HR departments at companies he thought he might like to work for and asked them, "If I send you an application in two years, what school(s) would you like to see my CS degree come from?"
He actually received many responses and compiled a short-list of the most-mentioned schools. He then made his final choice based on cost, distance from home, size of school, etc. Bowling Green of Ohio won out. It was in the top five most-mentioned schools, IIRC, which was surprising to us.And yes, it turned out to be a very smart idea, job-wise. ;)
You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
Being from a top-N school will open doors for your first job, and you may be better networked in school and for a while afterwards to opportunities. You may have better opportunity to try something that gets noticed to form your own startup (eg: Google). A lot of this depends on whether you stay for an MSCS as well.
If you are learning plenty now, and planning on grad school, you might stay where you are and target a top-N school as the next step. If you don't plan on grad school, and don't have a calling card project on which to hang your hat, a prestige school won't hurt. Joe Schlemiel from Podunk Extension isn't going to get much attention from many employers outside Podunk.
-dB
"It if was easy to do, we'd find someone cheaper than you to do it."
I went to Sheffield Hallam, a University that also isn't particularly well recognised for computer science. Nevertheless, I was very happy at University, the course was as practically based as it could be for computing (if you get too much into specifics it'll be out of date before you finish). I ended up with a decent grade, a 2:1 (I don't think Merkin Universities allocate grades on the same scale). By contrast a friend of mine went to Imperial College, a very well respected University, and I'm not afraid to admit I was a little jealous of him for getting in there.
Fast-forward to three years after leaving University, he hated his time there and finishd up with only a 2:2. He's doing a rather dull database administrator job whilst I'm a Senior Systems Administrator, working on a large Linux network doing a job I enjoy. And whilst I don't think one should get too hung-up on money, I think it's relevant to say that I earn more than double his salary.
Essentially, I believe that it's more important for you to be at a Univeristy where you are interested in the course and happy with your surroundings. You don't (or shouldn't) go to Uni to say 'I studied at XYZ', you go to learn. You can do this wherever you are, although obviously it helps to have good teaching staff. Since finishing my course I have found that most employers aren't actually too concerned about what University one went to, or even what grade one got or course one studied. They're far more interested in employing someone they feel can fulfil the needs of the role they're interviewing for. If you work hard at University, you know your stuff and you can show it, it really doesn't matter where you studied.
If you're happy at your current University, you like the people you're studying with and the course seems to be covering the topics you want to cover, stick with it.
Blaming GW Bush for the Iraq war is like blaming Ronald McDonald for the poor quality of food.
If there's any chance you'll ever want to go get a PhD and teach and/or do research, then get into the best school you can. Typically tenured state jobs go to PhD's from the ivy leagues. If your state school isn't quite as nice, the faculty will come from the good state schools.
I'm about 16 years into my career and took a job teaching at a community college to get through the dot bomb. Its been a great experience, and I had the time to get most of the way through a Master's degree. I like teaching and I like school (though the money is pathetic), but to really play in this arena though, I'd need a PhD from a top-notch school. My choice for my Master's program was/is the local branch of the state-school and probably wouldn't do me well as far as getting into a good PhD program...my mortgage does the rest. So any thoughts of a career at State U. is just a fantasy....that's the dark side of the story. There's plenty PhD's out there who spent the work to get the PhD, but don't "rank" enough to score the tenure-track position. Its competative.
Anyway, the education you get now is the foundation for whatever you may (want to) do down the line. I doubt a good education will hurt you in industry, and a mediocre one won't hurt either. Its things that do require an education that may suffer. The future is hard to predict, and I agree with all the posters who say its your education that counts, but there are career paths where it mattes.
When we receive your resume, we look at experience first. If you also went to a great, well-known university, it definitely helps your case, especially since many candidates exaggerate their experience. It's harder to exaggerate the fact of a top university degree. Personally, I have found that our stronger engineers have come from top schools. When I do a phone-screen and ask a practical CS question (e.g., given two simple algorithms to a solve a problem, which one is better and why?), the candidates from top schools can do it consistently, and the others cannot.
When we do campus recruiting, we visit only the highest-ranked universities in the area.
Hot tip to job candidates: In your resume and cover letter, there is a difference between describing your skills and boasting about them. Please learn the difference if you don't want to turn off the reader. Avoid stuffy cliches like "I have a proven track record for blah blah blah" because the person who decides "proven" is the hiring manager, not you. Steer away from presumptuous statements like, "I know that I can succeed at your company" because, actually, you don't know anything about the company until you've worked here. And don't call yourself an "expert" at something unless you are ready for me to sling expert-level questions at you during the phone screen. If you sound full of yourself, your resume goes to the pile labeled "poor social skills" which are actually at least as important to success as engineering knowledge.
Sorry for the cynical tone, but I receive so much bullshit from job candidates about their experience and skills. On the other hand, when a truly qualified candidate shows up, it's like a gigantic breath of fresh air, and I remember what it's like to work with excellent people.
I have over 24 years of programming experience, twenty years of Internet experience (it was called Arpanet/Milnet back when I started), but no well-known companies or degree on my resume. In spite of performing well at interviews with the techies, HR has repeatedly rejected me, often over vociferous objections of the techies, because I lacked a degree and/or a good title with a well-known company.
Things were better during the dot-com boom, of course, but difference for me, personally, has been much more extreme than the average guy with a degree. It has to do with the job market. Back in 1999, anyone with experience was in demand, and they got more experience on the job. But none of that led to a degree, so when the bottom fell out of the market, I found it very difficult to compete. I've been turned down for jobs that pay less than half of what I used to make (luckily, hired in other better paying positions, but after much interviewing and effort, and still making nowhere near what I mad in the boom years). I believe it's all due to the lack of a degree. This is especially important in areas where the amount of graduates is very high, such as Boston/Cambridge, where I live.
Now, whether it matters where you GET the degree, I think it does. Non-accredited, or unknown non-US universities, can probably be a negative, because people may think you're a con-man. Community Colleges can educate you, but having an associates degree from them may likewise be a negative - people think you went to a lowest-rung college because that's the only place you could get into and graduate from, whereas if you had no degree at all, they might think you just had better things going on.
I think mid-level schools can be a plus. I'd say that any state university is at least mid-level, with some such as california or michigan being very well respected. But the university within the state college system matters - for instance U.C. Berkeley is so far more impressive than U.C. Riverside.
ANY degress from a top-level university will be impressive, especially outside the U.S. I'd say a bachelor's degree from MIT would trump a Doctorate from University of Alaska. A Bachelor's degree in Botany from Harvard with 3 years of programming experience may very well trump a BS-CS degree from University of Oklahoma with 1 year of experience.
All of this is the reason why I decided to go back to school, and I chose Harvard. They have a wonderful night school, and you can get an actual Harvard bachelor's degree. The cost of courses varies from cheap to moderately expensive though, from $550 - $1975, with the graduate level CS courses being the most expensive. Undergrad CS courses are $1400-$1500. I was also able to transfer in two years (60 units) of credit from other institutions. At Harvard, credits do not expire, unlike many other schools.
But I have started off taking the cheap courses that a requirements outside CS, because I am paying for them myself. In the future I am going to try for financial aid, or employer tuition reimbursement. Let me tell you, this is NOT some sort of community college with a harvard name. No, these courses are DIFFICULT! I took 3 courses (12 credits) this semester and I think I bit off more than I can chew. There's little time for anything else, and I feel guilty about things like...reading slashdot...when I should be doing my schoolwork.
I know I'm weighing in a bit late and am mimicking the general concensus, but I'll say it likely doesn't matter which university you graduate from unless you want to go into a very specialized field such as AI.
Many IT organizations actually prefer new grads to be green and moldable. Those who graduate with honors from MIT, Stanford, etc. might be expecting (maybe with good reason) their employer conform to their wishes rather than the employer molding the new employee to fit the corporate mold.
So unless you are a prima donna or really want to get into a highly specialized field, stay where you are.
Thus sprach higg.
I graduated from University of Washington CSE at the same time that a good friend of mind graduated from Washington State University with the same degree. There were many many interviews I had at companies that would not even talk to him.
Having said that however I think after a few years of interesting experience (vs schmuck work) it probably doesn't matter at all since by then most employers are more interested in your experience and references.
Also, you should really get a PHd or Masters at least. I learned the hard way that even with a degree from a top CS school there are certain classes of hard or interesting problems that no employer will ever let you touch otherwise so I ended up going back to school (which really sucks ass after having made good money for a few years).
I've seen hiring ads and known many managers who turn blind eyes to people without degrees. I'd have to say for the guy who's asking the question, a degree is a degree, but many of my friends who are self-taught are in lower positions than I am and of those, a lot of them have not only more experience but more talent.
My little piece of paper has gotten me places that my friends without that little piece of paper can't go. I don't know why so many people are posting otherwise. They must have 18 charismas or something.
It won't matter what school you go to if you don't have a clear sense of what you want to accomplish once you get there. Good schools are good because they offer quality courses but also a diverse range of studies. And there can be bad courses at good schools too. I can't tell you how many times I've seen college students grumble that they seem to be taking the same courses over and over under different names because the school seemingly doesn't do a good job of telling the students what the course is good for. And these are good schools too.
In the end it comes down to how much utility you will derive out of each of the courses you fill your schedule with. You ARE doing this for a practical benefit like getting a good job that will pay the Vegas gambling bills, mortgage and so on?
I'm a firm believer that you'll get a decent education at most reasonable schools. The biggest difference is in personal networking. While you may learn the same thing in a no-name school, you won't be going to class with the daughter of the CEO of the company that can hire you out of school, or and you're less likely to be sitting next to guy who starts the next Google or Ebay.
Any degree may give you bonus points when someone looks at your resume, but it'll matter a lot more if your resume is handed to HR by a good personal reference, especially if they're a high-up already.
It may not be pretty and it may not be fair, but it only makes life easier if you can get into the old boys club.
Hi, I can give you some advice from the perspective of a C.S. Ph.D. student (Carnege Mellon University)
You're early in your Computer Science program so you might not know if you want to go to graduate school. But it's an important consideration. A master's program is generally fast (less than two years) and people will look more closely at your master's degree than your undergraduate degree. You need to make sure you've got a good GPA to get into a good masters program. Go to a better school than you're at now and you'll be in good shape. I can't see any reason not to get at least a master's degree.
If you decide you like research, you want to go into a Ph.D. program. First you should try doing research as an undergraduate. Find a professor that needs help with something. They love undergrads because they're cheap. You can get into a first tier Ph.D. program from Middle of nowhere university if you have solid research experience and solid letters of recommendation. Of course, it might be hard to do research at your school. There might not be many research faculty.
If you try research and become totally convinced that you want to keep on doing it you should probably get into the best master's program you can and do research at that school (look for an assistanceship to pay for your school!). You're much more likely to get into a first tier Ph.D. program if they know your recommenders and if you've made a real research contribution. You probably want to be coming from a top 20 school for this to be the case. (Ok, huge exceptions to this. If middle of nowhere university has a world class Widget Analysis lab, you're fine applying to Berkeley if you emphasize your Widget Analysis work).
Hope this helps. Don't feel bad about the school you're at! Seriously.
Alumni connections are always helpful. It may actually help to go to a school with a good business or management school if alumni connections are what you want. After all, managers frequently have MBAs.
Another thing to consider: some schools have "better" career-placement offices than others. Just because a school is better known doesn't mean it has a better placement office.
If you are going to look for work in your city or region, it won't matter, as your school will be "well known" enough.
If you are going to grad school, be aware that most grad schools combine your GPA with a "difficulty factor" - an "A" at one school may be the same as a "C" at another. High GRE scores can make this a non-issue.
Basically, you have to decide:
What am I going to do after graduation? What companies or graduate schools am I going to interview with? Do they care?
Then there are all the non-technical things:
Do you really want to move? Are you prepared for the change? Are you prepared to pay more tuition?
If the deadline is approaching, go ahead and apply then withdraw your application later if you change your mind. Sure, you'll be out your application fee but at least you'll have kept your options open.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I am in the process of completing my MBA in Technology Management at the University of Phoenix, and I can assure you it is far from a diploma mill. The curriculum is rigorous, maybe even more so than local competing colleges. The school's stigma is attributed to the adult learning model and its methods of advertising. The school is a business, after all. My wife also teaches undergraduate Nursing for UOP. As faculty, she too can attest to the legitimacy of the school.
I have interviewed at smaller and larger corporations. You can get a job regardless of the university (or trade school, or even online programming course) if you can demonstrate knowledge and understanding in your chosen profession. Ask anyone whose employed.
But try applying at Sun with a CS degree from Northeastern Christian Junior College. You're not going to get into the stack.
I've interviewed candidates from Harvard, MIT, as well as BU, UMass Boston, and even some local community colleges.
Hired that MIT guy, and he turned out to be a complete waste of time. Wonder what the UMass boston guy's doing now?
BTW: if you have enough PRACTICAL experience on your resume I'll never even noticed your Alma Mater. As long as you can walk the walk at interview time...
I retired at 39, a self-made millionaire developing software in many environments. I have never had a computer class of any kind, ever. I taught myself everything I know. Several BASIC's, numerous assemblers, FORTRAN, Pascal, C/C++, J2EE, Unix, networking, MIS and even some digital hardware design as well.
While my friends were all busily remaining sheltered in school, I was out in the "Real World" getting real experience. Now I'm on permanent vacation, while they're all working - some are even living paycheck to paycheck!
For career advancement in any field, connections are indeed crucial. But don't believe anyone who says it's simply "who you know." It's absolutely more than that. It's who knows what you know.
A degree will absolutely open doors especially with larger corporations or governments, but it's your experience and creativity which will get you hired, and which will form the larger part of your professional reputation. A degree is only one small piece of a much larger whole.
Don't get me wrong; many people do rise through the ranks of large corporations based on their credentials alone. This class of person eventually gains sufficient authority to cause all kinds of damage. However I have also been present during interviews in smaller companies wherein a CS degree was openly viewed as a liability. The understanding was that there would be four years of accumulated bullshit to undo before the prospective employee would become truly up to speed.
If you want to be designing chips at Intel, or writing flight software for NASA, do the political thing and get the most prestigious degree possible. That will get you an interview with these large and highly political organizations. If you want to rise through the ranks of cubicles to the levels of top management, the credibility of your degrees will be useful in your political ladder climbing. Plan on always having a "boss" if you take this route.
Or, if you're a person with more knowledge than your instructors, and more ideas than time, and have a desire to blow past all the career drones and forge your own trail, my advice is to quit spinning your wheels in college and get programming. Finish your degree if you've already made a substantial investment, but hurry up and get out of there. You might be the next Netscape, Kazaa, eBay or Amazon!
"Your education begins when what is called your education ends." -Oliver Wendell Holmes
I went to a school ranked in the top 10 for their CS program(Ivy League) for a CS degree.
:-) (Besides the fact that an easier college would have been nicer, there are other what-ifs... most notably I could have ended up in classes/friends? with Marc Andreesen if I had chosen to go to the University of Illinois! So you never know.)
Since it costs big bucks, the question is: is it worth it? While it might be in my interests to say "yes", I'm not sure.
While top-20 school graduates earn more than others, there does not mean that the degree got them the money. There also exists the possibility that the qualities that got them into the top-20 school (but not the education or the degree itself) got them the money. In fact, I have heard of a study that analyzed students who got into the Ivy League but didn't go. Their earnings were the same as Ivy League graduates on average.
So I'm not sure the name buys you much, empirically speaking, based on that study. (Sorry I don't have a better pointer; I haven't scanned Google.) Maybe a CS degree is different from the general "Ivy League-or-not" question but I doubt it. If anything, CS is more meritocratic.
From personal-- albeit anecdotal-- experience, I would say that my salary isn't appreciably different due to the degree. It makes it easier to bargain with employers but at the end of the day, my salary isn't super-high or anything.
Also from personal experience, I'd say that the top-10-CS degree has had the following benefits: 1) I met a couple world-class professors and had a couple world-class classmates. Using one of the former as a reference acted like an 'oh-hes-good-no-need-to-check' flag. 2) Almost everybody in my classes was smart and most worked hard. (Hrm, is this an advantage or disadvantage in school?) While I have yet to take advantage of my relationships with them (hiring, getting hired, etc), perhaps that could pay off at some point. 3) When interviewing for a job, the employers (save a standard Microsoft interview) generally don't even bother to try to figure out if I'm smart enough; they assume it and focus on other issues in the interview (experience, skills, personality, etc.)
The quality of the teaching can probably be matched at a very strong state school (UC Berkeley, UI-Urbana/Champaign, UT-Austin, UMass-AnnArbor, wherever else I'm forgetting) for 90% of the classes you'd take. A top school (I'm getting a bit sloppy here; some top schools are strong state schools) will emphasize a lot more theory which may or may not end up being helpful for you. Some top schools (and it varies widely even among top schools) may allow/encourage working with top/name-brand professors on research projects which could give you a leg up if you wanted to do grad school in CS.
Going to a top-name school, when it comes up, also causes people to mentally put you in a different category socially. Overall I consider this a wash; as positive as it is negative. YMMV.
I pretty much went the expensive route because, once financial aid made the choice between the high-priced option at least possible, it was like "go for it! who wants to wonder 'what if...' later?" Ironically, I still wonder what if...
--LP, writing a bit hurriedly
You are a software developer in the US? Dont bother with transferring:
1. In India no one would have even heard of the prestigious university you want to transfer to.
2. McDonalds and Walmart dont care what university (if any) you graduate from.
Going to a good school will help you build the skills you need to build a good reputation. By building a good reputation, you get to know more people who can help you get better jobs.
Going to a mediocre school won't help you with this and will generally just give you A's if you even try half-heartedly. While you might not ace every course at a good school, you'll learn more than you ever would at some school who doesn't specifically care about the degree you're trying to get.
In short, your Dad is right.
Later, GJC
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep
get paid
get insurance
get experience
get tuition waivers or tuition credit
I worked at a campus computer lab '91 - '94 while getting my degree, and I believe that was key in the number and quality of offers I had when I graduated.
I graduated from the University of Michigan College of Engineering almost 20 years ago.
I'll agree that there is a certain amount of pedigree that goes along with attending the likes of MIT & Harvard...but here's my case for why attending a large university might be a good thing:
o I once had a recruiter from Motorola tell me that he liked recruiting from Michigan because he knew that grads would be able to handle themselves in a large organization like Moto. I'd have to agree. Dealing with red tape is a part of life, and my undergrad years at Michigan taught me how to "work the system".
o I've had my share of crappy professors and even crappier TA's. If there's one thing a big university teaches you is that you can teach yourself just about anything. I've worked with other grads from smaller colleges that knew more nitty gritty detail about this subject or that. It was impressive that they could actually recall some abstract equation, but we were working in a commercial world, not research. Results is what matters, not some detail from some long ago class.
o There's still an "awe" factor being a grad from a big name school like Michigan. I'm at the age where other parents say "My kid wants to go to Michigan." And I say that I'd gladly talk to them about it. I've never met a Michigan grad that wished they had gone to a different school.
But, it's not for everyone. I had a few High School friends attend then drop out. It's a sink or swim environment. Weeder classes are a reality. There's no hand holding. It's a 4 year (well 5 in my case) hazing ritual. No doubt it's high pressure, and people crack. Competition is fierce (especially in engineering). You get a huge ego boost and feeling of accomplishment when you graduate, and you carry that confidence forward the rest of your life.
Did I get an education? Sure I did. Was it as good 'academically' as an education I might receive at a local college or boutique school. Hard to say, but I would guess that it was only marginally better. Would I do it again? Absolutely. Best 5 years of my life. It's like the marines, I went there as a boy and came out a man.
So yes, I would have to say that there is a added plus to attending a larger university. It's not an 'academic' plus, but it is most certainly a life lesson 'plus'.
A good friend will help you move. A really good friend will help you move a body.
but the question isn't about degree vs no degree, it's about State U. vs "highly esteemed". A bachelor's in CS from a highly esteemed school may be better, but its possible to have a career with just a state school bachelor's.
I have a math degree. I work as a software engineer. Without a CS degree, you can't get in the door at most places no matter how much experience you have or how good you are. I'm a good software engineer. I worked with a fella who had a good GPA and a CS degree from Cornell who was terrible, but who could get in the door and get a job because he had a degree. I had to work my way into the position he was handed and then worked right on past him to be his supervisor in less than 3 total years.
I have been in the IT world for abour a decade.
I was all rosy-eyed and hopeful when I graduated, only to have reality clip my wings with rusty scissors. I change jobs, on average, every two years. The contracting world sucks.
Learn a health-related skill.
People will always be sick and need help == job security.
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I have a BS CS degree from the University of Illinois (UIUC). That qualifies me to wash dishes using several layers of abstraction :-). The most important things are:
sigs, as if you care.
It depends on the job. If you are going to get a CS degree make sure you learn good software arch as well as good software coding. On many programs being just a hacker won't cut it. You need to know how to arch good software that is fault tollerant, reliable, quality and is testable. Many times this does not happen so if you can do this you will have a leg up when you get into the field and are selling points. There is a big difference in a software architect and a hacker/programmer
Evolution or ID?
Contacts
If you are hoping to work in your local market, you may be better off sticking with your current school. Local career fairs and contacts are much more likely to yield a good local job than a particularly fancy degree. The converse is also true. If you envision yourself doing really high end cutting edge stuff, you had better start rubbing elbows with the people doing that stuff.
Either way, you need to make a name for yourself which leads us to...
Experience
GET IN A COOP PROGRAM!!!!!!
If your school does not offer one, change schools. If getting into a coop is too difficult, get a job as a research assistant. There are three really good reasons for this: 1) having real experience on your resume beats good grades 9 times out of 10. 2) You will make contacts and 3) money you make now is worth much more than money you make later in life. People don't talk much about the last one because it runs counter to the typical "spend what you make" mentality. Think of your career as a game where the objective is to save $2M as fast as possible. Playing with a little spreadsheet showing yearly contributions and interest will show you how soon you can do it and how easy it is IF you start early.
Grades/School
Right out of school, these things are a little bit important but more in the senses mentioned above than in of themselves. Frankly an employer who is primarily worried about appearances (high status school or grades over experience) over results (experience or grades in the absense of experience) is probably not one you want to work for unless that also reflects your values.
Finally a comment about you Dad
f*** him. No, just kidding. In light of the above, consider what your dad is offering. If going to the school he suggests may open doors for you (since he knows people or knows people who know people) it may be a good time to swallow your pride and go. If he is willing to pay for a school that offers better resources (smaller classes, better equipment, better profs, better coop placements) it may be good to go. If he wants you to go because "X is a good school" then you would be better off to investigate and be able to come back to him and say" "I've looked into Silver Spoon U. the undergrad programs are basically used to finance research: most classes are huge and taught by TAs. Also, Dr. Scorpio here at Podunk State is a leader in giant space mirror research which is something that really turns my crank. I would like to talk to him about a coop term at Globex." By presenting this case to him, you will get a better understanding of what you want and may, in turn, get some useful ideas from him.
Just my 2c. Good luck.
E.
I've hired a handful of entry-level sysadmins in my time, and conducted close to 50 interviewsin the process. Since I have a liberal arts degree myself, I'm inclined to look past the degree someone has, but...
Over time I've learned to be distrustful of folks with degrees from DeVry and the local equivalents. A standard "filter" question I ask during the interview is, "What is DHCP for?" and a sad number of folks couldn't answer correctly. I've never had a trade school degree recipient answer correctly.
Note that this is NOT the same as having a degree from a "good" school - if I had to choose blindly, I'd sooner pick a graduate of one of the CUNY schools (city colleges) than just about anywhere else. In NYC especially, there's a lot of folks with brains but no money for college.
I got my degree from the University of California at Santa Cruz before it was well known for engineering. They had a very good program and I had no problem getting a job after graduating. My ex roommate, on the other hand, went to a local California state college. As I helped him and saw the curriculum, I was surprised at how backwards it was compared to what I had to do. In many ways, even though I got my degree ten years ago, UCSC was far more advanced than Cal State Hayward. While many courses were the same, I thought CSH's courses were a joke compared to what I had to do. In many classes, my roommate had to hand in printouts of code or turn it in on floppy disks. Back in 1989 at UCSC, all of our code was submitted on the network and automated scripts performed the initial validation, i.e. compiling and running test data on it. We never handed in code printouts either, after all, that's what the network was for.
Helping my roommate with his homework further reinforced this view. Much of his homework for equivalent courses was much easier. Of course, when I took it we didn't have google or the other Internet resources available either.
Not all colleges are created equal.
-Aaron
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...when I graduated from a Minnesota state university (Mankato State) with a BSCS back in 1987, it made a large difference to my first employer (Unisys Corp) because the folks at Unisys knew quite well that Mankato State (and St. Cloud State) both produced CompSci people with solid experience on Unisys 2200-series mainframes.
That's the platform we did most of our coursework on, and of course was also the platform that they were wanting people to write code on.
A few other employers also knew the relatively good quality of the CS program at MSU compared to other local schools at the time and indicated to me during interviews that MSU grads were given some preference, so the school actually *did* make a difference, at least at that time.
I have no idea how good their program is now, or whether or not it makes any difference anymore...
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
I didn't think anyone would spend $100k on an education in CS anymore at a college.
Spend your time learning some of the Indian dialects, Japanese, Chinese, and business. You can learn to code from a book, but learning the nuances of the future overlords of IT is much more time consuming.
Seriously though, basing your career on your college education is a waste. You're not a lawyer, in 10 years it won't matter where you went, it'll merely be "can you wipe your own ass? check. have a bs degree? check. can you write your own name? check. can you spell it correctly? maybe."
I've got 5 years experiences where my friends got degrees, right now I earn about 20k/yr more then they do and spent $100k less getting here. Moral of the story, in the short run no degree is better, long run it may pan out to be worth it's while but I'll be retired before that time.
Its not what you know, its who you know.
But seriously, the degree you get does NOT guarantee what you'll be doing...one of my profs has a CS degree but was a SE for Xerox...people get degrees in one field and go and do something related or even completly different anyway.
Also the school doesnt make a HUGE amount of difference, obviously if its from MIT or such it will be hugely valued. But I go to RIT (how many of you have even heard of that place) and graduates are very much in demand as well.
If dear ol' dad is footing the bill and wants you in a more prestigious school, then start packin' yer bags... You definitely want to keep him happy.
In truth, he's probably mistaken about where the degree comes from - at least in the CS market - as experience and depth make much more difference that the name on your wallpaper - but if it's his money then it's his call.. Get up off your butt and move across town to the BIG school!
"Straddling the sword of technology..."
If what you want is to find a job related to computer science, your best bet is to leave the US and get a degree from the Mumbai Institute of Technology.
Whereever you go, make sure you know your basics inside out. For instance, you should know your basic data structures and algorithims well enough that you can easily implement them and answer any questions in an interview.
...)
It's the technical interview that will get you the job (at least for technical jobs
I went to a smaller university, not state-college level, but not huge either; 10K students. I've talked to the people who interview here where I work, and they put hardly any stock into WHERE you went to college. Experience and GPA get you past the HR department, and being able to act like you know what you're talking about gets you in with the people who'll make the final recommendations.
Every once in a while you'll hit some nutjob who went to a big university and was in a frat or something, and he'll try to give preference to an alumni, but most people are buying a person, not a cookie cut with some specific cutter.
For your bachelor's degree the content is primarily the same...for any field (I know nothing of the libaral arts part, so I'm talking just science). Computer science, engineering, physics, etc.
You got your calc, your classical physics, your circuit theory, your algorithm complexity, your thermodynamics, etc. and they are all basically the same content. All just the fundamental basics to each field. A top school might just get your learning wheel going faster and sooner but you certainly can get there by yourself (IOW: self-motivation).
As for master's and doctorate it's another ball game. You need good faculty to do good research in good labs. Sure, you can get by with less but research is about pushing the envelope farther. Lacking the key ingredients hinders doing this. Less is fine depending on your goals, but ask your drag strip racers if you win by having a mediocre car and/or a mediocre driver.
But once you get out of academia/research then see the hundreds of other posts here talking about job experience.
:wq
This may sound stupid... Pick your college on where you want to be for 4 years of your life. If you are someone who is driven to learn, you will learn regardless of where you are, what obsticles are put in your way, no matter what. This is what defines someone who is going to be a good programmer and someone who isn't, not the college you go to. I chose poorly, I went to "a good school", RIT. I have many, many bones to pick with the CS department at RIT. If I had it to do over, I'd pick somewhere warm with lots of girls. As another user said, experience is key. GPA means nothing to anyone outside of college, what university gave you the paper means next to nothing. The only way it will probably help you is if someone you are interviewing with went to the same school and you can have that connection. Experience is probably the most important thing, a very close second is interview. If you can ace interviews you are golden. I highly suggest doing as many interviews as you can for fun and food. For example, Microsoft gives you $70 a day...for FOOD(and beer counts!). Their interviews are also awesome, and a lot of fun. So to recap...when choosing a college, rate your choices (in no particular order) on: a) Nice weather (as defiend by you) b) Proximity to activities. (Mountains, ocean, clubs etc) c) Members of the opposite sex. d) The feeling you get when you are on the campus And not on their "reputation"
I paid off my student loans in 9 months. Let's see you do THAT with the kind of debt you'll be carrying from a prestigious school.
Now, two and a half years out, I have a $240k house and a total household income of over $100k. Whereas many of my friends that went to other schools are projecting times to pay back their loans in terms of decades.
Get real. Look at the job market. Unless you are willing to work in India or China, then your chances of a successfull CS career is the same as winning the lottery. The future is outsourcing programming jobs. Transfer to a major that has a lower chance of being outsourced in the future than CS. Oh, I forgot to mention that I teach CS at an Ivy University.
The NYTimes just ran an article about this exact subject, and it turns out that only black recruits made more in their lifetime when it included military service.
No other segment of society did, though some did make more for a short time before fading.
Oh, and in the military you may have to kill people, or might die, as part of the job. Something to think about.
It may be unjustified (I am not taking a position either way), but there IS a stigma to the kind of school you're attending. I am sorry if you only found out about while attending (rather than prior to enrolling) but you will have to deal with that stigma with your interviewers...
I have a BS in Architecture from UVa. I did get a certification from Sun in Java, though.
With 5yrs experience in web app development, I've just gotten a new job for great money and benefits with SAIC. I also have been working for quite some time now on a team of great developers with backgrounds in chemestry, mathmatics, and biology.
I did graduate from a no-name state U and was asked in an interview why I chose that school (answer: it was there: I was working there, free tuition was the only major perq. And it was my 4th college degree, but that's another story).
In my experience, a degree from MIT, Stanford, etc, etc is going to get more attention simply because they are known and highly selective. Jerry Falwell U may have a fine CS dept., but that fact will probably not be the first thing that springs to the interviewer's mind.
However, producing really useful, well written code trumps all. A similarly situated no-name U grad friend who wrote a little shareware program got hired by a major empire (where nobody from no-name U ever even scored an interview previously). The program's usefulness was not even that massive (specialized hardware), but if you needed it, you needed it. And he was willing to entertain modification requests, especially from somebody at evilempire.com. And they could look at what he wrote--clear, well structured and documented.
I personally do not have a CS degree, but it would seem the best part would be the relationship the school has with corporations willing to give out internships.
...
My first IS/IT job was the hardest to land because of 0% experience. During the interview process the topic of this position doesn't even come up.
It is what have you done lately?
The internship will help you can some experience to give you a shot at a decent entry level position.
My room mates where electrical engineering majors and I think one of the key benefits for their career was that they got internships at GE etc
Eric
Schools with a more renound program also have a better ability to place their graduates once they are done. I was very fortunate that my advisors were able to line up many interviews for me during my final year.
Usually professors at schools with decent PHD programs will have many active contacts with former PHD students and postdocs that carry the clout with their companies to get you in for an interview. Of course, if you're one of 1000 undergrads, you'll have to impress them and turn on the charm a bit to motivate them to help you out.
... on Jeopardy!
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
A degree is important but what is more important is being competent at what you want to do. I have no degree, I'm just an eccentric geek who knows a little of everything and a lot of nothing (well a smaller set at least). As a result I have never had much trouble finding employment but it has never been doing things I WANT to do. An employer will say "We need someone who can do X." and I get to volunteer and figure it out. As a result I am now a database guru. But guess what? I freaking hate databases!!! So my advice is this: Figure out what you want to do and use the CS program to learn how to do it. If you happen to get a degree along the way GREAT!!!
60% Experience (this is what gets you in the door)
39% Interview (this is what gets you hired)
1% Piece of paper
Remember, included in that 60% is the fact that while you are getting Experience, you are also meeting people. If you are good they will be more than happy to put in a good word for you later. This is very helpful in "getting in the door".
Being "good" means both technically, and not being an ass of a person.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
My company had a recent college recruitment "job fair"; Stanford, UC Berkeley, Brown and numerous other (ahem) luminaries of the computer science education world were well-represented. BS and MS candidates were invited.
Candidates were given a function prototype and a vague functional spec (just like in the real world!), and asked to write a pixel-munging function in C or C++. Typedefs for all pertinent data types were provided, as well as guidance to program defensively, and that no early returns would be permitted. The function was spec'd to return an error code, so throwing exceptions was also discouraged.
They were given a week to reply, could use any compiler, rip off code from text books, write test harnesses, look up stuff on the web, ask their mom for help...whatever.
Of the 30 responses I received, 8 compiled. Of those eight, only three actually worked.
In most of the posts here, the poster's arguments for not transferring are post-facto. But just because they did well without some specific advantage doesn't mean you shouldn't give yourself that advantage. Who knows where it'll help!
The arguments in other posts go like this: "I went to no-name-given State U and, look -- I am doing OK." Or, if they are even more macho: "Look, I didn't even go to school." Good for them! Now ask these people to look around and see if the number of people from top-tier schools isn't disproportionately higher. There is a reason why that is true:
- The top-tier schools provide a better education; that is why they are "top-tier", duh! Better education translates into more capable workers
- Because they are ranked highly, such schools often have very talented students. Smart peers can do wonders for your own abilities, knowledge and outlook.
- The best jobs are highly coveted; employers (read HR) will often apply a pre-filtering based on the degrees of each applicant. Experience does matter , but if you can also get the degree- why not!
- For better or for worse, a certain amount of degree-discrimination occurs in many of the best companies. Google is notorious for only hiring from the top-schools; they often reject people who are experienced but don't have sexy degrees.
BTW, when I say "top-tier" I don't meant just the top-whatever as per USNews Review. What I mean are schools recognized for their CS programs (e.g., in CS terms U Waterloo in Canada will probably beat Harvard, but not MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, CMU etc).In my experience, the only way a 'less prestegious' program hurts you, is if the company has interviewed other candidates from the program and they turned out to be dumb as rocks.
If your classmates are below average programmers, and you'll likely be applying to the same jobs [generally, CS jobs around the college] then yes; I'd say it'll make a significant impact.
I've interviewed with nearly a dozen companies since leaving the university and I've _never_ had a technical interview. Many non-tech companies that hire techies don't do it. I should also add that these companies are more likely to care about degrees and certifications versus what you can do.
Look up ratio of boys to girls at your school.
Look up ratio of boys to girls at schools you might transfer to.
Go with the best odds.
In practice, most jobs'll look for certifications and maybe a degree as an afterthought. They're not interested in your actual knowledge, they're only interested in not being held accountable if you don't work out.
Lastly, you're going to get rotten jobs, whatever education and certifications you have. Most jobs are rotten. Especially in IT, where most companies are plain stupid. Many IT specialists and generalists stick with getting a well-paid job, rather than a useful and/or productive one. There are exceptions (eg: my current employer, where a number of key people read Slashdot) but for the most part, if you want an intelligent job, you need to work for yourself.
Oh, and stay out of the military, if you possibly can, even if you sacrifice Government jobs, loans, etc. IT professionals are snobby in their own way and have far stronger ties with intellectual pursuits than grunt work (with the exception of hauling servers and running cables, though you'll notice most IT staff "let" other people do such stuff, especially in public). Also, whenever there's a call-up of reserves (as at present), businesses lose out big-time. You can't get useful work from a person fighting in another continent. Nobody is going to hire you, if they think you'll cost them more than you'll make for them.
Also, many intellectuals and many higher-end IT professionals tend to be left-of-center, non-conformist and don't follow rules (without a major internal struggle). Exactly the opposite of what most militaristic and Government-oriented organizations want. In IT, you're there to get the job done, and if the rule book gets in the way, too bad. In something like the military or the civil service, you're there to follow the rules to the letter, even if that means nothing gets done.
My advice: Get the degree (and if you can get sponsored for a Masters, even better) but don't go for a PhD. Even if (and it's a big if) you get paid more for it, the cost of the degree and the cost of not earning for those extra years will often make it pointless.
After you've got your degree, get a certification. The program itself is likely to be pretty useless, but the scrap of paper at the end of it is worth a lot of money and improved job opportunities.
Don't get a student loan, unless you absolutely have to. Sponsorship is generally a better bet, doesn't charge interest, and the demands aren't quite so obnoxious. Businesses looking for new graduates and looking to expand in the medium-term will very likely be willing to consider some sort of deal. (eg: internship over the summers, plus a guarantee that they get first-pick on whether to hire you, after you graduate, in exchange for contributing towards the costs.)
A more dangerous path - but it's worked for some - is to ignore the whole degree/certification approach. Become famous or infamous for something so spectacular that even the most dim-witted of Human Resource people will know you're in the news, even if they don't know why. Few can pull this kind of an approach off, and several of those have spent years or decades in prison (eg: Kevin Mitnick) but those who succeed often get the Really Big Money. Those who fail will never move beyond minimum-wage jobs and will eventually die in obscurity and poverty. It's about the same kind of risk as staking not only your entire life's earnings but all potential future earnings as well on the lottery.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I think you'd be better off if you worried about what the different schools can teach you, rather than which gives you a better chance at a job.
Some posters have said that small class sizes mean you can learn more from the "unknown" schools. Other posters point out the benefits of learning directly from the leaders in the field.
It's up to you and your learning style. If you need hand-holding, then go to a small school where you can get all the personal attention you need. If you are more independent, then go learn from the best, even if you do have 249 other people in your classroom.
Personally, I'm biased toward the big schools. Not for the name, but for the chance to learn from people who literally are the best in their field. And I think it makes a difference, even for low-level courses. Someone who takes "Algorithms 101" from Knuth is going to learn much more than the person who takes the same course taught by Joe Average, even if the syllabus is the same.
Also, I'd like to point out that you can get personal attention at the big schools, you just have to work harder to get it.
I hate it when I make a joke and I get modded "+5 insightful". Mod the stupid comments "funny", not "insightful", pleas
On the officer side, they start with students who had to either get into the US Naval Academy or get a ROTC scholarship. Neither of which is particularly easy. Then only those that perform well academically will even want to get into the nuclear power program. much less be allowed in. And once they're there, about 1/3 of them will flunk out.
I work for a public library in their IT department. I do custom scripting and system administration. It's a fun gig, pays well and is reliable as long as the neocons don't kill off public libraries in favor of book stores. The main problem with all college graduates (I can speak about this because I AM a college graduate) is that when we graduate, we're hoping for that dream gig where we make good money and shine on the job. But the reality is that unless you are well connected, you are going to work shitty jobs for the first year or two out of college, maybe more depending on how bad the economy is. Then, once you do finally get a decent job, it may have nothing to do with your degree. If it does relate to your degree, then consider yourself lucky. But also realize that you aren't going to be making the salary you dreamed of in college. Here's the facts jack:
1. I graduate with a non-CS degree from a pretty good college
2. I was unemployed for six months while I tried to look for work in the field I majored in at uni (Audio Production)
3. I finally got a job after six months of no work. Installing alarm systems for $6 an hour.
4. I worked that job for about two years while using any spare moments I had to look for other work. A fruitless endeavor.
5. I got my old early college library job back and worked that for two years
6. I was in the right place at the right time. The library system needed an IT person and I was lucky enough to have made an impression on the people doing the hiring when I'd fixed a few computer problems in my department on my own.
7. I started as an IT person because of a lucky break
8. I worked hard for about three years in that position and attracted the attention of a larger library system and got offered a job
9. That is where I am today and I am quite happy.
The thing is that when I was in college in the early 90s, I was hoping to get an audio gig doing music composition and production for the television and movie industries. I was hoping to be making decent money. I dreamed of starting at $50,000 a year and moving up to maybe $200,000 a year. The reality is that I am just at about $50,000 a year now (which is great in this economy) and the chances to go beyond that are slim.
Don't sweat the degree or where you get it dude. Just get one and then get on with life. College is just a roadblock to reality, but you need the paper to open doors that would otherwise remain closed. If you want to learn about programming, read up online and buy O'Reilly books.
I haven't read all the responses so I apologize if any of this is a repeat.
When I interview people I'm mostly looking for real-world experience or at least the ability to learn what we need a candidate to do. However, as I work for a major university who is a primary employer in the community, I also have to abide by their rules. For many of the full-time positions we open you have to have a degree to even be considered. It doesn't matter where that degree is from or even what it is, but if you don't have a degree you won't get an interview. A degree can open doors that are simply closed if you don't have one. (But again, it doesn't matter where that degree is from.)
I don't like it, but there's nothing I can do about it. My advise is to play the system and get your degree any way you can. After you have it, nobody will care where it's from or even what your GPA was.
I have no college degree, and no high school diploma. Someone in my situation at this point in time with no work experience would have a hard time finding someone to give them a chance. There are a couple of things that either I did or that were circumstantial at the time that made it easier for me.
1. "Work Experience" - This is in quotes, because most people would not consider what I put down on my resume as work experience as work experience. I put down various side jobs that I had done in high school such as adminning various small web hosting provider boxes and shell hosts for free, or creating programming projects for myself such as ODS. Why admin someone else's boxes for free? I did it because I enjoyed it. Little did I know that it would help me a couple of years down the line to land my first job (at IBM of all places - full time job at age 16.)
2. It was a very good time to find jobs in the technology fields. This was 1999. That alone should be enough to give you an idea.
Once I had IBM on my resume (in addition to my other less accepted "Work Experience"), getting the second job (which paid twice as much) was a lot easier. It still took a little bit of searching, but it worked out. And now, I have 4 "real" jobs that I can put down on my resume. In fact, finding this last one took less than 1 week from the day I put my resume out, to the day I received an offer that I liked. That was in March of this year.
To sum up. In my experience, work experience is king. I think all a degree helps people in our field with (unless they are doing research or teaching) is to get their first, and maybe second jobs. If you can manage to snag that first job by yourself, and you have the knowledge and drive to do the job they give you, then everything else will fall into place. After the second or third job is when it really starts getting easier.
Regards,
-JD-
I just saw this posted in this article that Gartner predicts that half of U.S. IT operations jobs to vanish in 20 years.
There will be massive pressure all through the IT field in every occupation; if you're lucky enough to get a job, you know what the law of supply and demand will do to the pay.
As a computer professional, I would seriously recommend looking at another career field.
My personal experience is this:
I've been working (and earning money) doing PC / computer programing and work since I was 14, having learned at age 11 at the school where my father taught (WVU).
Your undergrad school's CS department doesn't mean a lot on interviews. What matters in a solid understanding of concepts, tasks, and programming methods. You'll learn a lot on the job no matter where you go.
On a side note, I will strongly suggest that you do a double major, with a second degree in liberal arts. You might burn out of programming and want to switch over to something else, and having knowledge outside of computers is a good thing.
Now, if you continue with your education and want to earn a Masters or PhD in CS, then yes, your school does begin to matter.
On a personal note: My undergrad degree is Japanese Political Science, I write software for a HMO in Boston with a very (*ahem*) healthly salery.
I started but never finished my Masters in Computer Science at Harvard, but I take a class every now and then to learn something new.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
When you come out of school you are likely to land in a pretty poor job that doesn't make full use of what you learned. Your chances of going to work for a better company may be a bit better though if you go to a more prestigious school.
What you learn in these first jobs is every bit as important as what you learned to get your degree! You learn to deal with "office politics," bosses, co-workers, and eventually (perhaps) underlings. Make no mistake about it, your education doesn't stop when you graduate. All college did was prepare you to enter the workplace, there are probably more differences than similarities between academia and TRW (the real world).
Colleges prepare you with a very broad brush. This is both a good thing and a bad thing but really, it is the only thing they can do or your opportunities after graduation would be very limited. Within a few months of graduation you will marvel at how little of what you learned you use and how much you have had to learn on the job. To some degree at least you will question the value of your education. Yet, you'll also realize that without it you would never be where you are.
Perhaps, rather than going to a better school you may want to consider a second major (business?) to supplement your CS degree.
With the world the way it is today, I'll be honest as say I am glad not to be in your shoes. If I were, I may even consider enlisting - in many places the job market is that bad.
i'm also biased: i've had to work with people who just can't grasp theory.
my biggest pet peeves: examples are not proofs and correlation does not imply causation. as far as i can see, the only way to break people of thinking like this is to make them take enough proof oriented classes and stats classes that you beat it out of them or convince them to major in something else.
If your goal is to keep good doors open to jobs after your bachelor's degree, then what matters is (1) learning the core material well; (2) getting good letters of recommendation from faculty; and (3) getting good grades, in that order. Achieving (1) does rule out some schools, that might not be offering a strong or standard enough curriculum. Most schools do (in fact, many are accredited by organizations such as ABET, basically your guarantee that a solid curriculum covering all of the fundamentals is being offered). Achieving (2) requires your faculty to be accessible, and requires you to take advantage of that and go the extra mile -- preparing for class, speaking up, attending office hours, etc. There *are* companies that take grades into consideration. The only exception to the "name" issue is if you are planning to interview in another part of the country, it doesn't help if the folks there have never heard of your school -- doesn't necessarily hurt, but doesn't help.
If you think your future might include graduate school (and many many students change their minds and want this extra credential down the road), the order changes to assure admission to a quality program: (1) good letters from faculty with good reputations (2) good GRE scores and/or good grades (both for the top programs) (3) learning.
Of course, just as with a job, once you're in the door, knowing your stuff is everything.
Prof. Karen Karavanic
Portland State University
karavan@cs.pdx.edu
If you are currently going to a school that specializes in something far removed from CS and you want to work in the CS field, you may not be getting everything you should. You will probably have no problem learning the core skills, but may be missing out on the real value of the more prestigeous school, and that is the peers around you. I learned as much or more from my peers as I did from my professors. The more prestigeous school typically will attract on average a higher caliber of student, and these students will challenge you to push yourself as well. I learned more in graduate school than in undergrad primarily because in undergrad I was always at the top of my class and was never seriously challenged. I always knew that there were smarter people than me in the world, but it was at grad school where I learned how many there were. Working on side projects with these people pushed me and really is what provided me the skills that I use everyday in my work.
For the most part having a CS degree from a state university or something prestigeous won't matter. I was hired out of a state school. A year later, I tried to get a friend with a masters degree a job with my company, but we just weren't hiring as many people. So it most likely depends on the job market once you graduate.
I know people who have got CS degrees from several different universitys, including the University of Manchester and "new university's" (the dozens of polytechnics that became full uni's in the 80s/90s).
The people I know from Manchester haven't faired particulalrly better or worse job-wise from uni's with less well known CS departments. Employers recruit on merit and ability, a degree just gets your foot in the door. There is one obvious exception, if you want to work in R&D heavy companies or work in academia, a red brick degree will definately help. I found this out when I applied to do a Phd only to be told my new university degree didn't carry as much weight with the admissions board as would a red brick degree. I suppose it boils down to a belief that the older a univeristy is the more it encourages theoretical thinking (or something like that).
For me its all academic really, I gave up working in IT as I got dissolusioned with the way the industry was going, far too cut-throat and lack of job security.
In my opinion it depends entirely upon the type of job you're looking for. The computer field is rather messily divided between techies and intellectuals. It's a bit of an open system, with people migrating in both directions, and considerable overlap, which disguises the fact there there are, in fact, two camps.
Degree or no, fine school or barely adequate, you're going to start life as a techie. Welcome to the help desk, cubeville, or low-end development. Your geek-badge and a love of white-collar slavery is your passport to this world. And thus begins the journey. . .
You will gain experience, confidence and skill, and begin to be promoted. You will (hopefully) gain a reputation in your chosen fields, and garner the laurals of a job well done. You begin to plan a career path. Somewhere around Sr. programmer (substitute DBA, Network Admin. or Sys Admin as appropriate) something unexpected happens.
You see, at the upper end of "applied technical knowlege" there is a fork in the upward path. The broad road leads to middle management, and God help the poor souls who venture there. The narrow path leads to "think tank" positions.
It's true, most large companies have one or more senior geeks doing funded research, planning strategy, or generally dispensing wisdom on demand. They really do exist, but you don't see them because they live in the nice office building in corporate headquarters not in the programming shack.
Here's the important bit. These guys are hired for their brains, and to join the club you need to have the sort of broad-based understanding the almost inevitably comes from a top-notch college education. A B.S. gets a distainful sniff, but the doors gape wide for the ivy-league Ph.D's, and may open for an M.S from a solid school with a bit of persistance.
The self-taught crowd will howl and cry that it's not fair. They can program as well or better than their pedigreed peers, they have probably built an open-source terminal emulator, and they've labored in the same trenches, side by side for years. However, in reality, very few people teach themselves calculus, computer theory, materials science, economics (and don't forget ettiquite) with the level of rigor demanded by these positions. This is where the four, six or eight years of studying that "useless theory" becomes useful, even necessary.
I'm a self-taught techie with several certifications, facing this division. I'm 40 years old, and a Sr. DBA for a large firm, making a good salary -- end of the techie line. I've been courted for managment positions, which I don't want. I've got three B.S. and one M.S. degrees in various sciences, all from good schools, but no C.S. degree.
Over the past two years I've taken several C.S. classes from a good school - algorithm analysis, advanced data structures, automata, etc. I'll probably get an M.S in a few years, and maybe a Ph.D. after that, but more importantly, I'm learning all the little details that differentiate a computer scientist from a competent techie. There IS a differance, after all.
... is to get to know smart people, IMHO. Knowing and interacting with smart people improves your ability, and that is supposed to help you in the end.
This is speaking as a Unix SA only, so I don't know how well it will apply to pure programmers or other professions.
... some law firms will reject resumes outright if the person didn't graduate from a top 10 school.)
/ephraim
There are two main benefits to having a college degree on your resume: getting your foot in the door and getting a good salary.
Having a well-known college/university on your resume will open many more doors than if you don't have the degree, or if you have it from a lesser college/university. Simply put: You are more likely to get interviews if you have a top university on your resume than if you don't. That being said, the value of a name decreases over your lifetime with experience. Once you're known in the field (and believe me, the world of SAs is smaller than it appears to be; corollary: never, ever burn your bridges), your (people) networking skills will get you farther than the degree. However, the degree and name in your pocket will help for those first few years when you're a nobody, and make your resume sail a little closer to the top of the huge pile on somebody's desk.
(Note that the name of the university you went to affects much more than just CS type jobs
In terms of market worth, having a degree will get you a better salary. My impression has been that the name of your school will not necessarily affect your market worth, but having a degree -- any degree -- will affect your salary big time.
Example: I used to work with a guy who had dropped out of college and started work as a night operator for a major finance firm. Over 3 years, he worked his way up to senior SA. Out of all the guys I worked with, he was the smartest and hardest working of the bunch, but because he didn't have a piece of paper from any university, his salary was about 60% of the market rate for those with a college degree.
Just my $0.02.
I got my degree in CS from a state university. The most important thing I did for my career during my !4 years in school was sign up for the internship program. I interviewed at 4 large code-mill-type insurance companies and 1 state agency. I ended up getting a job at the state agency and thinking that I wasn't a good enough programmer to get a "cool" web programming job at Aetna or ING. For the most part that was true as is the case with many recent CS grads. CS doesn't make you an out of the box coder. Once I learned the technology I needed to solve business problems, I was on my way to my current job as a statistical analyst/programmer. I solve problems and CS was important for me because I did't have an innate ability to do this otherwise. Some would argue, and quite validly, that experience is key and I have to agree with them. So, stay where you are, land an internship or co-op or volunteer to write some apps for a non-profit, and you will be on your way. The average cs/programmer/code monkey changes jobs so many times that it is important to note that it is the last one that you have that will matter, not the first. Put yourself in a position to choose that last one and make it something you love to do and are compensated well for. I think you are well on your way right now.
--Always, I mean never..., No I mean always check your references.--
UC Berkeley completely changed my career and by extension, my life.
When I got there, it was a trial by fire and I practically flunked out. Since then it's been 12 years, 5 startups (3 IPOs), and many product releases. Virtually all of these "hot" startup opportunities came through connections originally made through Cal contacts, either in the CS department or business school (where I did a minor).
By comparison, you can look at my friends from undergrad and compare our careers-- hands down, I've fared the best:
- the Berkeley name opens lots of doors: I can cold-call companies and they will take me seriously.
- concepts, keywords and communication styles I learned at Berkeley are widely respected as The Standard. For example, I recently joined google as a manager (i.e. survived their insane, 6-round interview process), something that would have been impossible without Cal, even with industry experience.
- the Berkeley network is incredible: see above, but interestingly, though Berkeley I'm friends with Turing award winners, CEOs, CTOs, VCs, VPs, etc. -- but also hundreds of people who do the real work, including key product and engineering managers for tivo, palm, google, microsoft, amazon, ebay, etc.
Of other top CS schools, I see this same effect for MIT, Stanford and CMU, with the others important for specific fields, but not the same impact.
Obviously, your school is not a career panacea: I have friends who went to cal (and finished their PhDs) who struggled after school. Some other key elements: write useful working code, learn how to be a good team member, learn systems architecture (OSs, databases, networking, programming) and keep reading. It helps to avoid being egotistical or jerky-- remember that you need people more than they need you!
Except if you're, say, a MIT graduate and you get interviewed by a MIT guy, I doubt it will make much difference where you got your degree (except if you got it at DeVry "University"). Even in this case, your experience (or experience of other candidates that compete with you) will outweigh the degree.
You should get into a better program for two different reasons:
1. You'll get better education
2. Schools with such programs usually attract recruiters, and it's not uncommon for students to spend their last summer as an intern for a large company, and get hired a year later.
Well, they can. I took one class that think got me a job out of college - software engineering. I got my CS degree in '93, so the environment may have been a little different, but not that much. I attended an Illinois university that was better known for its party atmosphere instead of academics, but the CS program was pretty good. I took a class in software engineering my senior year. There was ZERO coding. It was learning about requirements, budgets, planning, testing, mockups, etc. We worked in teams on projects, which was a whole new experience. One thing about going to a bigger university is the job fairs. Mine didn't have a very big one, but I had friends who went to U of I in Champaign. I took off on a weekend and drove up there and took about 100 resumes. I gave them all out. I got several interviews out of it, and it was how I got my job. I ended up in the Chicago area for Motorola. When I interviewed there, I brought my senior project for the software engineering class. While talking to the first interviewer, I showed it to her. She said "show this to every other person you talk to today". I went through 6 other people, and I found out later that that project impressed them. They said everyone else just had programming experience, but I had at least some experience with the software development lifecycle. I didn't realize how important that was at the time, but man have I learned it since. I am not currently in programming, I made the choice to go into software testing instead. But my software development background has served me well. My bottom line would be - don't just learn programming! Programmers are a dime a dozen. Learn about the software development lifecycle and what goes into it. In most companies, programming is just a small part of software development.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this.
While the advice is great (don't worry about it, experience is more important.) Make sure the small university or College you go to is accredited.
This ensures that most of your credits will transfer over to other universities or colleges.
Anything else may be construed as a Cracker Jack diploma.
I always went with folks with 4 year degrees. It didn't matter where or in what. The 4 year degree shows that you made a long term commitment and stuck with it.
If you like it at your current school and have made some good friends, stay there.
During my college years at a state school, a Professor said to a class I was attending, "You'll get the same education here as you will at MIT. We cover the same material. We just don't have the 3 letter name."
"...the shortest distance between two points may be straight line, but it is by no means the most interesting."
Let's be blunt here - the only job your new college degree really matters at is YOUR FIRST (maybe the first 2 or 3). That first job will probably suck, but it's entry level and you are competing with non-degreed people with experience. The key is that you do good in the classes you have (mostly A's and maybe a few B's), and then perform very well in your job for a few years. Employers and headhunters look at the months of on-the-job experience with a particular technology; the degree often times is to fill the checkbox for the HR folks. Just stay flexible and don't marry a particular technology or language. In this bussiness, things are always changing, and you will always be learning the latest technologies and methodoligies if you like staying employed.
Assuming you desire to eventually acquire a pointy hairdo: Graduate degrees are becoming so pervasive (especially cheap MBAs) that management applications of the future will need one just to compete. I work in the ISD department of the 6th largest city in California and all of our managers have MBAs. The local state Univ. has a cheap and easy MBA program that spits out MBA graduates. With increased competition from abroad, graduate degrees are becoming a minimum for management. Most tech jobs in most companies sit only 2 or 3 positions (in the org. chart) below a manager whose job is entirely business centric (i.e. not technical). Most software development is still governed by business-market-forces. Even here in the public sector, managers are required to have business savy (i.e. MBAs). Thus, in most organizations, coders grow up to be managers that are required to have business smarts.
Somebody told me once that my CS degree would be worthless to Microsoft because they don't even look at applicants who didn't go to certain prestigious schools. Anybody know if that's true?
It seems like most of my classmates I've kept in touch with are software engineers, yet none of us majored in computer science. We have a philosopher, linguist, biologist and geologist among us. The dot.com boom, bust, and outsourcing fad seemed to pass us by.
I took some "trendy" courses in the business school (Course XV) and core theory courses (Course VI-1). The former long became obsolete, while the latter are still useful.
The degree is just the secret handshake. Once in the door, you will succeed or not based on your drive and ability. Having a degree is better than not, but no one much cares where you got it.
As someone with 14 years of experience on the ops side of things and no degree; the dot-com bust got a little tough. I was losing out to people with the same experience who had the degree. Get as much experinece as possible before you graduate. That's what counts. Your degree will just give you an edge with people of the same experience. It's a checklist item.
College degree does relatively little for you. :-(
Ideally you want at least 3 jobs (possibly short term contracts) on your resume where you clearly explain that everytime you designed a sophisticated relational database backend using SQLServer 2000 and ASP/ASP.NET for presentation. List how many stored procedures you used everytime. Otherwise you'll be stuck out of college just like me
Note, that companies like to hire high school students to do the basic HTML/JavaScript stuff too. To get into that market you need to offer much much more than that, especially if you are to ask for the money that is dubbed to be the "market rate" for someone at your level.
When I graduated from a relatively well-known engineering school in Illinois, about half of all the graduating seniors were Computer Science majors, the other half was everyone else. You do the math.
It's not the quality or reputation of the shcool that counts so much. That's almost always something that rises with didstance from the institution anyway. Every good school has it's share of lousy professors and vice versa. The most highly reputed schools will have a real crap shoot of big name, brilliant professors that either can't teach to save their lives or are the best lecturers you've ever heard.
What really matters (to me) is the quality of your peers. Sure you are learning, but relative to what and who? Are you making frieds that you will want to call on later in life for references and job leads? Are they challenging you to keep up with their abilities? Are they brilliant but too competitive or arogant to be partners in learning?
Good luck!
Davo -- Free speech, free software, AND free beer.
Make sure you go to an university where the CS program and department have friendly people and are gender balanced. Don't make the same mistake that I made and end up at a place that's in the top 10 but totally male dominated and crawling with anti-social creeps who spend more time watching online porn than interacting, socializing, studying together, and discussing research. The gender ratio is probably the most significant factor that ensures a healthy social life and a friendly and productive research atmosphere.
However, once that door is opened, the rest is up to you. That is, 1) your work experience, 2) the rate you adapt and learn, and 3) your attitude and personality.
I am in a Fortune 500 internet company (market cap = US$50B) and everything I learned about technology (SQL, OLAP, datawarehousing) I learned on the job.
Caveat: I am not a programmer and my degree is a BS in chemisty and Asian Studies.
Hey guys, I just submitted this to Ask Slashdot but who knows if it'll be posted. On a related issue, I'm in college for Computer Engineering, and it deals with software like CS, but it also deals with creating hardware from circuit boards to microprocessors. To get a job that involves making stuff like that, do you need a degree? Or am I just wasting my time?
Well, you've said two very different things here, that you've been interested in Computer Science from a young age and that you've been interested in being a developer. That's like saying you were intereseted in Mechanical Engineering from a young age and are interested in being a mechanic.
/across the world/ looking for a programming job, you're going to have a tough time finding a job you enjoy, much less one that pays well. And I'll be damned if there aren't 20 guys from India who worked their asses off their entire lives that aren't willing to take that job from you for even less money. Good luck.
If you're interested in being a developer, I'm going to give you the advice that everyone will give you: get out. These days, with everybody and his/her mother
Computer Science, OTOH, is an entirely different matter. You're qualified to solve problems knowing computer science, not code up the same shit you've been coding all your life in this year's fad language. In that case, go for a master's or a PhD and get a job at places that make life fun again, like Google. It'll be more or less the same excitement as learning QBASIC was way back when. Development won't.
It's not likely that switching universities will help your development track. Sure, being at MIT or the likes will get you better, more secure development jobs if you'd like that, but aside from the top few universities you're still looking for the same jobs as everybody else. Go for what counts if you want to beat them all, like experience.
Do well at your university, do some research, and get into a good grad school. Whether you enter the industry or academia, you're much more likely to find a job you'll enjoy.
A good example is the hiring tactics employed by Google. Just look where they're looking for talent... by posting that billboard recruitment ad, they are dipping into the general population. They aren't just limiting themselves to CS grads, and especially not CS grads from specific schools.
It seems the trend is that companies hire similarly.
I couldn't help but notice that most of the posters seemed to have misread your question. I don't think that you are asking whether or not to get a C.S. degree but rather what kind of hit will you take in your career overall if you get a C.S. degree from a relatively unknown university versus a prestigious university.
I believe that my situation was very similar to yours. I knew from the start that I was going to pursue C.S. and I started in a small state college. I was enjoying the classes and the favorable student teacher ratio. About two years into it, one of my professors said to me "what are you doing here? You need to go to a bigger university."
You know what? He was right. I went to the bigger university. It had a more international perspective. It had more resources. I also had teachers who didn't care if I lived or died and, because I also co-opted, I had to retake a lot of two part classes because they kept changing the curriculum to accommodate A.C.M. and I.E.E.E. accreditation requirements. It is almost twenty years later and I can tell you with utmost certainty that it was well worth it.
If this doesn't take you where you want to go, spend big money for a 1-year MS/M.Eng at a top school. These are not that difficult to get into (if you have experience and recommendations) but will open many doors (and save you paying those big bucks for four years).
If you are hoping for a research job, that could be harder to come by without a top-shelf degree.
Is a Brown CS degree well-respected? Discuss.
Since when has this country used intellectual elite as a pejorative term?
Unless your degree is from India Institute of Technology, of course.
Give up on the CS degree. Study economics, go to business school, and become a manager. Then hire lots of Indians cheap.
Suggestion: Don't go to college for a degree
We have been brought up in an environment where people have dictated to us throughout our lives that having a college degree will ensure your success.
This could not be further from the truth.
Now don't get me wrong, college will be able to teach you incredible things, in a fantastic environment with qualified staff and surroundings. But always remember that is why you are there, not for a piece of paper stating you "graduated".
What businesses look for:
I noticed in a post above that companies might want to hire you because you are more "flexible", this is garbage. Go look at job postings, take 10 random ones. They will tend to be pretty stinking specific. Look at it from their perspective: If they are going to spend money, it will usually be because of a direct need. "Hey, we need some Perl stuff done." "Hey, we need someone than can rewrite older programs into .NET." "Hey, we are in need of a person that can take a given WinSrv/SQL set-up and move it to Linux/Oracle." You'll quite rarely see a "Hey, we need somebody that can do stuff (we're not really sure, just a lot of stuff)"
What is becoming in demand:
Certifications! Again, look at those random job postings. Time after time after time you will continue to see more and more people caring less and less about college and more about certifications/experience. Look at it from their perspective: Take a guy who graduated with a MS in computer science, what does that tell you about his knowledge? Nothing. Take another guy, this one with CompTIA A+, LPI Level II, and a MCSE. What does that tell you about his knowledge? A lot.
But why?
It's one thing to have an accredited 4 year college put their stamp of approval on you. It's quite another to have the actual manufacturers approval. Sure my college could say: "yeah, this dude knows what's going on.", or I could be interviewing for a position in a Microsoft shop, and have Microsoft say: "This person has the knowledge to deploy and manage OUR software in a corporate setting."Always remember: A company is going to be spending money on someone, they want to be guaranteed that someone knows what they are doing. And as the progression of IT has made it, a degree doesn't match the power of certification.
"When I want your opinion, I'll give it to you." --leonstryker
....but I'm quite happy and personally think I'm learning plenty. My father thinks otherwise, and the deadline for transferring successfully is approaching quickly.
Your father isn't the one who has to determine if you have learned enough for the jobs you want, your potential employers are.
What chance do I have in the real world with a not-so-prestigious degree?
As much as anyone else.
Am I likely to be learning what's important?
Probably not but it really donesn't have much to do with what institution is on your diploma. I'm a senior engineer and lead programmer in a network operations and monitoring center and am part of our interview team. In the last 5 years we have only hired one person based on their degree or certification, and that was for a specific contract period to complete a specific migration.
Of the CS grads and certification holders who come for interviews and pass (they get either probationary hiring or internship) less than 25% have necessary real world skills. We rarely hire anyone for any position except tier 1 unless they have at least 2-4 years experience in a real world enviornment. Unfortunately, most of the 'I have a BS in CS' and 'Hey, I have my CCNA, MCSE, and a CS major in programming' are not willing to work through a 6-12 month stint at Tier 1 or 1a (probationary tier 2).
Of our entire top engineering staff of about 20, only 3 have completed a CS degree. Of our developers and programmers (about 10), I'm the only one with ANY formal programming schooling at all.
I actually have taught classes at a local community college titled, "Problem solving and logic: Introduction to programming". Most colleges and schools no longer teach people how to think logically. The entire quarter is taught without using a computer. The gift for skillful programming in the real world has little to do with computers or languages.
Am I looking at a series of awful jobs if I don't transfer?"
Depends on how you define awful. Some people define Tier 1 (first to answer the phone, first to call someone and tell them their only BGP peer has gone down) as awful. The successful ones take it as an opportunity to learn the necessary skills they didn't learn in school. You are the one who determines what you get out of a job. Not to say that I haven't had my share of awful jobs, I've even been flat out fired a couple of times. But in almost every one, I have come away with some useful knowledge.
Just a side note here: We don't hire any engineer or programmer who can't learn Perl. We only have one programmer who only knows one language, most of the others have at least a basic working knowledge of three (including Perl).
The University doesn't matter as much as work experience.
Get yourself a co-op job over the summer and work your ass off. If they like you, employment post graduation is nearly certain.
If you can find a local tech company where you can work part time during the year, it's even better.
That said, keep your GPA up. A lot of employers have a minimum GPA requirement for co-ops.
What I've found about my old classmates and myself, is that having any degree can get you a foot in the door and a strong basis upon which to work, but its not going to do anything for you that you can't accomp[lish by yourself.
A number of very reputable people in CS have minimal schooling, or schooling from some backwoods campus, whereas a number of MIT grads go on to great mediocrity.
My honest belief, and experience given the way the Internet works now, is that if there is a specific sub-field of CS you want to persue, most people who are established there will be receptive to enthusiasm from a newcomer, and will find mutually beneficial ways to further their research or assist with a project they are working on with the newcomer, so long as the newcomer genuinely has something to offer. (You probably won't be paid to do this at first either.) Very few people of talent will be hung up on the "quality" of a degree, but at the same time, they will get hung up on a lack of "fundamentals." Some schools offer better fundamentals than others, but again, the bottom line is its all stuff you can teach yourself. There are no hard rules about what will get you a job, but social networking with people who are doing what you want to be doing is the best "in" for anything.
Your best bet is to run through IRC, web forums usenet, or mailing lists and find a group who are doing what you're specifically interested in and get a feel for what you should know, how you can know it if you don't already, and not worry about who gives you a degree. Some highly specialized fields aren't as open and may require some more specialization from a school, but if you just want to roll code, all you have to do is roll code. If you're good at it, someone will pay you to do it for them.
The key difference between a Programmer and a Senior Programmer is that one of them is Mexican.
How Important is a Well-Known CS Degree?
It's rarely important.
When I sit on the hiring side of the interview table and evaluate a candidate, it's the technical interview that makes the most difference. There are plenty of people with prestige and credentials that aren't able to do the job.
When does it make a difference? Perhaps if two candidates tie, but there are other things people use to break ties too.
Your state university is probably very good. Just make sure you take full advantage of your opportunities there. Learn how to learn; you're going to be teaching yourself new tricks for the next 40 years.
Like so many things in life, I don't think your question has an easy answer. A degree from a well-known programming school might give you an easier time getting a foot in the door, but in the end, skill has a lot to do with it (and just because you graduate from a state college shouldn't mean you don't have skill), and so does plain old dumb luck.
I was a Poli Science major in college. I graduated with unremarkable grades from a good school with a Poli Sci major and a Geography minor. Not exactly the educational path one takes to become a programmer. But I am two weeks away from celebrating my 15th anniversary doing just that. By luck, I worked for a tech company in the summer, and then as a temp after graduation. I was attracted there because I liked to code in BASIC as a hobby. Turns out I was good at it as a career.
I graduated from a good school (not great, but good); I have skills; I had a spot of good luck that I parlayed well. Some combination thereof has to make for a good career in this field.
I once asked the director of verizon's human resources department (he was visiting my college) if he was more likely to hire someone over other potential employees based on what college they went to or even if they had a degree. His answer was "I don't care if you have a degree or not, just as long as you can get the job done."
-Foxxz
It really doesn't matter. A CS degree by itself isn't going to be very useful. With there being so much competition in the world for programming jobs, you can't be competitive unless you work for free. Then how do you eat? It will be difficult to find a job with a large corporation, only small shops will hire you. Then you usually don't get as good of benefits. Backup your degree with a business, accounting or HR degree. This will bring much more to the table and more attractive to corporations. Outsourcing is huge in America, and getting larger. I work for an HR outsourcing firm and prefer candidates who have experience or education in HR or accounting. The more knowledge you can bring with you the better. To just know how to code isn't enough any more.
Going to a prestigious school garners the following benefits:
1. Access to accomplished professors and state-of-the-art research projects.
I got job recommendations from profs who wrote the texts used in many courses. As an undergrad, I was able to participate in research that even grad students wouldn't have access to at other schools. I even got to be a co-author on a paper published in a top journal, and also got to do a presentation at a national conference (not just a 'poster session' either!).
2. The Big Dogs always visit the Big Schools.
Companies needing "the best" will go to the schools that produce them, in order to get what they need lined up BEFORE the new grads hit the market. For other schools, you often need to go to the companies and compete with everyone else trying to get in.
One caveat: This does NOT apply to internships at companies that aren't located close to a top-ranked institution. Sometimes, getting a good internsip at a good company matters far FAR more than the school, since then the company can become an integral part of your education.
Not only did I get to attend a great school, but I also had a killer internship. And the job offer I got from the company I interned with was WAY better (in opportunity, not just money) than the offers I got from HP and SUN.
3. The GPA from a good school matters LESS than it does from a lesser school.
This is mainly due to the fact that the GPA at a good school is often harder to maintain. But anything less than a 3.8 from a middling school may prove to be a hindrance.
So, if you have a great internship, keep it and don't move! Otherwise, if your GPA is currently good (*all* grades 3.00 or better), consider moving to a school that having the benefits that matter the most to you.
I graduated from U.C. San Diego (UCSD) in the mid-80's, and the quality of that B.Sci. eliminated the need for a Master's degree. I learned how to do my own research, and was immediately ready to participate in cutting-edge R&D projects. Basically, the fun factor was (and is) fantastic.
The degree matters MUCH less once you have 5 years experience. But how do you get those first 5 years to contain the best experience? That's right: Start with the best job. And to do that, you need either a great internship or the best degree. Preferably both!
Well, for a variety of reasons I actually went to 4 schools to aquire my undergraduate degree in computer engineering.
When I started going to school I attended PSU, which had a no name computer engineering program that was actually more like electrical engineering with a few cs classes. They had no reputation. Compound this with some money problems and I found myself transfering to Michigan State, which actually had a CE program, after just 1 semester.
Well, it turned out the Michigan State had a program, but it wasn't very good. At least they had a program though. I went there for a year, but I rapidly determined that a) I wasn't learning anything, and b) no one would hire me based on the reputation of said school.
I then took some time off and saved some money, stopping at a community college along the way. From there I transferred 1 last time, to a school that had a good reputation for computer science and engineering, University of Maryland. Note they are all state schools, I never had the money to go anywhere but state schools.
Anyway, long story short, it took me 5.5 years total to graduate, and that wasn't because of bad grades. Schools don't take kindly to transfer students. They will lie, and tell you they do, but I *assure you* that there will be problems getting your classes transferred. Trust me. They will actually lie to you right to your face and say "oh yeah, no problem, most classes transfer". LIES.
Do your homework on this one, an extra year in school is not going to get you a much better job.
As it was my degree was never questioned at any job I ever applied for, so I question why I didn't just stay put the entire time and save a year.
Change colleges.
University is a chance to get to learn about yourself. Changing away from a comfortable situation to a challenging one is a good way to understand who and what you are.
Also, you shouldn't be looking to a tradeschool mentality as your career choice. We see programmers getting outsourced a lot. Yes, there is still a need for programmers here in the states, but it's getting easier and cheaper to go somewhere else for that talent. Having a CS degree, if you keep it upto date, provides you the skills to actually change with the evolving technology. Being trained to program in language xyz only allows you a job as long as xyz is used. And only while the job is not being outsourced. This is the situation faced by a lot of folks today, those who learned C, but never really understood the computer science concepts. Now that C programming jobs are being sent overseas, there are a lot of floundering employees. They'll need to get retrained, or barring that, a new career.
You're not going to be in the same job for the rest of your life, unless you join the federal government, so why not experience the flux of change now? You're still young, and can become adjusted to the challenge. If you can't handle it, like some have written, then you'll know more about yourself. It's an individual decision, making the decision, instead of having it made for you is part of growing up.
With over 20 years of experience in the industry, my judgement is the most valid and true.
It doesn't matter which college you goto as long as it is not something like University of Pheonix, devry, or ITT tech, what matters is how much you paid attention and whether you actually understood the concepts instead of memorizing them. You can sure as hell bet that during your first interview, you are going to be asked some obscure question you learnt in a college class. I graduated summa cum laude from a well known university, and boy was it hard to get hired, you know why? Because I never tried to understand theory, I just memorized it... just worked enough to get an A instead of showing interest and really looking into the subject.
Similarly, it doesn't matter how much experience you have. What matters is what type of experience you have?Hell you could have 4 years of being a code monkey who comments out lines of codes for developers, and it ain't gonna get you anywhere...
so in short, if you feel that your college offers you good classes (DISCLAIMER: GOOD AND EASY ARE TWO DIFFERENT THINGS) and have capable teachers then stay... but again, MAKE SURE YOU LEARN AND UNDERSTAND EVERYTHING IN YOUR COMPUTER CLASSES INSTEAD OF AIMING TO GET AN A.
I missed out on joining IBM because of this very reason when IBM was king of the industry... my friend, who graduated with a 3.0 GPA beat me to the job, because his emphasis in college was to understand the concepts instead of getting an A.
I once knew many people with a similar background to yours. One difference... they were neither smart nor capable. And they were the first one's let go and are now the one's you hear about complaining the loudest about the economy and the outsourcing of tech jobs.
It was easy work while it lasted!
As much as the people you will meet. Reasons why the Ivy Leagues are so sought after is as much the education as the people you will associate with. People are more likely to hire someone they know, even if only vaguely.
When deciding who you may want to switch too, take a look at what companies they have close associations to and if they do things you are interested in. If there are alot of U of whatever grads at the company you are appying to, it will give you a leg up.
To evaluate your current situation, look at who's gradating this year and what jobs they are getting. If 90% of CS majors are getting Help Desk Jobs and you want to be a programmer you may want to consider switching.
BOFH, My model for being a sysadmin :)
Accreditation.
:( What's that mean? Means I have to start all over at a different school that is.
;) That stated, not having one won't 'necessarily' prevent you from getting the job, but it could seriously hurt.
Yeah, a big named school most likely would help, it's unlikely to be worth it. Other people have mentioned it before... that a degree will get you past HR.
I know for a fact that my degree got me past HR for my last two jobs. Without the degree, they wouldn't have even considered me, but with it I got an interview.
However, that stated, if you're interview is with the CATBERT(tm) drone, then he'll go to the big book of colleges, flip it open, and see what accreditations it has.
As a CS person you'll want ABET. I got my engineering degree from an ABET accredited state school. I'm moving on for my MBA, and 1/2 way through a program found out it isn't AACSB accredited!
Northridge losts it's AACSB accreditation a couple of years back and caused a rather large shock to the education community because it was one of the best schools for business in the state.
Anywho... I hope this offers something else to ponder. This comes from the insights of several tenured faculty as well as a couple of hiring managers. Less about the school, more about the accreditations,... and that you -have- a degree, not so much as what the degree is in, but that you have one at all...
And I got my programming job because my boss asked my mom on a date once.
If you want to do CS heavy stuff like OS, architecture & language design, then a Ph.D. from a big-name CS department would certainly help. But my totally decent software engineering job would have gone to me just the same if I went to Chico.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
However, having a good first job on your resume helps you get a good second job. Lather, rinse, repeat.
It's just help, not magic. People seem to eventually gravitate to certain places no matter where they went to school. But it's nice to start out higher in the food chain, and could conceivably (dollar wise) pay off for higher tuition fairly quickly.
On the flip side, you'll get where you're going eventually. If you love where you are, you'll learn more than if you don't. In the long run that's more important. You are not "looking at a series of awful jobs if I don't transfer", and you may be looking at burnout if you do. Of course, you might love the new school even more...
Either way, good luck.
TOP PRIORITY IS CO-OP
Even a great school can only teach you so much, and to an employer, with the exception of those top 10 schools, they are all the same.
I had 2 years of good hard experience when i got my bachelors in CS. I had a job waiting for me, and it was a tougher market then, than it is now.
Most of the time if your school does not have co-op, you can kind of rig it yourself, by convincing an employer, and then switching up your classes appropriately, but DEFINITELY DEFINITELY DEFINITELY DEFINITELY get as much co-op as you can.
Good luck bud!
I've hired many software engineers over the years, and I'm a software engineer myself. I think you would be silly to transfer to a more pretigious (and probably much more expensive) school for your undergrad degree. As others have pointed out, an undergrad degree isn't even a requirement for many CS jobs, but it definitely helps and it makes it much easier to advance in your field. However, where you went to school is almost immaterial, as long it's a reputable school. If you look at the likely difference in your salary for the next, say, 5 years, it's unlikely a fancy school would provide any ROI, particularly given the additional expense of the education.
If your folks are itching to set you up on a career fast track, tell them to put you through a fancy grad school for a masters. Brand name matters a lot more for grad schools, and the better schools also tend to have excellent job placement programs and active alumni networks that can mean more opportunities for you down the road.
For those of us that spent our college nights slaving over a hot lab terminal while our friends were out partying.. The sad truth is that people generally dont give a flying f* where you went to school. or even *if* you went to school. After a year or two out in the real world, all people care about is work experience.
RIT's advantage is that they REQUIRE you to do 50 weeks of co-ops before they give you a degree.
That, and when you go on the campus tour you can end everything the the guide says with "... and then you get a job."
but it requires a lot of patience, economical support and many years of study to learn howto to solve relevant interdisciplinary problems. Take a look at the following site:e ynman.h tml
http://www.longnow.org/about/articles/ArtF
- aaki
you're learning what you like, and that you're in the right field. Don't worry about employment after college now; if you like what you're doing, you'll work hard at it, and your enthusiasm will show; you'll get hired in a minute.
No data, no cry
Numerous studies have shown little correlation between schools, marks and "success".
...
What does matter is how socially connected and people skilled you are.
The truth is most people get what they got because of who they are and who they know.
They'd love to believe it's all genius and or hard work but that's often just self-justification.
Many senior people I've worked for technically didn't deserve the position they held.
Welcome to the real
Words to men, as air to birds.
While the source of the degree (and sometimes the degree itself) likely matters little, a college with an excellent CS program is more likely to prepare you and teach you useful things you didn't know you needed/wanted to know.
Hunt your preferred prey at Aliens vs Predator MUD. Join the war at avpmud.com port 4000
Most people who produce what the company needs succeed. Therefore, a state school student who learns his lessons is perfectly capable of succeeding. A good name school does open more doors for interviews but once your hired the rest is up to you and the name of the institution doesn't matter -- all that matters is your performance.
I would not put too much stock into a degree. From what I have seen and experienced in the workplace, experience will always trump a piece of paper. We have had plenty of coders submit resumes from well known colleges and universities only to find out they can barely tie their shoes. On the other hand, there have been plenty of people hired on that dont even have a degree and are top-notch programmers. It's all about experience, what you can show the employer, and finding a niche and focusing on it. That is my experience and opinion.
I've searched the web and none of the universities I've looked at offer even a paper in Counterstrike let alone a whole degree dedicated to it...
I'm sorry, but I must emphatically disagree. Perhaps your organization does not have a HR department? All I know is when I left the Service, with over twenty years of field experience, the HR droids routinely round-filed my resumes and applications without so much as a "Thanks but no thanks" letter. I finally had to resort to the military "Old Boy" network to finally get my foot in the door.
One instance that really sticks in my head is one place where I was bumped from consideration in favor of a kid with absolutely no field experience, the reason being that he had a BS and I didn't.
....I was offered a job on the cleaning staff, however....
P.S.: What town are you in? I wanna move there....
Regards;
The most important aspects as far as I, a manager of a small programming staff, am concerned is attitude, willingness to learn, and problem solving skills. None of my programmers have a CS degree and all are very successful programmers. One got a business degree, another was a professional musician for 20 years. Another was a psych major. Doesn't matter - learning programming isn't that hard for a person who is so inclined. Finding a person who can has the right balance of independent thinking, communication skills, problem solving ability, and good attitude is worth investing training time and money in.
I do not have a degree.
I have been working without interruption for 15 years now.
And I have interviewed and be part of interview processes in many occassions.
The reaity is that the context is king. In some places they could not care less about your university degree or the school you come from.
In other places they did actively filter people from well known universities. In yet other places it was the other way around.
The only thing in common is that people had to demonstrate they knew their field, and the only case in which many places got really punctillious was in assesing skills (ridiculously complicated tests).
Very rarely you have two guys that, once properly assesed, score equally (if you are assesing the candidates properly that is, if you are just fooling around, then yes, paper may win, but I have seen in several occasions managers that lived to regret such carelessness).
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Yes, you will be fully prepared for a job in exotic India, China or Russia!
Just a little side note: I went to a university known for having a good business and data processing curriculum. I took my first job writing in an obscure language for outdated mainframes. After about 2 years, I thought I'd look for a job doing what I really wanted to do, and the conversations with recruiters usually went like this:
Me: I'd like to start working as a game developer/engineer/etc...
Recruiter: Well, I see you've got many skills listed on your resume. But, what experience do you have as a developer/engineer/etc...?
Me: (sheepishly) Well, none - but it's something I'd really like to do. I've done some work on my own and read up on the subject quite a bit.
Recruiter: Well, that's nice and all, but my clients are going to want someone with solid experience... Would you be willing to take a job writing in COBOL instead?
You see, my mistake was twofold:
The perception problem is very real. If you stay at a lackluster school, you will neither get a good education, nor have a good career - at least not without a great deal of effort. Having a few years in an given technology tends to pigeon-hole your career prospects, and you might find yourself unable to find a position doing what you want to do if you don't get in with a good company right after graduation.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Its as simple as this... there are diploma mills, party schools, technical schools, research institutions and brain trusts. Your degree will fit into one of these categrries. The category defines your starting point on the career ladder. You decide.
Computer Science is a very young discipline compared to other engineering disciplines. This explains why there are so many computer scientists / software engineers who do not have a degree, did not go to college and yet have highly successful careers. This is characteristic(sp?) of young disciplines. Ignore it.
CS itself is getting older, more mature. People are starting to understand that just knowing how to hack doesn't quite cut it (always). In short, going to a college and getting a degree in CS never hurts (as opposed to not getting one, not opposed to getting one in some other engineering field).
If we agree to the above - ie we must get a degree in CS or EE or math or something related, we question where we must get it from. College degrees are not pieces of paper that open the door to getting a fat job. This is one of the perks for sure, but there are others. They open the door to contributing something for the betterment of humanity (by doing original research), they open up your mind by forcing you to interact with peers who are often better than you. No matter what your job, you will fall into a mental rut as compared to school. A school is only as good as the students that study there. The students are what makes the MITs and Stanfords of today - not the professors. If the professors were getting sub-par graduate students to work with or sub-par peers they'd leave.
This is why it is absolutely essential to try to go to the best possible school you can go to. You will get exposed to things that you never were exposed to. You will learn new things from both professors and students alike. You will take part in activities that will challenge your mind in multiple dimensions - something quite unparalleled in the "real" world.
And you never know - you may want to do research for life. You may want to go on for a higher degree. In all these cases, the better school always wins. You can get by with going to a lower school - in fact you can "get by" with not going to school at all. But our purpose in life is not to just "get by". The whole point is to do something great - something that you can point your finger to 50 yrs down the line and say "I did that and changed they way people think / do something". Always strive for the best.
"Second, stronger programs are more likely to focus on ideas beyond mere software development: the theory of computation, algorithm design, and mathematics"
Maybe I'm dating myself, but I graduated from Penn State in the early 80's, and to get a CS degree, there was *no* software development courses; all of them focused on computation algorithm design, and mathematics. I took as much math as physics majors, if not more.
You were simply expected to "pick up" programming on your own.
My point is that the stuff you talk about is generally covered in any state school.
In fact, if I may be so bold, I would say hard work and insatiable curiousity are worth 10 degrees. HOWEVER, until I finished my B.S. degree, it was difficult to get an interview. I finally finished my degree, sent out 10 applications/resums and got 6 job offers (this was the early 80's, remember).
So the degree is important, but where its from far less so.
I really don't think it matters where you get your degree, just as long as you have one. If you learn alot and pay attention in your classes, I think thats what is key. Also, make sure you can intern while you are getting a degree with some local businesses. I think some work experience in the field is key.
Most people of any importance in a company are not discussing employing contractors.
That only speaks about the size of the comapnies you are working with.
All the power to you if you work with small companies or with family businesses, but there are many jobs out there that are not dished out under the bizarre conditions you are describing.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
420
I got a CS degree from Rice. If I had to do it all over again, I would to Math and Linguistics in undergrad with some introductory CS classes speckled in, and then get a non-thesis masters in CS.
...You'll have contacts from both universities.
Education and reputation-wise, only one thing matters in regard to "where" you went to school... if the hiring manager also went there.
Unless you're thriving where you are, pack up and move.
It matters not what the paper says. you think someone is just going to pop up at the end of college and GIVE you a job?
A more realistic view would be that you will have to fight to get noticed, have to make many many contacts durng job fairs, and basicaly market yourself with a kick ass resume and some demo code. then maybe they might interview you. and maybe you can show up that person with the degree from DeVry.
I've interviewed CS degree grads who made excellent grades at big name schools but didn't seem to have much first hand experience in really developing challenging programs. Many simply did the assignments and worked on a few group projects and didn't seem to have much to say about what kind of technology and applications they had been working with. In contrast, I've interviewed (and hired) grads from colleges didn't even have an actual CS program. The two individuals were CIS grads that had managed to gain some pretty impressive experience with complex projects and could demonstrate a very high level of understanding though their explainations of college projects. They also had some gained some valuable experience working part time doing software work outside of school. The point here is that a really good education, with solid experience and understanding, can be achieved at not-so-prestigious college IF you work hard to apply yourself and your knowledge. I think the bigger and more prestigious schools often have labs and resources that give you the chance to work with more advanced technology, and that can certainly pay enormous dividends to your experience. I would be more concerned with the more prestigious schools when/if you go to do your graduate work.
It all depends on the job-market. In the current market, you better believe it matters. This isn't 1999 anymore.
Go to college. Focus on the fundamentals. Don't take excessive crap classes that you can learn from a book.
If you can, take some of the intro EE classes. The logic classes are easier. I regret not taking any of the signals and systems classes.
Take stats - your most useful math class for the real world.
Take an economics or a business class. If you don't have time during your 4 years do it after school. I took macro economics at the Harvard extension school.
Most importantly, learn how to learn. A good engineer can pick up a new tool (language, application environment, design pattern, etc) in a week or so.
I'm sorry, but if someone can't look at the code/documentation/google and work it out they shouldn't be working there. I'm the first one to explain to someone how things work - I don't mind if they've made some effort first (I've personally trained 4 or 5 people).
This isn't about solving some coding issue, this is about the documentation you provide for the things you create so that *other people* can understand them. Are all your process flows that you created documented on google? Of course not; should you be required to explain things over and over again to other team member? Again, of course not. This is where good charting and documentation abilities come in. This has absolutely nothing to do with getting a degree, instead it is all about your ability to work in a true team environment.
--- I do not moderate.
I managed to get some great offers with a dismal GPA but several solid internships. As most of the previous posters pointed out, experience matters more than anything.
However, one thing that good schools get is a better range of employers at their career fairs. There were several companies that came to my school (U of Washington) but didn't bother going to the other Washington state schools or the Oregon state schools. In my experience, meeting companies at university career fairs and career centers is much more likely to net you a job than random applications via their web site.
As a high school student looking for colleges in Ohio, I've heard that Ohio State is high on the list. But then it's CS program isn't ABET accredited.
Is it high-up, as CS programs/colleges go?
I've seen a few job listings that even say something as obvious as "Ivy League Grads prefered"... so yea, there will always be some of those.
;-)... for $0.50/hr.
But you know something... that doesn't mean much. Some schools 30 years ago weren't what they are today. So does someone who graduated 30 years ago have the same value degree as someone who graduated today?
Is someone who learned computing with punchcards at MIT better at Java and more modern skills then a Geek at a county college? Not necessarally so. Could have no knowledge of computers after 1981.
[sarcasm]
On the other hand: you can always move to india where you'll be very valued
[/sarcasm]
I am a younger one, and I don't think it matters too much where you go because what is most important is that you are doing things outside of class to learn. What they teach in school will not get you a job, it's the more advanced projects that you must do outside of class. But as far as the degree itself, I didn't have any appreciation while I was in college for it, but once I got out and started working, I started noticing differences "sometimes" with people who had never been to college. No offense to anybody without a degree, I'm not saying you are any dumber or smarter, but I think what you need to get out of your school of choice are analysis skills thus it's a good oportunity to work with newer technologies. That seems to be what a lot of people lack because they just end up in a job learning only what they work with everyday. But a lot of people think it's only experience, so I could be full of crap.
Especially if you're getting a Computer Engineering degree, or some variation upon that. One of the reasons that I got hired in my current job is that I had a wide range of skills due to my experience in computer science, web development, programming, and electrical engineering. They're a smaller company that provides voice and data (wiring/network) solutions, but also web hosting, computer repairs, and anything else an IT department might need to do. So I do a little bit of everything.
Here's what my dad always said about college: an electrician and an electrical engineer both have the knowledge to wire your home, but only one of them you'd want working on designing a nuclear power plant.
Do you planning on becoming a corporate desk programmer? if so, then it doesn't matter too much. If you love programming, don't do this.
Do you want to go on to further education? If so, go to the most prestiges CS program you can find.
Do you want to work for a Government agency. Say NSA crypto? If so, go to the most prestiges CS program you can find.
You going to start your own business? doesn't matter. and take some business courses!
Bottom line:
The most important thing with your career is to be social, and motivated to get what you want. those two qualities will make up for any precieved degree 'defiantcy'.
Believe me, the perception people have is far more important then the degree you have.
Final Note:
Listen to your dad, he knows you better then you do.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
You have no chance to survive. Make your time.
I'm a sophomore CS major at Northeastern University. Our co-op requires us to get entry level workplace experience. It's extremely valuable! Consider NU!
I interview candidates regularly for our (admittedly small) company, and the qualities I look for are 1) a good attitude and 2) interest in CS for its own sake. Experience comes next, followed by schooling. I think smart employers will hire for traits as opposed to specific knowledge, except possibly large employers with highly specialized jobs. I want to hire people who will go buy and read Godel, Escher, Bach on their own time, because they're interested in it; in other words, geeks with a lab at home and plenty of curiosity. I think there's some correlation between these people and students of colleges like MIT, but that's incidental and not something I can depend on.
Read my keyboard review.
When you say prestigious, do you mean a school "known" (in general) or "known for computer science"?
An ivy leaguer who studied Art or Music will fare much better than someone with a 4.0 in Comp Sci from a state school. It doesn't have to do with the curriculum, but the fame of the school.
Some of these schools that are supposedly known for CompSci I would be weary of - it is only worth going if EVERYONE knows the value of it.
The sad reality is that it is all about who you know. If you go to a better school, you'll meet people with better connections - thereby getting you a better job.
I'm sure I'll get modded down for this, but take it from someone in their late 20's who has seen it first hand. Don't get me wrong, I went to a state school and do just fine (very well, in fact), but the people that I know who went to ivy's have had opportunities offered to them that I've never received.
Yes, I didn't give you a straight answer - because there is none. Good Luck.
Physics is only one technical subject, computer science is a different subject area. In that Nucs are generally smart and smart people make better coders than dumb ones, I'd have to agree with you assertion, otherwise, all bets are off.
And then there's personality - which Nucs either don't have (mostly) or have too much of (even worse).
I'm scared of world leaders who think locally and act globally.
...for a top-of-the-line education:
ocw.mit.edu
CdnYoda
"The Source is with me...;-)"
I'm a guy who recently got a B.A. in C.S. from Vassar College. Seeing how most people still think Vassar is still an all-girl school, and how it is a (very) liberal arts school, I was afraid of competing with pro-science University graduates and the stereotype of my school (even though it has an incredible reputation) in a science orientated field. However, I had little trouble finding a job. As the work force is shifting from closed-door developer houses to very interactive, small developing groups (consultants, project managers, outsourcing coordinaters, etc.) personality, initiative, and experience have more stock than a solid GPA from tech school. There is simply a huge stock in developers around, most of whom need to make a business for themselves. Grades and alma mater don't have the credit they once did.
I went to a small Cal State and looked into transfering to a UC after my sophomore year. In the end, it just wasn't worth it. Because of various quirks in sequencing, it would've taken me 3 more years to finish just a CS degree at a UC.
By staying put, I was able to complete a double major in CS and math in only 2 years. Because it was a smaller school, I also got to know the faculty really well working on a few projects outside the classroom. That's helped me immensely down the road as they've provided excellent personal references.
Having taught CS courses at several places, I can say the curriculum is pretty much the same everywhere. You're not missing much material by not going to a larger university.
On the downside, the career placement offices at large schools can be worth their weight in gold, especially if you want to work outside the area. Coming from a small school, you'll have to do a lot more legwork to find openings. But once you do, the degree doesn't matter nearly so much. Whatever school you're at, the most important thing is to build up contacts and experience.
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on lunch.
CS is one of the few professional fields left where a college degree is not all that necessary. Sure, it's "nice" to know the intricacies of B-trees, finite-state automata and the like, but these things rarely show up in their pure theoretical form in most everyday work. What IS important is to be able to absorb info, make design tradeoffs, and apply your posterior to the chair for extended periods of time until you get the dang program working! I've seen CS PHd's that can't figure out the * operator in C. I've also seen high-school dropouts that can do most anything with a computer. You decide which is more marketable.
The 3 requirements of any job is: experience, degree and certs.
Communication skills, personality and motivation are a distant fourth, and hard to measure.
So If you have a crap degree (I.E. compared to an ivy league student) 2 additional years of experience, especially with well-known companies will make you equal. Having additional certs, especially relevant ones will help as well. For security, database, networking jobs, certs are critical, sometimes meaning more than the degree if you browse joblists, and will do you more good than a masters program. So the right certs will land you the job over the same ivy league student without them.
Basically if you lack anything from the above 3 requirements, getting jobs will be difficult. However all else being equal, you do get a better edge getting a better known degree in CS circles, so if you can help it, and if it doesnt affect anything else, transfer.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
How cool is your Mum!
Teaching you QBasic at eleven? Now that's modern parenting!
It is true that "most" employers of CS people hire based on actual skills. Even so, you should be aware that a great many top-tier companies (especially Pharmaceutical and Military Contractors) employ Human Resources people who "filter" inbound resumes based on the ignorant idea that specific degrees and college reputations are what matter most.
One of my current clients (hq for a major pharma company) loves my work (as a contractor). Even so, it is clear that I'll never get past the HR folks for even an interview for a job on the same level I hold as a contractor. (Yes, I probably make a lot more money as a contractor, but there are all kinds of perks available only to "real" employees that I wish I had.) The culture there is that they only hire people with advanced biology and chemistry degrees and then only from the best schools. (They assume that everyone comes equipped to learn any CS skills they need and generally do not value CS degrees as such.)
Consider where in the country you want to live and the major employers in that area. If their culture values college reputations, then your future happiness may be influenced by your choice of school.
Disclosure: While it took 12 years of night school, I graduated in 1996 with a non-CS masters from a non-Ivy League, yet generally respected university. Had I paid more attention in high school and gone to someplace like Princeton or the U. of Pa. and ALSO picked up more chemistry and biology, I have no doubt that there would have been more opportunities in the years that followed. (Yes, I live in an area where big pharma companies and military contractors dominate the high-end of the job market.)
This is not to say I shouldn't be grateful for what I've got. I still make a top-notch income. I love the people I work with. I've been programming (and/or software engineering) since 1980. I love what I do so much that I still show up for work early even after all these years in the workforce.
But you did ask.
Live Long and Prosper - Thanks Leonard. You are missed.
I'm at a mediocre midwestern university, also not known for its CS dept. I transferred out of a major, well-known, well-respected engineering university, and have that to compare to.
At my school, most of we do in our CS classes are business reports. AI? Distributed computing? Cryptography algorithms? Game development? Forget it. You're lucky as a grad. student to learn such things. Here, we do COBOL, JCL, and assembler -- yes, assembler -- on the school's IBM s/390 mainframe. Why assembler, when even major financial institutions in the area readily admit they don't use assembler? Who the hell knows, but my professors are tenured relics from the 1970s, so maybe that explains things...
Regardless, there's nothing interesting here in CS, which is largely why my interest in CS has faded.
In short, if you're at a mediocre university, don't expect to learn Interesting Things as you progress towards your senior year. The first 2 years can be fun, but the last 2 are just grueling busywork -- just the opposite of how the undergrad experience *ought* to be, IMO.
Your question asks of the importance of a no-name degree. Let me put it this way to you: I have less than a 3.0 CS department GPA, and even before graduating, I have a job lined up in a Major Corporation You've Heard Of for next year.
In truth, your degree doesn't matter much. Employers only look at your CS degree to know that you have a tolerance for a certain amount of bullshit that will be thrown at you in the working world.
No, in the real world of IT, experience is king, your degree is second, and your certifications (except truly-significant ones, like the CCIE or CISSP) come in a distant third.
I've never been hired for any jobs based on my education; all the jobs people have wanted me for were based on the experience I'd had and the interest I'd had in the things professors don't teach you in school. Nobody gives a crap that you can code C++ -- after all, so can any other even halfway-technically-minded monkey from a university, including the ones in India who are likely to take your job in the next 20 years.
What matters is what you find interesting outside of your schoolwork -- that, in my experience, is what you will be hired for. Your degree is just icing on the cake.
Going back to my first paragraph, I said I'd been to a larger engineering university. What's that like?
It's big, informal, and if you like big-city style anonymity and serious geeking, it's wonderful. I completely blew my time while I was there, but in retrospect, I really wish I hadn't. College could've been the best 4 years of my life; instead, they've been the worst 5.
I would personally recommend that if you're really serious about IT, transfer to an engineering-oriented university. You'll learn useful things there, unlike at my school. You'll be around major geeks off of whom you can bounce ideas and learn stuff, unlike my school. You might not meet as many chicks there, but then, I don't meet chicks at my school either, so it's no loss (besides, you've got the rest of your 20s/30s life after college to meet people, although I warn you that it won't be nearly as easy as in college).
My problem is that I serve as a warning sign to other people on how *not* to go through college...
Howard Schmidt, another UoP grad, is widely respected in the computer security realm. He was an advisor to President Bush and is currently the CISO of eBay.9 28_1176.jsp
Read an interview at http://www4.gartner.com/research/fellows/asset_65
The most crucial thing in getting a good job is having references. Look at your school's internship program. Ask about actual placements, not just openings. If your school is placing CS people in internships, then get one and do a good job. The colleagues you meet there will be your references that get you in the door of your first real job. Strong references mean a lot more to me when I interview people, than whether they went to a big-name school. If you think an internship will be tough to get, transfer to a school that has a better track record with placements. It's that important.
If stupidity got us into this mess, then why can't it get us out? - Will Rogers
But in my twelve years of (non-degreed) experience, what I've come to realize is that those with degrees have broader horizons and potentially a higher income ceiling than I'll see until I can compete with them on a level playing field (by earning a degree myself). For the most part, large organizations' HR departments do take into account whether or not you have a degree; it's part of their peer-comparison salary review, for one. Smaller organizations and head-hunters usually couldn't care less, as long as you can get the work done.
About thirteen years ago, during the recession of Bush the Elder, I worked for a few months in a tech staffing office, sorting the wheat from the chaff in the resumes. At that time, there were a few more prestigious institutions we looked for, such as MIT, Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, etc. Surprisingly we also kept an eager eye out for Shenandoah Conservatory of the Arts, Julliard (sp?) and a few other prestigious music schools. I have no idea if that's common across the industry, but our company's president had read that the musical and mathematical minds work in remarkably similar ways, so he decided to follow up on it. I've read the same thing since then, but never had the opportunity to follow up with the musicians we hired to see how they were doing in their programming careers.
So to answer your question: a degree is a great first step to get you through the door, and throughout your career will keep the number of available positions greater for you than for me (unless I eventually do go back & get a degree, too). However, it's the experience you pick up in the working world that will decide how stable your employment is, how much you earn, etc. Frankly my best possible advice is: when you move from one job to the next, always stay on good terms with the people you left behind. They'll make great references later. I have unfortunately lost contact with some of the best references I'll ever have, and it's hurt me over the years more times than I can count.
Best of luck when you graduate, or if you take an internship before then, or whatever path you choose. May CowboyNeal never have to put a boot to your head.
Allegedly real newspaper headline from 1998:
Man Struck by Lightning Faces Battery Charge
The difference between a Highly respected CS program and a mediocre CS program is that the mediocre program teaches you to program and the Highly respected one does not. In any good CS program you are excepted to learn how to program on your own. You go to MIT, CMU or Berkeley to learn the SCIENCE part of computer science.
,computer graphics, computer architecture, GUI Design, and data bases then you are a programmer. You will end up in some company doing data base management, pay roll systems, IT, or some low level development work like the print handler, bug fixes, Customer support, testing etc. If that's what you want to do pretty much any school will do. I recommend one in India or China since that is where the jobs are.
If you are taking courses like Intro to C++
If you are taking courses like Abstract Algebra, Stochastic systems, Combinatorics and Discrete Probability, Computability and Complexity, Efficient Algorithms and Intractable Problems, and Randomness and Computation then you are a computer scientists. You will be looking at a PhD or at least a masters degree. You are looking to work at some place like PARC, HP labs, Microsoft research, Google, IBM research, a major research institution like MIT or CMU or a lead development or architecture position. Now you want to be in a well recognized program. Further more you want to be doing research at an undergraduate level, preferably with a well respected (and published) professor. This is the only way to get into a good grad program.
To recap:
Programmer -> No one cares -> Shitty Job -> Burn out
Scientist -> Long and Hard -> Great Job -> Worse Burn out -> Management or Fellowship or Tenure
My girlfriend's personal experience with U of Phoenix in the BS program lead her to drop out and attend a community college until she could get herself into a state-funded (traditional) private school with a good night school/online program.
She was NOT happy at all with U of P mainly due to the ineptitude of the profesors and the poor quality of students in her classes. She hated the team structure because she ended up doing all the team work or risk a poorer grade.
She's much happier that she left, but that is only one person's account.
Sierra Tango Foxtrot Uniform
The best thing about my graduation was the three small children sitting in the audience watching their daddy walk across the stage; all of them are now young teenagers and they take it for granted that they are going to college, which is very, very cool!
Slashmail.org "The Open Source Email Company"
...I went to a small school with a solid CS curriculum (College of Charleston) and I make over 6 figures only 7 years later.
I'm no genius (as many will happily attest) but I've found that hard work, making disciplined engineering choices, and standing up for yourself w/o alienating others are a good way to move forward in your career.
I'm sure others have different recipes for success. My degree has had nothing to do with it. Personally, I've worked with people from CalTech who were, professionally, idiots. Same thing with Berkeley CS grads as well.
I'm sure that for many managers the name means something when you start out, but I've found that after your first couple of jobs, what you've done is much more important than where you graduated.
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I did an Electronics degree, not at a red brick institute I might add, but am now in software as it is my real passion. I have to say that after my first six years of work the hardest part is scoring the initial experience/job. After that it is how hard you work and the results you get - not what type of qualification you have. I worked with guys that have PHD's and Masters and mostly they just do not cut the mustard because at the end of the day they do not get the code compiled and out of the door with few enough bugs to satisfy the customer. My advise, get your ass into the first job that is roughly what you want to do then work your butt off, learning new shit from people around you, keep on top of new technologies and make sure you never ever slide into a 9-to-5 routine/slagging of the company role. If you loose interest in your work then move on, maybe programming is not for you. After a year or two look for somewhere else that is closer to what you are aiming for, maybe more money , better conditions or more importantly, more interesting work. With each job hop you should be closer to what you want to do, and you will slowly be gaining industry experience and real knowledge, and will have a better idea of where you want to be in ten years time. Do not let someone put you down because you did not study at the right place, let your work speak for you.
When I was getting out of school, some big companies had an actual formula to calculate your starting salary. So if you went to X Institute of Technology you would get more starting money than if you went to Y State College. This was explained to me during an interview by a rather attractive but inexperienced HR lady. I suspect the way the formula worked was that there was a base starting salary, then four or five factors between maybe 0.8 and 1.2 that were multiplied by that base salary. Grade point average was also a factor. In this particular case, GPA and the reputation of the school were rated equally.
If stupidity got us into this mess, then why can't it get us out? - Will Rogers
I would say that it becomes important if you're looking to go into an area outside of CS/Engr in the future and especially if you would consider grad school. MBA/JD programs can care a lot about the prestige of your ugrad degree, I do work for the admissions department at a top law school and having a degree from a big name school can be all that matters when looking at 2 applicants. I went to ugrad not thinking I was going to change fields, but ended up deciding that the law was for me, so if you're not sure that CS will be for you forever and that you might go to grad school I'd go to the best ugrad I could.
This is just a fascinating discussion.
... And that was it. Never actually took a computer programming class. I think the only conscious choice involved was deciding that the girls in the English Lit department were better looking then.... well, then the guys in the Comp Sci department. I did end up getting a BS, so I wasn't math-phobic or anything, just never happened.
... And then I went to law school. Hah. That's what fascinated me so much about this discussion. The rules for lawyers are completely different. No so much where you went to college, but where you went to law school is the single most deciding factor for many firms. Obviously, this is a gross simplification, but as a general principle -- I think I'm right-on. (Just FYI -- I went to a school consistently ranked in the high teens, low 20's..... Good, but not great.) And most of the people in the really good law schools went to really good undergraduate institutions.
/., but I digress.)
I'm one of those coulda-been techies. I did all the requisitely nerdy things in high school -- captain of my chess team, played M:TG, built my own computer, taught myself HTML, completely socially inept.....
Unlike programming, practical experience is not particularly valued (with the exception of court house lawyers, for whom experience and bringing home the bacon is the only goal.) If you want to work for an established law firm, a good school with top grades is a necessity. Of course, luck plays a role, and there isn't come cabal sitting in judgment over the 2nd tier / B / C students.... But I think this is true, especially when starting out. (Again, FYI -- I went into government myself. Much less emphasis on schools.... There's just a lot less asshol-ism among government attorneys then among many (especially the larger) law firms.)
The comparisons are striking. Only one state today even allows people without a legal degree from a certified school to even sit for the bar exam. Historical examples notwithstanding (for instance, many Supreme Court justices -- in addition to Abraham Lincoln were self taught), the idea of a lawyer not having at least an undergraduate and graduate degree is laughable. And the very fact that whether going to a big-name institution is even seriously debatable made my jaw drop. (Of course, there's also the possibility that all the big name comp sci grads are doing something other then reading
So, yes, this post does have a point. And it's this: our young friend here may -- shocking, I know -- decide he wants to do something else with his life other then program or design software. Maybe he'll find his great passion playing the violin or studying history or -- god forbid -- as a member of the bar. He needs to think not only about the profession that he -- as a sophomore -- envisions for himself, but also what other doors may be opened for him at other schools. All in all -- the very fact he asked the question indicates he's doing his homework. I'm sure someone this thorough and seemingly conscientious will thrive in a variety of academic settings. But not every field has the same laid back attitude towards educational background. Should he want to pursue an advanced degree in the humanities, or go into academia, or any number of other fields that don't share the laudable emphasis on merit that CS has, he may want to consider other educational options.
And one last little tidbit -- as much as I joke -- I love the legal profession. Law school was one of the best and most challenging times of my life and my job now is rewarding and fun. Sure, there may be more asshol-ism among the legal community then the community at large, but eh, I just don't hang out with those types. And the breadth of jobs I'd be considered for (outside the traditional legal roles) is astounding. Unlike a comp sci grad, lawyers are presumed to have the competence to practice in any legal field -- and usual
I have a BFA in film from a school that has a couple of entries in the Jargon file, but that's about it. I am totally self-taught in terms of programming, and I've now been a Windows/Unix C++ programmer for seven years.
I started by writing Excel 4 macros, moved up to VB, then went to C, later C++. I also learned a lot of SQL, where I can now write sprocs in T-SQL for Sybase/SQL Server, and PL/SQL for Oracle.
In every "move up", it was seeing a need for the next level up when the stuff at the previous level wasn't good enough (needed custom VBXs for VB, etc.) It wasn't lying, we really did need this stuff, and I was willing to step up to the plate to do it. I put in a *lot* of long hours. I read and read and read and played every single day. In all of 1996, I took July 4th, Thanksgiving, and Christmas off...I worked all the others.
I was also upfront and made mistakes (especially when threads got involved), but I worked like hell to fix, and more importantly, *totally* understand the actual issues. I think it also helped that we didn't have things like the STL to use, so I had to roll my own binary trees and linked lists by hand...a great way to learn how to use pointers.
I'm not so sure this method will work for anyone else, as everyone has their own journey to take. But I worked with a lot of others who had various art degrees who were also in IT, and they did it basically the same way as me...lots of grunt work to understand what was going on, and could demonstrate it at both the interview and on the job.
So I would say that it doesn't matter. I also will say that as one who has interviewed a lot of people, I never take into consideration the "Education" section of the resume. You either know the answer to my questions, or can at least try to reason a good guess, or you don't. You can have a PhD in CompSci from Harvard, but if you can't tell me how to update a table in the database, then it's not going to help.
I don't think it matters that much. What's more important are the skill that learn. More importantly the talents and skill that you learn on your own.
For example.
1. Create your own projects that force to create and develop SW/HW that is outside of regular class room activities.
The more of these projects the better for a resume. Not only will it broaden your CS knowledge but it shows that you are a creative, intelligent individual with a passion for technology.
I didn't go to a fancy school and work as a HW/SW engineer for a extremely large communications company as part of a development team that makes ruggedized computers.
I can assure you it is far from a diploma mill.
Thanks so much, a good laugh is just what I needed. Priceless!
In my experience, in the corporate world (unless you are going into consulting) the school you got your degree from doesn't really matter - it's the training and discipline you get from doing the degree that matters (I have two degrees, neither in CS and went straight into an IT role out of school).
On the other hand, if you want to do onto graduate work, a first degree from a good school does make a difference. Not only in getting into grad school, but in getting grants etc once you are in. My SO is an academica and has sat on admissions and grant committees and has repeatedly told me that in general those groups weigh a 3.0 from a top teir school much higher than a 4.0 from an unknown school.
Just my view, your mileage may vary.
I have since started to take classes in CS in my spare time. I found out that I had so much to learn! In (some of) those classes I really learn a lot which I would never have learned "by experience".
The conclusion: If I was the boss, I would hire people with a degree. And ofcourse one you can trust have substance. At a good university you learn stuff in a few years that would have taken lifetimes to learn "by experience".
Not because of job prospects but for the professors and people I get to meet. I would love to be taught by the authors of papers that I struggle to comprehend, now that I am going for a Ph D. If you are considering to go for a higher degree I would recommend you to transfer.
Computer jobs are the new fast food jobs.
Theres just too many people and not enough jobs in the field right now. That wont change for about 8 years either.
If you want in computers. You better have an advanced degree.
Quite simply, the "big name" schools have the best research faculty, where "best" is measured by top caliber conference publications.
You may get a great undergraduate education at Bumfuck State University, but you won't have the opportunity to work with the best people in the field. You won't get undergraduate experience working on great research projects. You'll need to do internships in industry to make up for it.
My advice: Apply to transfer to a top school. If you get in, great. If not, no big deal. Regardless, make sure you get good work/research experience while you're there.
I am in the "CS industry". I have been for 27 years. Size matters in some organizations, but not in others. When you go in for an interview a CS degree from the University of Illinois looks much more impressive then BS/CS from Monmouth College. However, the larger the organization the more degree addicted they tend to be. However, as a seasoned professional I am more likely to look at the types of projects you have done, the context and intricacies of those projects, the types of tools you used and determine if I want to know more based on these things. I will glance to see if you have a degree and where it is from, but would not deny you if it is from a small school in Montana. If you get an interview, I quiz about depth and design principles related to those projects. Degree's don't necessarily mean much to me. Results and knowledge does mean a lot. Forgive my cynicism, but about 60% of what you learn in college will be worthless when you graduate anyway. Over 20% of what you learn as a professional expires in less then two months these days. Regardless of school, it is the learning process you take away that makes all the difference in the world.
Unless you are very socially adept and can work alumni networks well, having a prestigious name on your diploma is not important. YOU are important, and you can learn and do well at any competent university. In fact, going to an expensive school will work against you, because paying off unsecured school loans feels like throwing money away. It is a genuine psychological drag and gets in the way of more important things, like a down payment towards a house.
Please, don't put yourself into debt over the false idol of prestige. Focus on learning for yourself. Don't believe that people will simply hand you a job out of school because of a name. Don't believe that you are guaranteed any amount of money because of a name. Don't set yourself up to fall hard later on. Believe in yourself and work on improving yourself, and no matter your alma mater, you will be able to look confident in an interview or impress your co-workers during internships. After a few years, your diploma becomes an irrelevant piece of paper, anyway.
-- "Makes Little Debbie look like a pile of puke!" - Moe Szyslak
From my experience, a degree matters with your first job or jobs for new college graduates. They do ask you your GPA.
However, you can easily drop out of Harvard just like you can drop out of a community college.
Degrees matter after your first job, but experience matters more.
I've noticed that where you get your degree from matters more when companies recruit. Companies will go to certain schools, so Company A may recruit heavily at School B, but not so much or at all at School C. Do yourself a favor, see check which companies recruit at your school that have CS majors.
I generally agree that experience is key, but as far as getting your foot in the door, it matters. I went to one of the top CS schools and have no doubt that the name helped get me where I am.
I do plenty of recruiting and since we can't visit every school, we pick the best. So, it's not just a matter of the education you get, but the opportunities that are presented to you. I believe that you can get a great CS education without going to a well known school, but your opportunities will be different.
Honestly, I don't think it matters much. But who knows by the time you graduate if it would? There's a push among Big Consulting Firms now to be classified as CMM Level 5, and I could imagine them using the resumes and pedigrees of their employees to supplement their rating levels.
If I was in college again (I wish) I'd start building my contacts now, offer my services dirt-cheap for part-time, light IT work - as investment later on - because in the end its experience that counts (*and of course, good design work*)
You're not going to pick up calculus on the job. Get it in college.
To get your foot in the door. Sometimes companies care about that when you first start. After you have built a resume, the fact that you have a BS is all they care about. Good luck to ya!
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
yes.
It does matter where you go to school to study Computer Science. The more important reason is the oppurtunity learn more at another University. From what I have seen, there is a wide range in the quality of CS programs. You may not know if you are learning as much as you could just because of a lack of comparison. On the other hand, your school might have a good program.
To find out, I suggest talking with students at universities you're considering about specific classes. You should ask questions like, ``How are your architecture classes?'' or ``what do you cover in algorithms?''. See if you would be able to do one-on-one research/study with a professor. Compare the answers to what you find yourself and what upperclassmen say at your school. If it sounds like there's a large discrepancy, then you should get cracking on that transfer paperwork.
The lesser reason (but still important) is the availability of recruiters on campus and a campus career center. I've interviewed at companies that only recruit from a specific schools. One of these companies even has a map where you can see the schools where they recruit. Also, I've had oppurtunities through the University career center, where you post your resume online interview on campus. If this is not available at your school, it would be another important reason to transfer.
The most important thing for your first job is that you can maintain competitive grades. If you would get average or below grades at a top-notch university, then you're better off where you are.
If you are considering graduate school, grades might be even more important.
If the deadline is coming up, I say go ahead and apply now and then you can make your decisions later.
Good Luck.
What have we learned from the real world but that the truth between two options is the grey compromise?
Experience will trump education on a job-by-job interview, but consider what happened in the post-dot com boom, you NEEDED a CS degree. They wouldn't even consider you otherwise, unless you had a direct inside connection.
In times of plenty and demand for workers, education pales to the immediate need for experience, because they can always hire someone else if you don't fully pan out.
In times of lean, when companies need good people to fill their positions, they can be pickier, and you'll be interviewing against people with equivalent experience, and they will be more thorough with the evaluation. That's when education comes into play.
As a CS major (bachelor's only, not an ivory-tower PhD) who has dealt with many a non-CS IT worker, the difference in ability between those who took Computer Architecture, Algoritms, and Operating Systems versus those who just learned C or C++ on the job or in a night class is huge. Unfortunately, it's difficult to communicate on a resume, but on an actual ability standpoint, it will resonate, and that will build you a local network of people that respect you, and that will get you future jobs.
Hey, I'm just your average shit and piss factory.
If you are planning on getting an advanced degree, that's different. Getting accepted to a good grad school will be easier if your degree is from a more prestigious undergrad. But if you're done going to school after you get your BS, then seek out the best on-campus recruiting school you can.
Personally, I went to a huge state school and wanted to transfer to a small private school. I am so glad I didn't! Getting that first job would have been hell because I needed to relocate to a different part of the country. Without national employers recruiting on-campus, I would have been screwed.
Now that I have a bunch of experience, my education section is the last line on my resume. I sure am glad that line only cost me $30k rather than $150k!
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
...but than again I got a fat resume. I also had a lucky break about 7 years ago to get my foot in the door.
In the past few years I actually interviewed people and screened resumes for development positions. And I can only tell you what I know:
A light resume and no-school gets passed.
Post-grad's from any school get phone screened.
Undergrads from any school get phone screened.
The only people that usually bypass the phone screen, are post-grads from great schools with heavy resumes.
Any college and a well written resume will get you a phone screen, and a good phone screen will get you and interview, and a good interview will get you the job.
The three things I look for in an interviewee are:
1) Enthusiasm about getting to work and developing.
2) Did they ask questions?
3) Did they act like want the job? (asking for it is a plus)
plus the usual, not an idiot and someone I'd want to work with.
hope that helps
While making an impression is important, having a "big name" degree is not as cracked up as it is made to be.
In the limited amount of hiring I've done (2 sysadmin positions, 1 programmer), I find the degree and institution are good general indicators of talent, but not absolute ones. It's a form of verification, often: when a candidate interviews really well, and I see he's from (say) MIT, it makes sense. It's comforting. It fits. When a candidate interviews really well and he's from (say) ITT Tech, it doesn't fit. Something's wrong, why didn't he attend a better institution?
Also, when hiring, you want to know about the person's professional culture to be able to predict how he will fit in. I know what the cultures are at MIT, Caltech, CMU, Stanford, UCB are like. I know that if I hire someone from Caltech, he'll be pretty honest about things left lying around because they have an honor code there. I know that if I hire someone from MIT, he'll be apt to use unattended things around the lab to measure the mass of some esoteric subatomic particle in his spare time. Do I know the same thing about, say, U Michigan? UT Austin? NMSU? UC Irvine? UMass Boston? Nope. Will that prevent me from hiring them? No, but I'm more likely to hire someone I know more about, even if it's only by reputation.
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
Granted, I make websites and do some Network admin for a living, as opposed to working for NASA or whatever. Seems to me though that I do a lot less work as some of them as well.
[My comments are relative to my 25 years of experience in server development -- almost all at startup companies that grew into larger companies through various combinations of success and acquisition. I've toggled between hiring manager and developer about 50/50. If you're looking at IT or Applications Programming opportunities or want to work "eight-five" at a big company, my observations may be irrelevant. There are, of course, also exceptions to all the "rules" below - but in my experience they are fairly rare.]
BOTTOM LINE: GO TO THE BEST CS SCHOOL YOU CAN SUCCEED AT - THE SCHOOL MAY SET THE TONE FOR THE REMAINDER OF YOUR CAREER.
I've reviewed quite a few (probably nearly 10K) developer resumes over the years - most of which were prescreened by recruiters to my specific requirements. Even with the "prescreening", a resume probably gets an average of one minute of attention unless something particularly turns me off (in which case, it gets less than one minute) or particularly excites me (in which case it gets more time and may eventually end up in a hire). The more years of experience a candidate has, the less relevant the source and major of the degree is (although, if someone under about 50 doesn't have a B.Sc., preferably in CS or math, that's a red flag because such degrees were commonplace by 1980). But, for candidates with less than three or four years of experience, both the source and major of the degree is a very significant factor.
I've also been involved in a fair amount of on-campus recruiting over the years and the reality is that GPA and school are VERY important. From a "lesser" school (say, without the intent of offense, most Cal State schools) anything much less than a 4.0 "in major", 3.7 overall, and a preference for "hard" classes (i.e., CS classes to build credits, not Psych 101A) usually gets the resume routed to the "no on-site interview" pile - this is because it is relatively easy to get a 4.0 in-major from such a school unless one is lazy or not very sharp (neither of which is promising in a candidate for a job!). From a "better" school (say, without the intent of offense, UC Berkeley), seeing one or two A-'s or B+'s for a CS class is not completely off-putting (a B- or lower is cause for substantial investigation however). Even with prescreening of transcripts and resumes, from a lesser school I am happy if one on-campus interview out of 15 advance to an offer of an on-site interview. On the other hand, I expect as many as four or five from a top school to advance to an offer of an on-site interview.
One problem I have found with candidates from "lesser" schools who are at the top of their class is that usually they haven't been challenged by peers, coursework, and professors as much as they would have been at "better" schools. This "large fish in small pond" syndrome is a problem for a couple of reasons. First, they often think they are better than they are (after all, they are better than most everyone around them - but the people around them turn out not to be very good) and don't interview well due to this disconnect. Second, they often just haven't been exposed to some of the trickier concepts so in a 45 minute interview, it's hard to find a common ground from which to probe their intellect. This is sad because I'm sure some of these candidates would have been more qualified if they had been challenged more -- but perhaps could not afford to attend a better school or screwed up their verbal SAT scores and didn't qualify for admission to a better school.
Although one can rationalize "I will stay at a lesser school and get the experience I need at the first couple of jobs and then move into better jobs", I don't think this works well in practice. It's been my experience that the first job or two often sets the tone for the remainder of developers' careers. By the time you're "ready" for the better job, all the other people competing for the job already have three or four years of better experience so you're still beh
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
This is why: 1) you don't really know how much your not learning- i.e. feeling good can be misleading. 2) one of the most valuable things you develop is your network of peers. I was luck to go to a good school and now my ex-classmates include heavy hitters in the valley, particularly at the CTO level. This becomes more and mroe important over time where you can use this network to counter-balance the pervasive prejudice against age in our profession. So sorry Son, but your dad is right!
The only possible exceptions *might* be if your wonderful grades won you some important prize or honor (e.g. Phi Beta Kappa) that demonstrates that you were way ahead of most of your peers. And even then that would just be a teensy factor that might get your resume sorted higher in the pile.
In fact, when I see people put their GPA on a resume, it might even have a slight subconscious negative effect -- it makes me think they don't know what's important in a real job. Sort of like when people list their height and weight. (BTW, I say this as someone who had a high GPA from a top-rated school.)
Another recommendation (less related to your question, but very important nevertheless) that makes success in the industry more likely is to consider spending one term/semester abroad (it proves your flexibility and widens your perception and personal network).
--
Try Nuggets , the mobile search engine. We answer your questions via SMS, across the UK.
I have been mostly on the hiring side since starting my own company right out of grad school. My answer is that it depends on the position. If it is an entry level position aimed at freshouts then a degree from a good school AND a top GPA and project participation will get you an interview at least ahead of others from lesser schools or with lesser GPAs. The main things I see a degree from a good school getting you: - a better general education - more opportunities to work with and compete with other really top notch students - more exposure to cutting edge research, hardware and software
I graduated debt-free and my alumni network is huge... ;)
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
Having been in industry for over 20 years and now teaching in the University system take what I say within those regards. As a hiring authority on major projects (of dozens or hundreds of people) if I set a degree as a requirement I never saw a resume that didn't have the appropriate degree. Unless one of my engineers brought me some persons resume directly. When balancing the schools for major positions (6 figures and up) I might call the school directly and talk to the major professors and see what they remembered (usually these are the references anyways). For lower level positions who has the time?
I worked in corporate IT at two major telecoms, and two major consulting companies. At every job I've had the prior service military were a significant back bone of the profit making contingent. They required less management, met deadlines, and didn't whine about company decisions. Oh, I'm prior military myself (USMC).
When balancing two CS programs as an undergraduate you should be more interested in whether they are ABET accredited utilizing the latest curriculum standards than what name is plastered on the sign. What is your goal? Do you want to work in industry or be involved in research? If you want to be involved in research find the prestigious research university and ingratiate yourself with the faculty. If you are interested in doing 4-years and opting for industry get the paper and run for the door. When I'm hiring people the paper gets you the interview, your skills get you past my minions, and your ability to communicate with me during the interview gets me to sign the will hire paperwork.
--- Location Unknown
For Christ's sake, get a degree that can lead to a job: I recommend staying in school and working on an MBA.
That said, the school that you graduate from is more important than the degree that you get. Better to get a literature degree from Yale than a CS degree from Carnegie-Mellon.
Some employers think they're holding high standards by focusing on graduates from certain high-profile schools. Usually this is more a state of mind than an actual fact, however. My previous employer was very proud of the fact that nearly all of it's 40-some developers (including me) were graduates from the Milwaukee School of Engineering. And while this was great when they were a small company, as they grew and the projects got bigger, incorporating more people, it became a problem. There was very little diversity in the way the employees thought about problems, and in what they knew as they began their jobs.
Later, another problem surfaced. The company tried to create two separate groups, one for architecture/design, and one for implementation. The architecture/design team essentially touched no code at all. The MSOE grads loved coding, but being educated as engineers, they wanted to be involved in system design as well. This led to many conflicts among those that remained developers, but weren't willing to give up their say in architecture, and much wasted skill/intelligence among those who were willing to give it up.
I spent most of my youth programming computers in different languages, so by the time I was in college the syntax we had to learn was new, but the principles were old hat. I picked up all the languages we were required to learn faster than everyone in my class who didn't already know them. I also had several projects I had worked on outside of school in the various languages I had learned that demonstrated my skill. But, if I had gone to UW Milwaukee rather than MSOE, none of this would have mattered to my old employer. I wouldn't even have gotten an interview.
Big surprise, I was left intellectually numb by the work they wanted me to do. This affected my performance, and it was a mutual decision for me to leave. Now I work for a contractor, making better money, doing both design and implementation, and encountering unbelievable variety in projects.
Think twice about taking a job anywhere that wouldn't hold impressive experience above impressive school names.
I have a degree from a good school (Berkeley), but my experience as a manager shows that a degree isn't everything.
I've only had to fire two people in my career, and they've both had PhDs in CS.
Of the two best performers I've ever had, one had a degree in music and the other didn't have a degree at all.
Sorry, but considering this is one of my strengths, I always find companies scrambling for my services.
IT folk have never been know for their personalities, so if you've got one, you're in demand.
Taking advice from Confucius, namely that "The true measure of a man is his humility" if an organization has no interest in you by simply focusing on the piece of paper called your diploma and nothing else, well, frankly, I don't have time for elitists.
But I do understand that some organizations need to use some sort of filtering criteria when they have a glut of resumes. Something many organizations faced with the dot com implosion and the glut of unemployed tech people.
Disregarding what else your resume says about you and simply focusing on where you went to school seems fairly myopic.
In my experience (every organization I've been at) that where you went to school was irrelevant. If you did well in the interview process, had tech smarts, that counted far more than having gone to school "X".
Welcome to the real world.
-M
PS: "Those who can't, teach." -Proverb
The well known part isn't necessarily important, but if you're going to be a programmer, a solid computer science or engineering education won't serve you wrong. For as dime a dozen as neophyte java programmers are, people who have a grounding in computer science are like a breath of fresh air when interviewing people.
Its a small matter. Experience and the ability to document and prove that experience is key. Heck, I'm a BA in History and have worked in IT for 15 years.
I was interested in electronics and engineering long before I realized they were called such. I was interested in aerodynamics and the principles of aeronautical design long before I knew their names, either. In both cases, I'm talking about actively pursuing the interests-- researching and experimenting, asking questions, not just gazing at something and going, "Whoa! I wonder how that works!''
"It is practically impossible to teach good programming style to students that have had prior exposure to BASIC; as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration."
Enjoy!its not too late!
90% of all Computer programming jobs have vanished since the dot.com bubble burst, and the rest are rapidly being sent over seas where coders work for peanuts.
So, you might as well avoid the hassels of retraining in 5 years and change your major now, to an area the can't be outsourced: teaching (HS is nice College is better), veternary medicine, nursing, MD, Franchise management. Think hard about it, you'll come up with something. Unless you have too much personal prestige invested in a college degree you could also get professional training and become self employed as an electrician, plumber, welder, etc. Most of those jobs pay more than ones that require a college degree.
What was that?
Being one employed in the academic realm, the source of your undergraduate degree certainly plays a role when it comes to being employed in the academic realm, or going to graduate school.
Likewise, if you plan on pursuing research in computer science (in which graduate school is pretty much a necessity), whether in academia or in the private sector, your undergraduate school could have some importance in that.
Otherwise, as long as you do not attain your degree from St. Baliwack's Questionable Online School of Programming, you are probably just fine.
Having recruited for my company (large telecom equipment company) for a couple years and having seen my company drastically reduce the number of new hires I can give a little advice. My company decided to only hire from what they called Tier 1 schools. I don't remember the exact definition of a Tier 1 school but it ended up being schools that were either top ranked in any location or schools located very close to a work site. Now that hiring is increasing I still haven't seen that rule change. So my advice is to look at what companies recruit at the school by calling the school placement center. My guess is some schools don't have many recruiters show up. If the schools in question have the same recruiters or a similar number of companies you would be willing to work for then it probably doesn't matter much.
Never forget about people skills. Raw brains are a cheap commodity in the day of globalization. If you feel the need to party and socialize between classes, don't resist.
Table-ized A.I.
I would have used what was in front of me.
You can always chase greener pastures. It is the smart ones who maximize their situation.
Perhaps changing school would be better for you - there is really only one way to find out. However, if you are going to an accredited program, and you have some major corporations in the area, I would say this: use it to the max.
Keep, file, and organize every assignment and program you make. CS is cumulative.
Make connections with peers, faculty, and local industries. Think hard about a specialty, research the (world-wide) industry, and forge working relationships with a professor or two who will unwittingly become your mentor.
Do not be sidetracked by learning too much. Always do your homework, always shoot for a good grade. It is tempting to get sidetracked and start reading about "Type theory" and ignoring a mundane, stupid homework assignment. Do the assignment. You can always learn things later.
Trying to figure out what employers want is like trying to figure out what the opposite sex wants -it depends on the person/organization.
Know this. Good grades are good. A degree is good. Good references are good. Well-done and robust projects are good. A strong foundation in the fundementals is good. Results are good.
I sold my books during break to pay for food. I lost respect for my school and that affected my motivation. I pursued obscure and high-level topics at the sacrifice of basic homework and grades. I thought the more I learned the better off I would be. But I forgot what I was paying for. You ARE there to get a degree. You can learn on your own time. Do the work first!
Yes, I learned a lot. Yes, I did some good work. But a college has so much more you can use. Connections. Access. Experience. Participation. Use them all.
Stay healthy. Dress well. Look people in the eye. Do good work. Keep informed about the world out there. Visit your business library and read up about the current markets (Standard & Poors, etc.)
Now is a good time to start thinking about your first job out of school. Begin pursuing internships NOW. Talk to your professors about doing work around the labs and campus. Assisting in projects. Proofreading their papers. Do not look at yourself as "only an undergrad." When you start acting like a professional, you start becoming a professional.
First the two non profits. Non Profit jobs require a combination of degree and knowing someone who already works there. Since there's no incentive to work hard -- actually knowing how to do your job might not matter as much. Acedemia falls into this category IMO, and I think it's the best for a lot of CS people. Research can be rewarding and a lot of fun.
Government jobs are all about knowing someone on the inside. Nothing else seems to matter. Once you're in, you're in, then it's all political. The worst kind.
Mega Corps are all about degrees and knowing people, and in the lower ranks mostly knowing people. Large companies like these can afford to hire dipshits (who are usually someone's nephew, cousin or friend) who don't know how to do anything, and get paid for it. They use money and politics to do business (instead of product quality.)
I work in the For Profit *competitive* sector, where it's all about how good you are. If we can't compete with the other companies, we don't eat. A degree might help presuade a potential client, but it's all about actually getting the job done and done right (quickly), degree or not.
It's always good to have a degree in anything from anywhere. It's always best to be professional no matter what you do.
Whatever you do, stay in school.
Do you want to be successful like John Smith? How about Robert Jimmyjoiner? Sam Francisco? Well you better stay in school. You'll go nowhere fast without a degree because that piece of paper validates you and determines your worth as a human being.
If you drop out you are destined to become a small time failure, keeping company with such delinquents as Paul Allen, Larry Ellison, John D. Rockefeller, Thomas Edison and some other guys you've never heard of.
Don't be Bill Gates- stay in school.
Is your dad paying for the tuition?
If not, stay where you are. An extra $20,000 spent on tuition translates to needing to make nearly an extra $40,000 in salary (taxes!) to make up for it down the road.
On top of that, you'd actually do far more to help your future employment now to take a good internship (or research position or whatever) where you work for free (and willingness to work for free is one of the things that will get you a good internship) than to have to work a crappy job that pays the money you need to afford school.
Or if you're entrepeneurially minded (and can spell better than I can), you could take that $20,000 and start your own business now while you go to school. It's a lot easier to start a business when you have a student's flexible schedule then when you work full time (believe me, I've started two, and the one I started in school was much easier). Sell the business when you graduate, or hire a manager and enjoy the extra income.
The one place where which school you are at matters is what companies recruit at your school. You'll find that companies will tend to recruit at big-name CS schools (like MIT/Carnegie/CalTech) no matter how far away they are, the big state schools in neighboring states, and smaller state schools/smaller private schools in their more immediate vicinity. The converse of this is that if you go to a small-name school, you're probably going to be looking at a job near where you are now when you graduate, but on the upside, it's also easier to get interviews with local companies (cheaper for the company, it can be done anytime instead of in one of the 15 minute appointments the recruiter has, and you can interview on-site and meet more people and see the company).
Personally, I got my job because I was the most memorable person at an intern/co-op fair at my school, which was a combination of my company being at the fair in the first place, and being able to talk for a half an hour about the brewery local to the company's location while 20 unmemorable people waited to hand the guy their resumes. In CS, you'd be surprised how much of getting a job can just be being able to hold a conversation.
I got hired full time because I performed well during my internship.
Also, FWIW, one of the most talented people I work with has a degree from a small-name CS school (it's most known for it's music-related programs). But it's a school local to the company, so the company recruits there. He also started as an intern.
paintball
but what degree you get is basically not that important. It might get you an interview, but from then on you're on your own. I did I biochem degree, decided it really wasn't for me and did a bioinformatics masters - and then randomly ended up getting a job doing telco/IT consultancty (and I'm still here 4 years down the line). I went to a careers fair and gave CV to pharma company. Stand next to it asked for my CV, then offered a phone interview (which I thought would be good practice), then offered proper interview (again practice) and then offered me a real job - with real money. I think the specifics of a degree aren't too important. Every company will try to mold you into what they require. You just need to demonstrate you have a decent intellect, can adapt and improve, and the world's your f'in oyster. I'd stick with whatever actually interests you. Something that might be worth considering is associating yourself with something that will get employers interest. In my company at least new potentials are interviewed by their potential peers - nice normal vaguely geeky people who hate the whole HR thing and will love somebody they can have a geeky little chat with. They'll have to work with you and there are quite enough vacuously boring people in the world.
Sometimes on a weekly basis.
Hiring a person who has met this standard, gives the hiring manager at least a hope that his new hire will perform.
Without a diploma, I have found, not that people are lazy and or incompetent, but lacking in confidence and the drive to take a project to completion.
I usually don't care if the diploma is from an Ivy League or a State College. If you got the sheepskin, then you know how to work.
Too many people were lured away from College during the dot com boom... And now, post bust, the lack of that diploma is hurting them.
I hire diploma'd people because they perform better, they strive for goals, not just a paycheck, and when they are finished, they find something for their next assignment without my need to find something for them.
Just my two cents...
Im attending a small university average 20 students per class but its like a franchise of the big school. Kinda the best of both.
Small classes and Name University on my degree.
There are a lot of opinions here and you can pick the one that you like best but in my experience (not very broad but deffinitelly not limited) the name of the school is not what you will benefit at all. If you get your degree from say some small state institution vs. a respected private school it is not that degree that is going to help you get the better job. As some one mentioned there is a lot better network of people in the better schools and it does help a lot. Most companies are not going to look for people in the small state schools and if you choose to go there you should be prepared to do a lot of work on your own when looking for a job. That might involve a substantial investment in traveling costs to and from conferences and other stuff like that. If you do that the name of the school would be absolutelly no issue to you. Plus when you present yourself you DO NOT want to put the name of the school above your knowledge and experience. This is an error that a lot of people do in the *top* school and it cuts quite a bit out of their starting salary or may even result in them not being hired. Of course those people are usually the ones that just went through college and left no significant impression on anybody.
The other reason why you might want to choose to go to a better school is that you are a lot more likelly to get better and a lot more experience there compared to the the small state school. When the general level of the students is lower the professors lower their expectations and you end up with not as good of a class/ not as hard as you would in a better school. However, you should also know that a lot of private college (about 90% of the Liberal Arts ones) have a non written pollicy to lower the level so that a lot of students can graduate with high grades. It makes the department look better and it also results in a salary increase (about 1-2% every 2 years for good teaching skills). So, basically the question about the better quality and higher quantity of experience gained in a *better* school is very subjective. The easiest way to find out if you could get more experience in another school is to look at the members of the CS department. Look for a department that has at least 10 members and for one that has lots of grants and lot of profs. that activelly do research. Most people would post an abreviated list of publications on their home page. If the department is not activelly involved in research and they do not have grants I can gurantee you that you are not going to learn anything worth your extra time.
I can see pilots making good money. Right now, helicopter pilots are supposed to be doing well; jet pilots, not so much, what with the problems in the airline industry.
And top brass can get cushy jobs at defense contractors, where all they need to supply is their rolodex.
But most of the military? Nah.
University of Calcutta seems to be a good choice.
Dear Will, the plums were poisoned. -- Cheese Club
I have been a profession programming consultant for the last 5 year. I got lucky in college and a friend of mine gave me a job at his company (F500). I soon decided money > school and droped out.
Although I have been working on my degree (Electrical and Computer Engineering) part time, I mainly see it as something I will be able to use to get a management position in a few years.
Comming out of college with no experience you might as well expect not to get a job, let alone a high paying one. The IT world is ultra-competetive and too many schools, even the great ones, turn out people with CS degrees who can't program for shit and therefore most companies see no-experience grads as too risky to hire.
Unless you go to MIT, Stanford, CalTech, Berkley, or Carnige Mellon you probably won't get job out of college without atleast a Master's degree?
So what can you do? Go get some experience, work for free, do open source projects, just get projects on your resume with good refrences and then you have a much better chance at getting work.
Good luck!
The other thing to consider is, unless you are going to a really really really big name school (MIT, Harvard, Duke, Oxford, etc.), the difference between your state degree and a degree from a better school that may only be regionally acclaimed is practically nothing. Unless you are planning to get a job in the same state as your new school and there is a good chance the people hiring you would think great things of it, it just won't make a difference. Also, from having worked in the admissions department of one of these top-tier schools (Duke), your chances of transfering in are practically nil - Duke took 40 transfers per year for a school of 6,000. And if you're not tranferring to somewhere like that, it won't matter.
Basically there is one reason to go to a name program and that is location choice. If you went to Stanford, Berk, or MIT, you can get a CS job anywhere very easily, you can pick your city to live in. I went to a good program (UIUC), and I got a good job straight out of college during the crash (Summer 2002) in the Bay Area. I think this was largely due to my school, as I had many interviews outside the Chicagoland area. (Although getting interviews the east coast was surprisingly harder then the midwest and west coast coming from UIUC).
That said, if you are fine living and working near your school, besides personal networking, it doesn't really matter where you go. We have good people in our company from Chico and San Jose Sate, not bad schools but OK and local. Go to a defense contracter in the DC area and you will see people hiring from all sorts of small schools in PA MD, VA. NYC area companies will hire from all the SUNYs and schools like Syracuse, not especially known for CS. Well except finance companies, cause they are a little prestige biased. But otherwise it doesn't seem to matter much.
The three little sentences that will get you through any job. Number 1: Cover for me. Number 2: Oh, good idea, Boss! Number 3: It was like that when I got here
One problem I noticed personally is that the big giant state college campus for our state turned out less impressive undergrad CS students than the satellite smaller schools in the state college system. I think this might come from the fact that the smaller college doesn't offer a post-grad degree, and therefore they have the attitude that "We have to teach all the important stuff *now*, because this bachelor's degree is all we're going to be giving out..." Thus I was getting the same topics thrown at me in "400" level classes in my undergrad cirriculum that I saw didn't show up until the "500" and "600" level classes at the big central state school's cirriculum (i.e. how to write a parser, how disk filesystems work in OS'es, why semaphores have to be handled at the OS level and don't work in userland, that sort of thing). I think the attitude at the bigger college was "We can get around to teaching that stuff only for the students that are going on to grad school. For the rest, they aren't going to care about it."
I think that if you are only going for four years, you'll get a better education at a school that does NOT offer a graduate program. If you are planning on going longer than 4 years, then it's a different story of course.
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
I bought a brand new subaru impreza WRX when I got out of school with the money I saved. I have no debt from college.
Where did you get the money in the first place?
The code of honor and general feeling of brotherhood in the CS program at the university I went to was frightening. It was literally the only place I know of on campus where you could leave things all day and know that nobody would bother them. Someone might look throught a book for an answer if it was sitting on the desk, but it would be there when you got back. Worst case, someone might move the chair your stuff was in so they could use the Sun.
It also wasn't unusual to see us crash on the (extremely comfy) couches in the halls for an hour or so or even to crash on someone's couch if you didn't live on campus and had a long night.
Where did I go? Ohio University in Athens, a school generally known for it's "party" nature (but also with a good CS program, one of the best journalism programs in the nation, and a few other well known programs).
Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.
I am in the business of hiring people for software positions and have had some experience in trying to evaluate prospects for job openings.
There are usually two steps to getting hired fresh out of school.
1. Getting your resume picked. Here having a good GPA from a lesser known school or a reasonable GPA from a very well known school can help a lot. But so can previous experience even if it is a hobby that you pursued during the school year or a really cool school project. Some of the best programmers I have hired did more learning out of the class room than in it. If the resume can show this, then it can help it get selected.
2. Surviving the technical interview. I usually look for evidence that the candidate has the ability for analytical thinking.
I would switch to a more prestigious university if you thought it gave you an opportunity to pursue more exciting projects. I would not switch if a professor has picked you (or might pick you) to help pursue the professor's research interests. This is the strongest indication of accomplishment you can get as an undergraduate besides winning contests or writing a real cool application.
When hiring I could give two-sh@#s about where someone got a degree from.
Can you code? Are you seasoned/have experience?
Thats what it comes down to.
As per "networks" and alumni - go make friends and invest that $60k+ you'll spend more to go to an 'Ivy' league school.
...(what a few hundred Slashdotters seem incapable of):
I'd say right now the "classic" CS market is as bad as it can get. Which means: You have the distinct advantage of, what germans call "studying anti-cyclic", which means when you're finished you can expect there will be a growing demand again.
That been said:
No other area is in such a rapid and extreme fast-forward evolution than the IT sector. The way people work, earn their money and which kind of work is needed in order to solve problems changes at least twice a decade.
What I'm saying is, do be aware of this:
We are living in the steam-age of IT. Standards change every odd month. Weird things like the once so hip Java showing signs of age and having it's market slowly nibbled at by PHP - who would've figured? HTML & JScript Hacking was a big fat hairy deal a tad more than 5 years ago, now it's not even good for a joke.
OSS is around the corner, posed and ready to kill off large chunks of an entire world-wide 800-and-something billion industry which will then bit by bit be fed into entirely new industry stuctures and business models. Nerds hacking their Minix clones have grown to demi-gods of the industry and some other nutcase is making a huge fortune by forcebly ignoring classic IT concepts and selling little harddisks in white (and pink and pastel blue, etc.) cases that play music with a computer 3000 times the power of what your fields ancestors used to programm on for a living.
In other words & bottom line:
We're heading full-throttle into a large-type badass Age of Cyberpunk. Wether or not you you want to stand admidst in the fray in ten years from now is up to you. Go figure.
My 2 cents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
In my (and my wife's) experience - in England rather than America admitedly, where you get your degree is more important than the class of the degree (unless you get a first) and even the title of the degree.
:) at a first class institution - in the UK you'd be looking at Oxford or Cambridge. In America you'd be looking at Harvard, Yale, MIT and maybe a few others.
When you're a few years out of university nobody cares what you studied it's your experience that matters. What still impresses a potential employer is where you studied.
Leading both my wife and I to conclude that instead of doing Biochemistry at good institutions we'd have been better served in the long term by doing something really simple (History, Sociology - I don't want to get too rude but you know what I mean
So, in summary. Hard science degrees are a mugs game. Do a p155 simple degree from a top institution & you'll be much better of at the time - because you'll have lots of free time - and you'll be a lot better off in 10 years time because you've graduated from a "name" university.
What are you listening to? (http://megamanic.blogetery.com/)
I'd highly recommend a dual-degree (CS and some other major) or switch to another major and get a CS minor.
Computer skills coupled with a degree in another field puts in great shape for getting a first job.
My background is Chemical Engineering undergrad degree. My strong computer skills (Perl, VBA, and the arcane FORTRAN) are what put me over the top in getting hired at an environmental consulting firm (I run air pollution dispersion models, which consequently require tons of data processing of meteorological data. Fun stuff, especially with all the mapping in GIS I get to do!)
Out of my amigos who were CS majors, one works for a car dealership (some computer work, but not his dream job), another joined the Navy because the job market was so bad in his area.
I'd recommend Eletrical Engineering (my university had a combined Eletrical and CS degree) or Chemical Engineering which is also very computer intensive in many of its subfields.
Whatever you do, don't do a CS major only.
I know that that what impresses me in addition to course work is someone interested in computer science. People who learn on their own and do things on their own. People who have contributed to open source projects or published some of their own software.
Also, internship experience. This allows you to talk about accomplishments in something like a real world setting.
And on the topic of internships... Let me give a plug for the internship programs at the National Labs and in particular at my employer, the Lawrence Livermore National Labs (LLNL).
LLNL has excellent internships in a variety of areas, including physics, materials science and computer science. A friend's daughter did an internship here last summer and was given access to the microfabrication (silicon) fabrication facility. Another student did some work to add the Reiser FS to a distributed computing system. Some of the departments have seminar programs for summer interns which are interesting as well.
If you are interested in applying see the LLNL web pages (don't send me email, I can't help). You should apply NOW, since some of the programs stop accepting applications by the end of December (some allow applications through January and Feburary). In many cases you will need letters from professors, so get those letters now before winter break.
In today's climate, the job you're looking for can only be obtained if you already have a "network" of people who are ready to get you the job. These jobs are being outsourced to India, where those companies in this industry don't have to pay a living wage. And this looks to continue well into the forseeable future. I recommend you keep your passion, as I have, but pursue something that will get you employed. I recommend academia.
While I'm no expert at CS programs in the US universities, I lean towards belief that it does matter where you go to school. Good schools in general have better resources, better instructors and better students. There is a serious improvement in quality of knowledge you get when you are studiing with the group of extremely smart individuals as opposed to group of the average ones. It leads to more rewarding interactions with people you study with and allows instructor to cover more complicated and interesting aspects of the subjects. At least it is true for science subjects (I majored in Physics). The level of students always had MAJOR impact on how much you learn in my experience (I studied in Russia). My dad was a CS instructor for about 20 years and he would say the same thing. There is no substitute for experience obviously, but I would that think one should want to maximize the gains from his college/university years.
Sounds a lot like my Western Washington University experience.
Realities just a bunch of bits.
17 years ago my uncle gave me this advice when I was a freshman at the local state college, and having the same concerns as you. He said the school name on the diploma might help you land your first job, but after that it's all on you. Now here I am, 36 years old, a graduate of a no-name state college, and I make more than 2 of the guys on my team who are roughly my same age and who both have degrees from Duke (big name school in NC). The #1 difference between me and them? They thought they could coast after graduation, but I stayed hungry and worked my ass off.
College, just like life itself, is largely what you make of it. I'm not putting down the big name schools like MIT or Harvard, but never, ever forget that most of what is taught at the undergrad level at all schools is just stuff out of textbooks. The big-name schools don't really pull significantly ahead until you start talking about graduate studies.
After High School I was pretty burnt-out and didn't even bother with the SATs. After working dead-end jobs for a few years I enrolled in Community College, took all my remedial classes again and worked my way up to a couple A.S. degrees, x-fered to a local state university and finished up my B.S. in C.S. Along the way picked up numerous memberships and affiliations in honor societies and technical consortiums, oh and a summa cum laude etc. etc. Long story short, I now run a large training program for a massive part of the government and work for a $2bil/yr company. I'm in the queue now for my forth promotion in 2 years (a company record!).
Some of my colleagues went to top-tier schools and what I found was that, generally speaking, they started at a slightly higher position than those from lower-tier schools. However, long run I found that the slow starters often made up for and eventually exceeded those other colleagues (such as myself). Chalk it up to psychological need to prove themselves through hardword vs. the top-tier folks resting on their degrees or what have you. But I've found that after 4-6 years it really doesn't make a big difference except in one critical area - Community college was a steal, and because of my ultra-high GPA going into my last 2 years at university I got grants that were large enough to cover the modest tuition that state schools charge vs. private and other such top-tier schools. In otherwords my school is paid off. Done. 100% profit. While my colleagues have $100-$250k to pay off in student loans. While they live in rent controlled apartments, I bought a house and two new cars. While they can't even think about grad school because they can't afford to stop working to think about such a program. I'm preparing to go to one of the top schools in the nation for my chosen graduate field without breaking the bank.
Being in charge of the program I often interview new hires. The hiring committee and I often take this approach to evaluating the worth of degrees:
1)If they went to a top-tier school, but didn't necessarily major in a field that school is known for..i.e. C.S. Degree from Havard. Poli-Sci degree from MIT....in the trash pile. They obviously went for the name recognition. We don't want those types of shameless self promoters on our team. In fact given the incredible expense of those schools, one can generally sum up those types as masochists who will do anything to get ahead. Not an ideal candidate.
2)If the school was well known for their major then they get some bonus points. Let's face it...some schools really are that good for those fields. i.e. Harvard Law, MIT C.S., Tufts for I.R. Caltech for Phys. etc. etc. However, GPA really matters. It's still possible to blow a load of cash on a name school and coast through with enough to graduate. I have several case studies doing lackluster work in my office who were hired by other divisions based on name recognition and several who have been fired for said performance.
3)Unknown schools/lesser known schools. We talk to them about their program of study to determine if it was rigorous enough and diversified enough (we do like to see C.S. majors taking an extra semester of English or Poly-Sci students taking calculus based physics for their lab science req.) GPA means *alot*. If you couldn't manage better than a 3.3-3.4 in your chosen field of study, why should we hire you to do that same level of work in the application of that education?
4)All others...trash pile.
5)In a few rare cases we do look at people who do not have degrees if they have copious amounts of other types of experience. Speak 4 languages fluently and designed a new sorting algorithm? We'll talk. We generally use this equivalency. 5-7 years experience = B.A. 6-10 years = B.S. 13-18 = M.A. 15-20=M.S. Usually the M.A./M.S. position are usually filled by somebody with those years of experience and a B.S. We will never put somebody into a Ph.D. level position without a Ph.D. no matter their experience.
This may sound elitist or harsh but no business can afford to keep underperformers on their payroll.
I went to a private top-10 school for two years, and then bailed to UT/Austin for a math degree. Both schools taught me a lot.
The best thing I got, however, was entering the post-college trail without 100K of debt. It allowed me to take a lower-paying job that I actually liked after getting my degree. Because I liked it, I did well, and got higher-paid jobs, that are very interesting.
I can also afford to go to graduate school. Or, fuck off in boracay for a year.
Keep learning, do what you enjoy, and be fiscally prudent. It's more important that you may realize.
Best of luck. Part of growing up is figuring out what you want, and not doing what others want you to do.
I graduated with a Double Masters in CS and CE, 3.4 GPA in the past year. I had trouble finding a job because companies only go to career fairs to recruit of they have a vested interest in the school in some way. My school had only 11 companies show up at the career fair, making the burden of finding a job rest on my shoulders only.
To combat this, I also went to two careers fairs at a Prestigious University that I didn't go two. The Career Fair for CS majors had 50 companies show. The career fair for all disciplines had over 200!
I can truly say from having friends who went to the Prestigious school that I studied the same curriculum as them, and was at least as qualified as them. In some cases, my curriculum was even harder. What made the difference is the sheer fact that they were able to get their foot in the door through the University's name.
Example: I talked with a company at the Prestigious school's career fair, and the guy told me he talked with over 100 students about the opening they had, yet I was the only one they set up a formal interview with. Why? because once I was able to make the contact, my education and skills shone through.
This brings me up to the summary: once you're in the door (as other people have mentioned), it's up to you to interview well and land the position. But from my experience the interview is much easier than getting your foot in the door. In the end it is not worth the money to go to the prestigious school because you are most likely getting the same education, but in a tough job market (as it is now) spending the extra money through college loans will help you get your career started.
I assume you are talking about the US.
For the US I'd say: take the best college experience you can get. I thought I was hot until I started looking at some coursework they do in MIT. The expectations are higher.. the results are better. You DO get a better education there (regardless of what people think of it). That being said, in the US, in the end, experience rules.
For Latin America I'd say: degrees, degrees, degrees. If you can get it from Harvard.. that is better (because Harvard is the most well known famous University here.. so you'll look the best, nevermind if it is the best in your major). Experience matters very little or nothing at all. Degrees are everything. Even whimpy certificates from that PC repair course you took in grade school adds to your prestige. Though I'm sure that in some countries that may be changing because of US influence. (Age also matters.. )
Regards,
Mr. Dr. Eng. Prof. A. Coward PhD MBA
My time at university was the only time I met real, actual women in any quantity. And I still didn't get much.
Bear this in mind when you go for a career in a world populated 99% by men.
Get a degree from the University of Delhi
Slashdot: News for Nerds, Stuff that matters only to them
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Had I taken my own Dad's advice to follow in his footsteps, I would be stuck in some boring (but technical) government job somewhere, just waiting for my pension to begin.
So be careful about parental advice. Today's world is very different from the one your parents grew up in. Also be certain that your parents (or you) are not tacitly taking the position that because you have no personal talents whatsoever, a degree is necessary to validate you. The very premise is untrue!
so what your saying is, that there is no real differece between Penn State, RIT(RODchester INstute of tech) and Drexel(in Phili)? all which i got accepted into. I choose penn state becuase its cheaper and nicer. plus the football game :)
I hire developers. Some of them have agricultural engineering degrees, some have maths degrees and some didn't get near a college. I think one has a CS degree but I don't hold that against them.
All the successful candidates have two things in common:
My experience of recruiting is that having a CS degree is not a reliable indicator for either of those qualities.
L.
- Internships
- Alumni System
- Career Center
would be more deterministic. If they have a good relationship and you can get internships with good (preferably large international) companies you basically have a huge advantage after you walk.I had an internship at Boeing and I was very underwhelmed by the experience. But I knew several fellow students that started with them after they graduated.
So my advice would be to take advantage of such programs often and early. It will also help you determine if you really LIKE what you will be doing after you graduate.
Your mama codes in Pascal.
Not since Marie-Antoinette played milkmaid has looking simple and honest been so fake and complicated.
I work as an ENGINEER in the BIG 2.5 AUTOMAKERS without a degree. Sure, I consider myself really, really, lucky, but the fact is, there are a good number of us. You just don't hear it much, 'cos it's hard to admit amongst the degree holders. Doesn't mean we're stupid; just alternate education.
That said, you *do* need to know your stuff.
How does this apply to the IT world? Well, we have IT departments in the Big 2.5 as well.
These days it's not where you did your degree that matters... it's what you did in your Masters...
While an intern, it was my distinct pleasure to remove 2000 + goto statements from a pascal program that was translated from basic.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
known schools as bad programmers from well known schools. Skills, experience and the ability to have a conversation with someone.
http://tinyurl.com/3t236
Go to grad school. Then the only people who will care about your undergrad school is the admissions people - and all they care about is your GPA and abilities.
"Physics is to math what sex is to masturbation." - Richard Feynman
There's also a stigma about employers who carry stigmas... You're better off not working for them.
Working at a gas station doing overnight shifts, plus graduation money and such. Let me re-phrase:
:)
I had no debt after college, so I could assume the debt of a car loan
Reason, free market capitalism, and individualism
The school you go to is about the social networks you get. At least if you're only going for a BS. Obviously some schools have very specialized masters and phd programs. If you are going "all the way" then you would want to be at the right school. Although plenty of people get a BS at one university and get into a masters program at another.
If you really are only going to get a BS at some school, then you need to realize that professors and the alumni program at the school will be an excellent resource for getting your first job or two. If you have other resources and contacts for this, or are not terribly picky about what sort of CS work you do, then you can freely go to any college you feel is right.
I never finished college, and managed to land my first job through my own social network (I used to run a BBS and one of my ex-users sought me out to work at a start-up). But I am not a typical case.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
"Quite simply, the "big name" schools have the best research faculty, where "best" is measured by top caliber conference publications."
Right.
Which has nothing to do with an undergraduate degree.
Congratulations, you managed to come up with the worst advice in this thread, which is quite an accomplishment.
You must've gone to that "big name" school.
It is common knowledge that "networking is key". Two things will dramatically increase your networking opportunities:
- Rich family
- Prestigious school
A prestigious school can make up for not having a rich family, because you network with that many more people who do come from rich families.
This economy is about capital. It is very rare that someone with skill and insight, but who is lacking capital, will be able to excel. If you have skills, you need to network to again access to capital. No one will come looking for you. Those with wealth will become more wealthy with or without you.
Do you see that luxurious train? Get on it. Sneak on it. You will have more opportunities washing dishes there than you will - for all your skill - trying to succeed on your merits.
You don't want to know how many oafs, dullards, and drunken frat boys I have seen become prosperous over the years since school, who by their merits would be washing dishes in a 2nd rate diner or cleaning the men's room at a trashy bar.
This is true. But there is another way. That way is Academia.
Being a "seasoned" college junior, enough experience to know all the back ways around campus, but smart enough to know i still don't know jack sh!t, I'm going to venture my opinion here: If you're hired because of your talent/experience with a language, but you ain't got a degree to show that you did more than high school English, you're most likely going to be hired for a programming job and not much more. Maybe a project leader eventually.
I will agree that there are people who never did more than algebra who are some of the best leaders/thinkers out there, and there are others who have the degrees but aren't worth the oxygen they use hourly.
But there is no denying that most of the people who make it farther than the duties of a programmer/techie/etc are the ones with the social, management, and problem solving skills developed in those 8-10 semesters of schooling (in my case probably closer to 11 or 12 semesters...)
All employers do one way or another. You can either get over it, or start your own business.
that matters. The CS degree won't help much.
What matters more than the degree is experience 9 times out of 10. Not to everyone but to almost everyone.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
If you have any interest in it, I believe that nurses will make more than programmers in ten years.
Of course project leads/development directors/etc. will probably still make more, but how much more? Are the available tools and libraries making monkey's work out of application development?
(And yes, I work for a healthcare company)
Retired from software... maybe. Sort of.
your post very closely matches what i have been screaming (mentally) into my computer screen for the last 15 minutes as i read these posts. what i want out of life is a little more than a monster.com meatmarket job.
i am 10 weeks into my cs masters program at a school with a top (as in usnews tied for #1) program. until i was here, i was not a believer that the school would make a real difference and my decision to consider only the best school was was more of a "because i can" sort of thing. i spent four years out in industry and am coming here because i was subject to the monster.com meatmarket with no good way out.
what i'm finding is that my fellow students are the among smartest people i have ever met in my life--every one of them! they will all succeed. many will shoot up into management, many will be involved in startups, many will be top researchers. on top of that, i'm making sure to attend social events with the school of business and i'll be taking formal golf instruction later this year with many of them.
i'll probably forget nearly everything i learn here. it's not about learning. it's about proving i'm smart enough to get through here (the last 10 weeks have been the hardest, but most rewarding, of my life) and filling out the rollodex.
the school name on my resume may not help that much with monster.com, but you can keep monster.com.
You get the degree at the end of several years of work, not the beginning. It isn't the degree itself from the highly placed school that gives you an edge, its what you do at the school. The end result of some exploration and study is the degree, but that isn't the sum total of the experience. A degree, all by itself, is worth zero without the stuff you did to get it. Higher-ranked schools simply provide a much greater variety of opportunity to explore, network and do research. Schools are rated by employers, academics (and alumni), so find out why they like the school, maybe its in your best interest.
You go to school to figure out what you want to do; to start your professional network with students, who very likely are going to go places and do things, and may want to eventually involve you; to network with faculty, staff and alumni. If you are any good, you're going to become an enabler, and they're going to want you to work with them to make things happen.
The most important thing is to figure out what you want to do, because you don't want to expend your considerable energies over decades on something you're not interested in doing. Steer through school until you hopefully settle on some aspect of CS (or not!), and as you go you can start to use the academic experience at the school, plus the internships you may land, to put it all together. Usually, if you're able to narrow your interests down in a particular field like CS, you'll be able to identify the schools you want to attend because some prof whose work you admire is teaching or doing research there.
I think that the edge a CS degree offers depends upon what it is you want to do by the time you get it. If you have a clue, by the time you get that degree, you'll already have committed to something major and you won't have to worry about the employment thing after graduation. You'll already have attended conferences and mingled with the pros or started a business or developed your kickass open source package.
That degree is just a marker. In fact, you may already be moving so fast by the time graduation shows up that it'll be an effort to remember to stick your arm out the window to grab the darn thing on the way out. Don't forget that degree, however.
Does it matter where it comes from? Sure it does, some people think it is critical, that it is a quality control thing, and for that reason it has importance.
If you want to go to a highly-rated school for your targeted profession, you're not necessarily going to find people who are similarly highly rated, but you do have to put your toe in first to actually try.
To figure out if you belong at a school, you may have to experience the school for a little bit, like a summer session, or hang out at the beginning or end of a session, and you need to do some research. It helps to do some correspondence with folks who are going there.
These days you can find some people by internet if you work at it, and find out where they're going to school, but people on the net aren't necessarily the same in person, so you may not wind up hanging out with them.
Try not to do too much for free, as you do have to pay the bills, and there will be a line that someone will ask you to cross and you should not go. That comes with the territory of the CS degree. You need to figure out what you are worth during the time you're at school too.
CNN.COM:
Fielding's DangerFinder:
Forbes:
Military Casualties in Iraq:
- 1,402 deaths / 623 days
- 9,326 wounded / 623 days
For average troop level of 100,000 troops (currently 138,000) this is:- 821 deaths / 100k / yr
- 5,464 injured / 100k / yr
If 125,000 was the minimum troop level:So, I'd have to support your claim that joining the army is one of the more dangerous ways to pay for an education. But as others have said, if you stay out of the infantry, or serve during peacetime, the statistics are a lot better.
As for the payscale, Ask.com reports the starting pay is about $27k / yr. This doesn't compare favorably to the average U.S. salary of $36k / yr. Comparing a starting salary with an average covering a breadth of experience isn't fair. The average salary for someone with just a high school education is $15k / yr. So while I wouldn't say the military make much more than the average person , in some circumstances it can look pretty attractive.
Internships can be dangerous in this economy. We've had very good interns that we kept for 2+ years but then couldn't make a full-time offer to. What appalled me was that managers would keep hiring them as interns (one even went to grad school at night to maintain eligibility). Definitely do them, but realize that fate plays a large role.
Your degree should fit your story. Smart, broad guy -- Harvard,Stanford,UVA. Super technical geek -- MIT, Caltech, top state schools. Hard worker -- a wide variety of schools. Bootstraps -- no degree, but lots of courses, certs, etc. We hire all types and want all types. There is nothing worse than a group of all Ivy Leaguers or a group of all bootstraps.
Some jobs are exponentially harder to enter if you have the wrong background. Those you need to enter from inside the company or with a very strong inside connection. It doesn't mean people don't get there.
A prestigious degree may open a different set of opportunities when combined with your interests and your experience. But that may not be what you're interested in (I turned down two top MBA programs when I realized they probably wouldn't help me overall in my chosen career path -- but other potential careers they were a key gateway).
Companies like Microsoft and Google want the high-end degrees. They want really smart people (SATs are an intelligence test) that can survive the high-pressure environment. I knew people who just weren't smart enough (even though they worked harder than I did) to cut it in my CS program. And some were lazy, or unreliable, or...
There are plenty of people who are just as smart, hard-working, and experienced with degrees from elsewhere. But it takes a lot of false starts to find them. And when we find one, we love them because it drives everyone else to work harder.
My company doesn't like high-end degrees (they leave, want more money, don't like the low-end work at the entry and mid levels). We want people that are intelligent, reliable, patient, and willing to learn. People at MIT usually are lacking at least one of these if they're considering us (big company, not prestigious). We shop for them at local universities where we scarf up the top talent. And sometimes we get weaker talent from more prestigious places (usually academically average but smart and hard working).
An executive recruiter once gave me his view on people. The companies he works for looks for 3.9s at midrange universities (smart, hard-working, good social skills) or 3.0-3.5 at high-end ones (smart, not a geek, worked reasonably hard, good social skills). Most people will have a much easier time on one of these two paths. For me, it was the second. For my sister, it was the first.
In addition to what everyone else is saying about experience being key, I wanted to add 2 things:
1) Last I heard, 25% of all practicing programmers have CS degrees.
So, I like it when I see people with CS degrees. I just need to verify they weren't sleeping through their classes, otherwise, I need to verify whether an applicant may have the same capabilities, but will inevitably be lacking the formal terminology. A CS degree in any form is a plus.
2) Going to a local college is a lot less expensive, and I recognize that. Many people don't have the finances to go to a better name university.
If you can transfer and it's a much better name, and you can afford it, go ahead it won't hurt. But there's a number of things you can do to better yourself that would be more effective than transferring. For instance, I highly reccomend getting good hands-on experience however you can. Either via a job, or even an internship/co-op. The experience at that level is more valuable than any salary you'll get.
Just do what you like now, and skip so-called higher education. Don't spend your money on an education that has no value like I did. Don't expect to make any money in the U.S. as the buying power continues to decline. www.bls.org Incomes adjusted for inflation is down more than 30 of the last 35 years. The smart thing is take the money you have now and invest in a poor country like the rich people do. Move to the poor country of your choice and start a company paying people pennies an hour while you get the profits. Option 1 (Best): 1. Leave U.S.A. for a low cost country 2. Invest in your own business and make 25k which will buy 200k worth of stuff 3. Profit Option 2 (Pussy): 1. Invest in education 2. Get a job a McDonalds for 40k or Intel for 40k 3. Lose your ass in low pay and permanent debt Option 3 (What I did): 1. Invest in education (waste 6 years (I paid)) 2. Get a low paying tech job (waste 2 years) 3. Quit to run small business (lose money for 2 years) 4. Leave country (Next Month) 5. Profit (Due to false exchange rates) Option 4 (Unabomber Option): 1. Invest in education 2. Go crazy when you realize the U.S. hates math, science, and engineering people 3. Bomb the government 4. Lose your life Fight the World Nazi Police State
A lot of you are talking about what it's like in the "real world". Unfortunately, the world of college recruiting is quite different. Most large companies will only recruit at big-name universities because the talent they get has more value. Even if they do recruit at smaller schools, you can be sure that they'll be making smaller compensation offers.
Your undergrad major doesn't matter that much (unless you're SURE you want to do programming), but your GPA matters a lot. An English major with a 3.8 will get more attention from an investment bank than a CS major with a 3.2
My background is similar in that I also received a general CS degree from a state college. In the last 10 years, I've worked my way up to being the lead architect for a software company that develops and sells award-winning enterprise-class software to Fortune 500 companies across the global.
You will definitely feel that you are at a disadvantage when you try to find your first job given that if you don't have the experience, the college "name" may be the deciding factor that gets you in the door. In the end, you may end up in a crap job (like I did)...However, crap jobs are blessings in disguise...They will test your drive and fortitude to succeed in this field (two very essential qualities to being successful in general).
When I hire people with no experience, I look for people with ambition, determination, and a general understanding of how computers and languages work. Knowing a particular language or coming from a fancy school known for CS is secondary. One of my best friends has an associates degree in Liberal Arts and he is pulling down $250K a year as a contractor working on advanced satelite communication systems for the government.
If you have the determination to work hard and think big, this field can be very rewarding. Otherwise, save yourself the agony of sitting in cubical hell the rest of your life and pick a different career!
In the US it doesn't matter where you get your degree for undergrad in CS. A Masters or PhD would be a different story. If you have the skills, in general, having a degree in CS doesn't matter much at all... in the US. In the EU, having a CS or technical degree is a near requirement for any IT or programming position.
Another thing to consider is that, transfering to another school will screw you over in credits with few exceptions. I would only consider transfering schools if you were extremely unhappy with where you are at right now. Otherwise, transfering can be a pointless waste of time, money, and grand frustration.
In my experience (15+ years) working in Silicon Valley for various startups and big-players, where I got my CS degree, never came into play.
So stay where you are and finish your degree. And if you can help it, get a job now while you are in school to get some actual experience.
I did my undergraduate work at a relatively obscure state college. Nevertheless I worked hard, made connections with the professors, prepared for and participated in national contests like the Putnam exam, and landed a great internship at one of the national laboratories. With a bit of research experience under my belt, good test scores on the GREs, solid letters of recommendation, and heavy coursework, it was relatively painless to be accepted to good graduate programs.
If you aren't after your Ph.D. directly, you can always apply for a masters program. Virtually any program you get accepted to will pay your tuition and give you a stipend to live on. If you can say you have a Masters/Ph.D. from a highly regarded school, nobody will care where you did your undergraduate work. This is actually a great way to go, since a local state college is so inexpensive comparatively speaking. You just need an early commitment to put yourself out there and work your butt off.
I have to agree somewhat with what irritating environme said.
"...but consider what happened in the post-dot com boom, you NEEDED a CS degree."
I currently work for one of the top three auto manufacturers in the U.S. I read job postings for in-plant engineering jobs. Some I have read require a B.A. (some simply require a 'Bachelors Degree'). So....I can major in Dance , or Art , or whatever, and be qualified for the job, but if I have an ME, EE, or any Science study I wouldn't be?
I know, more than likely a B.S. would be every bit as adequate for the job, but it just goes to show you the mentality (or intelligence)of the people hiring.
I'm not a computer scientist (I'm an engineer, and I'm effectively drunk right now), so correct me if I am wrong, but "programmer" and "computer scientist" are not the same thing. From what I've read so far (comments here), a degree is not as important as experience when applying to a job as a programmer. But there are analytical tools that you learn in pursuing a CS degree that (supposedly) make you better in up front analysis of what you are doing or what you are going to do through programming. Not to belittle programmers with this analogy, but it is like comparing draftsmen or "mechanical designers" with mechanical engineers. Sure, you can learn a lot about design by doing design work. But from my own observations and experience, it is usually not a sufficient replacement for the experience of low-level tedious analysis (mathematical or theoretical analysis) that you might get from a degree program. Of course you do not really need to complete a degree to get this experience, and after a few years as the CS degreed folks start to forget everything, it really won't matter. My opinion is that up front, it really pays to have a degree from a recognizable university to acquire your first job. As long as you don't get fired immediately, any employment after that is based mostly on prior work experience. FYI, the company I work for, like many other large companies, uses (stupid) computerized filters to screen applicants. If the HR department sets up the rules to reject resumes that do not indicate that the applicant has a degree, your years of experience are irrelevant, as you will never reach the interview stage. I would guess that this is particularly applicable to early career type jobs.
What I did was get a degree in electrical engineering (from Arizona State, not a particularly well-respected university - it's known more for being a "party school" than anything) and then, my first job was programming related, and I got sucked into this career. I wanted to avoid spending my whole life staring at a monitor, and getting carpal tunnel syndrom, but that's what I do. (So far my wrists aren't too bad though.) But I really honestly miss a lot of things that I didn't learn, which I would have learned if I had gotten a CS degree. I never had compilers or operating systems classes. I didn't learn Lisp well enough. I didn't learn OO concepts at all. I had an AI class and one that covered some advanced knowledge representation techniques, but they didn't go deep enough. (Now, however, I have done most of these things in the course of various jobs I've had, and perhaps have learned almost as much as if I had had the classes. It was just a steeper learning curve for me than it should have been.)
I would recommend you go to a college where you will get an immersion in Scheme. That means either MIT or University of Indiana in Bloomington. Urbana-Champagne might not be too bad either; I'm not sure what they teach but at least they have a good reputation. At many other places you will only learn Java, which is too simple and doesn't expose you to some really advanced, powerful concepts, which are not used in industry as widely as they should be, precisely because too few people know about them. And it really takes some time and experience to wrap your head around them, too; a mere explanation does not suffice. The low quality of education that people are getting is holding back the whole industry. If you are sure you want to do CS work for the rest of your life, get the best education you can get, money be damned. That's what financial aid is for. You are only young once, and you have maximum intelligence while you are young, so make the most of it. I mean, you want to be a computer _scientist_ not a web programmer right? The other advice you are getting here seems to be more along the lines of doing as little as possible to get some kind of programming job and survive. But those jobs are going to India now, and maybe in a decade or two the computers will be doing more of the grunt work as well, leaving only really creative, intelligent, high-level work for first-world countries to do.
On the other hand, some circuit theory, digital logic classes, computer architecture, assembler programming etc. will be very useful to you even if they seem to be more in the hardware realm than what is required for CS. What has been least useful to me was the semiconductor physics (way too much of it) and analog IC design. I was pretty lousy in those classes too, and don't remember a lot. The active devices class I took at a community college was more useful than the university-level stuff.
Another thing is to make sure you can be friendly with the professors. Many ASU professors are terrible about that; they just don't care about students very much. Of course it's hard to tell about that until you try to interact with them. But I worked with a U of I student a few months ago, who worked at my company for the summer. He really impressed me with how smart he was (knew tons more than I did at that age), and he said he really liked his professors too. So I think it must be a pretty good school.
I went to a small state school, with the intention of transferring after 2 years, and I decided to stay. It was probably the best school for CS in the state's university system, and I think I got a good education, but it was nowhere as far as reputation. Even most people in the state more than 50 miles away have never heard of it. I got my first "real" job in '95, actually 3 months before I had the degree in hand and I'm sure it was on the strength of the interview, not the name of the school that was going to eventually grant my degree. I was probably offered less money than some others from schools with big names, but I advanced quick on ability and I left there 18 months later making nearly 35% more than when I started and with a recommendation that got me a job at a large defense contractor. My experience with them has been that if you come recommended, it's not so important where you went to school -- but we only RECRUIT at the big schools, and we only go looking for co-op/interns at the big schools (and most of the good co-ops/interns do get offers). Since I came in with a recommendation, no one ever looks at my CS degree or where it came from. But my alma mater could be turning out the the next Linus Torvalds or the next Alan Turing, and no one at my company would know unless he had a friend on the inside. I've volunteered to recruit there, and I might as well be talking to myself. But they'll send recruiters to the big name tech schools and the ivy leagues every semester. I can't say I blame them, I imagine it's a return-on-investment calculation for them. Sending a recruiter to my alma mater might net them one diamond-in-the-rough every few semesters. But they figure you couldn't have gotten into mega-institute-of-technology unless you were smart, so there ought to be lots of diamonds there. So, you may have an easier time of getting a first job out of college if you go to one of the well known schools (but persistence and the ability to interview well might work as a substitute), after that, as almost everyone else here has said, experience and recommendations are more important. Good luck!
Please stay, because I do not want to be the only one stuck at a dumpy school.
...
IT in North America is dead. There's a glut of CS grads, software engineers, system admins, programmers, and every other IT related field. There are still way too many people getting into IT (programming, engineering, administration, etc) as a result of all of the IT programs that were created or expanded during the dotcom boom of the late '90s.
It pisses me off every time I see another ad for some school recruiting students.
GET OUT BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!
I can't see it matters much at all at the undergraduate level. It might make a bit of difference in a more research oriented place for folks with a MS or PhD. But you can always transfer for those.
To tell the honest truth it seems like 90% of what you learn in undergraduate CS never gets used in the commercial software world. This is not because it is all useless by any means. It says more about much of the commercial software world.
A hint though. Spend less time learning the intracacies of Java and more time on "odd" classes like a couple of semesters of abstract algerbra, as much AI stuff as you can fine and HCI classes. Maybe spend some time with the Cog. Sci. folks. Build a good conceptual tool set and breadth. Don't plan on hacking code for some alone. There are tens of millions of people doing that.
Even better advice: Go to grad school and network like crazy. Find some partners to start a company with. Quit school when you have received all you can get there.
-s
I think that there is an advantage to graduating from a prestigious university. However, this advantage is useful when you are competing with people who are at par with you. You could graduate from a not-so well known university and still end up with a good job provided you are good knowledge and skills. As far as learning technologies is concerned, it is true that as a computer science student, you can grasp any technology. But when the meduim level companies hire, they look for professionals with knowledge fo required technologies to avoid learning curve.
I think the school matters and my reasoning is like this: ACM has a little programming competition and traditionally the school that wins in my region is a top notch school, why should it matter? The same knowledge is there in the same books at different schools, etc., but the students at the upper schools were likely higher achievers in high school. You need to have a good academic record to go to a top school, therefore that is where the smart people go. That should make the odds better for an employer, shouldn't it?
...
It was definitely harder for me to get in the door for that first job, though. I got lucky in many respects, whereas other folks from higher profile programs had an easier in. For the most part, though, I agree with the folks here saying your first job matters more than your degree. After my first job, experience and social networking were definitely more important than the degree itself.
On the other hand, I didn't want to finish with a B.S., I wanted to go back to grad school and eventually get into teaching at the college level. So after having been a part of the workforce for a few years, I applied to Ph.D. programs at several well known schools.
Despite my having very good grades and excellent references, most of them turned me down flat. I'm reasonable sure the primary reason was my undergraduate degree -- when you're competing with 9 other people for one slot in the program, it's easy to get tossed out for not having a degree from a well known university. My work supervisor at the time got his Ph.D. in CS from CMU, one of the programs to which I was applying. He wrote one of my recommendations. I got in. I think if he hadn't, they probably would have turned me away because of my undergraduate degree as well.
So I do think what program you're in does matter. It's also been my recent experience that the undergrads at the high profile program really do learn a lot more than I did in my undergraduate program. That doesn't mean it's true in all cases, but it certainly is true in my limited experience.
When I first applied to undergrad programs, I was accepted at several well-known programs, but I decided I wanted to go to smaller, more personal school instead. I liked the program I was in, but if I had a chance to do it over again, I would choose a different school.
Shorter summary: Granter of degree is not destiny, but is an important component of same.
Hope that helps!
IMHO, I think if you can transfer to a more prestigious college, then do it. When landing your first job, alot of what will keep your resume out of the circular file will be what college you came from. What counts for most employers is work experience. When you land your first job, then you can demonstrate how much you have learned. And lets face it, the reason alot (not all) of these colleges are famous is because they have really good CS programs. If you think your learning alot now, what more at a "Prestigious" college?
YES ... you'd better get into the most famous college if you ever want a job anywhere in asia. Why did you think spammers were selling degrees? It's all just for show so that you'll get the job... nobody cares how well you do as long as you learn to suck up to your boss ('s balls, if you're a woman)
Sounds to me like you're trolling.
I am in the process of getting a grad degree at an Ivy League in the west. I think it is easier to get interviews for jobs, but you still need to know your stuff. People give me business cards just if I say hi after a presentation - that's called networking.
However, if you don't want to work in Silicon Valley (I don't), it becomes more difficult as you move out from ground zero, because it becomes just a name on a piece of paper instead of a place they send a recruiter to.
In my experience, it's just another factor, a good GPA, good letters of recommendation, and a good "brand name" all are parts that will land you an interview/ consideration, but if you don't perform well on a technical interview, they will quickly pass you over.
To answer the original topic question instead of trolling:
Also, being the top student from a lesser known school will increase your chances of getting into some good graduate schools. They like to increase their networking/future alumni base by pluckinng the top students from a wide variety of places, and it could be you, if you do some research/get good grades/etc.
For the record, I went to a Big 10 school as an undergrad.
One more thing. If you do a high tech startup, a name brand degree is icing on the cake, although that's about it. It means you were able to jump through some sort of selection hoop/test score.
There are lots of people who do not think that a CS degree is that important. These are usually people without a CS degree.
The argument usually goes that experience counts for more, or at least as much, as a CS degree and therefore a CS degree is useless.
The big question is- how do you get your first job? How do you get onto the first rung of the ladder? Answer: in one of two ways 1) you have a CS degree (or similar academic qualification) 2) You (or daddy) knows somebody who can get you in regardless of your experience.
Perhaps a more meaningful question is take 2 school leavers and put one in CS college, the other directly into a software job. after three years- who knows more a about software development? Answer- the college guy will have a much broader and conceptual knowledge of software development. He will have had to have proved his worth to get into college in the first place, and also programmed full time for 3-5 years, learning a variety of state of the art techniques. He will be as profficient in database modelling as he is in evaluating compression algorithms. The guy that got the job directly from school? He will probably have a deep understanding of the organisation that he works in and a reasonable understanding of the part of the product that he works on (although he will have nothing to compare it to). Having never had any of his abilities independently evaluated, he may be completely useless- you just cant tell.
The bottom line- beware the guy with no CS degree, for he is an unknown entity.
It is interesting to note that the most sucessful software companies have stringent academic requirements on new hires. Try getting into Google or Microsoft with anything less than a CS Masters! There is a reason for this- CS graduates are ususally far better programmers. I should know- I have worked with both for years.
A CS degree counts for a lot. Many people feel threatened by it and will try to undermine it. These people are idiots. Ignore them.
Differences in interest rates of, say, 2% a year don't sound like much. But over 30 years it makes a heck of a difference.
So it is with a well-known university. The immediate advantage is not great but it accrues over many years into something quite significant.
Compare 10% with 12% over 30 years: the end multiple is 17.45 vs. 29.95
In the UK the University does make a difference, firstly the Universities are selective on admission, the better Uni on average the better students. Secondly the better Uni teach a tougher course with more challenging modules.
There is also is the divide between the Ex-Polytechnics and the old Universities. The Ex-Polytechnics tend to teach more piratical causes e.g. Oracle instead of database theory, to start with the Ex-Polytechnic student can do more things with your db when you first hire them, however your more theoretical tourt student will take a little longer to start with but after that initial hump they a typically overtake the piratical student as they have more developed learning skills.
This whole post is full of sweeping generalisations but does represent a trend I've noticed over the last n years.
If you really want to increase your chances for a better future, get involved in projects. Open source is excellent for this kind of thing. Or something cool at your school. As someone that reads resumes, I can say that I weigh a cool project 5 times higher than the person's grades or school. It shows motivation. A school shows... what exactly?
Devon
malfunct or mjpaci or both?
Not to mention the degree will get you past the HR department.
If you're going through the HR department, then you're doing something wrong. HR is for companies to hire and manage food service people or janitors or laundry people. And HR stuff like insurance and benefits.
HR is a barrier to entry. If you're going through HR, then you're (usually needlessly) subjecting yourself to a filter that weeds out job candidates.
Networking is the key to getting good jobs. Somebody you did a favor for a year ago will be looking for a new employee a year from now. Someone you were friends with in college will think of you when their manager asks if they know a good person for that position that needs to be filled.
My advice for getting a better job:
Be nice.
Wait.
Ask.
Will your skills suffer greatly by staying where you are? Probably not. IMO most of learning is what you put into it. If you put in the effort, you'll walk away learning a lot whether you go to the top schools or the not so top schools.
However, where the prestige, or lack thereof, of your school will hurt you is in getting your foot in the door. While it probably shouldn't, the name of the school carries weight. When someone reading your resume recognizes and respects the school you're from, that helps get you an interview. After that, it's what you've learned, your experience, and your skills that get you the job.
There's one other benefit to a better school. Networking, and no, not the wired/wireless kind. At a better school for your field of interest (i.e. CS), you're going to meet lots of other top people in the field. That network of people will help you create and find better opportunities in the future. Who you know really matters, so the better people you associate with, the better off you'll be.
I ended up choosing a smaller but well-regarded private engineering school over a very good but large state school. While I probably would have learned just as much at the latter, the career, networking, and academic environment at the former formed a far better foundation for my career. This is evidenced by the results, as I had a number of equally intelligent friends go to the latter school. I've had significantly more career opportunities due to my school's reputation and the social network I made there than my friends from the state school. It certainly helps that I did well in school and have good experience, but I definitely would not be where I am today had I chose differently.
My advice: go to the best (for learning/teaching), most reputable school you will be accepted to, can afford, and aligns most with your career interests.
I've been working on computers since I was 13. That's 18 years, or since 1986. I went to a lower class college, took up a IT job, and quit college.
Even though I know more than many folks, I have been here longer, and I work harder - the people with degrees always get paid more.
It is well worth it to get your degree. The 4 years you spend as well as the money will reward you later on in life when you retire. The extra money I could be making if I had a degree would really look good in my 401k, IRA, et al.
That is the most important aspect of getting a college degree when working in general IT. My opinion would be different in other fields, or specialized areas.
a cs education is often what you make of it - a lot of programs offer considerable flexibility in what you can concentrate in, and what you get breadth in - and the more you know, the better off you'll be. of course it depends on what you want to do career-wise, too...
my suggestions is doing a comparison. i had a friend who got a CS degree at a prestigious (but not for CS) university, and i felt that my education (I went to CMU, he went to NYU, FYI) covered a lot more important things than his did... more concentration on concepts, less on languages and details like that.
hope that helps!
Yesn I know that. I was agreeing with a comment about another comment. Please read the parent to understand.
So...Uh... Everybody's job hasn't been outsourced?
...are just not represented on Slashdot's comment board. - Heh - They prolly sold their pc's to buy food...
Do the posters here on Slashdot - account for the majority of people who are - or more accurately "were" in IT?
Perhaps the posters on Slashdot only account for a very small fraction of the IT (or Once upon a time employed American IT) professional? - Perhaps the vast sea of unemployed/underemployed x-IT workers that have lost their jobs to:
1) Outsourcing
2) H-1B non-immigrant type work visas
3) The CAFTA loopholes which let the citizens if treatied countries vie for American jobs..
---
SpawnClown- look me up on SOCOMII and lets war
Let me re-phrase:
:)
I had no debt after college, so I could assume the debt of a car loan
Oooooooh... I see.
Apparently, you can go to college and still not know how to spell "cannon".
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
There are some pro's and cons - but my 2 cents says...
A CS degree is basic, like a BA but with computers. Easy to get and graduate but is a basic minimum today. Very few CS types program well.
But the best degree to have today might be Electronics or Electrical engineering with a major in computers. There are a few big advantages about being an engineer. First, the degree is generally more widely accepted in and out of the I/T industry. The second is that if you decide I/T is too unstable or disorganized you have an exit.
I also predict the day of I/T meets up with real engineering. Most I/T shops today are disorganized and unplanned reactionary events. But business is starting to realize that unplanned I/T development has some huge long term disadvantages to costs, support and functionality that could be avoided with decent rational engineering processes.
But make sure you get a degree of some type as like bad love is better than no love at all - a lesser degree is better than no degree at all.
In their recently published "College Majors Handbook With Real Career Paths and Payoffs" (Jist Publishing), three economists ... concluded that choosing a major was more crucial to future financial success than the college attended.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/05/jobs/05jmar.ht ml ?pagewanted=print&position=
December 5, 2004
Choosing a College Major: For Love or for the Money?
By DAVID KOEPPEL
Like countless other college students, Susannah Lloyd-Jones struggled with her choice of major. Finally, in her junior year at Loyola University in Chicago, she picked sociology, a decision that "opened my mind and introduced me to other cultures, " she said. More than two years after graduation, though, Ms. Lloyd-Jones, now a 24-year-old paralegal from Maplewood, N.J., occasionally wonders if she made the right decision. "It might have been easier if I had been a business major," she said, "because that's where the money is."
Ms. Lloyd-Jones says if she had it to do over, she would probably still study sociology but take more business classes and work some internships. She said students feel tremendous pressure over the choice of a major, which could be an important career decision, when many are just beginning to understand themselves.
Many students and career counselors say the pressure to choose the "right" major is more intense than ever because of factors like rising tuition costs and the uncertain economy. Parents and students today often consider college more an investment than a time of academic and personal exploration. Some students say they are education consumers seeking the best return on that investment, which is often financed with a student loan.
The annual cost of a four-year public college averages $11,354, a 7.8 increase from 2003-4, according to the College Board; a four-year private college averages $27,516, a 5.6 percent increase.
In their recently published "College Majors Handbook With Real Career Paths and Payoffs" (Jist Publishing), three economists from Northeastern University in Boston try to quantify just how much students with a variety of majors can expect to earn in their careers. The authors concluded that choosing a major was more crucial to future financial success than the college attended.
One of the authors, Paul E. Harrington, an economist and associate director at the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern, said that, on average, humanities and education majors fared far worse financially than students in business or engineering.
In 2002, workers with degrees in chemical engineering and accounting were on the high end, earning an average of $75,579 and $63,486, respectively. On the low end, philosophy majors made an average of $42,865 and elementary education graduates $38,746.
Mr. Harrington said the research was not intended to dissuade sociology majors from following their passions. Instead, he hopes the information will help students prepare carefully when choosing a major. He recommends that students contemplating majors in the liberal arts or humanities also take some business-oriented courses. A philosophy major, Mr. Harrington said, should probably get some real-world internship experience.
"The world is a more unforgiving place than it used to be, and investment costs are too high for four years of drift," he said. "If a student doesn't take the right sequence of math courses in high school, they can lose out on the best jobs."
But some people worry that choosing a career based primarily on economic factors can lead students to make poor choices. Jieun Chai, a 2000 Stanford University graduate, for instance, deeply regrets not majoring in Asian languages.
"I'm so angry at myself for giving in to peer pressure, parental pressure and societal pressure," Ms. Chai wrote on her Web journal. "Why are you taking only language classes? Think about your career in consulting, engineering, medicine or law."
Alysha Cryer, who was Ms. Lloyd-Jones's roommate at Loyola, withstood pres
Seems like everyone's walking around with $0.98 in their pockets...there's a need for my $0.02.
With the exception of those with well-heeled parents, every student should go for the school that offers the max reputation, name recognition, and quality program.
Why? Simply because the admission standards used by each school inadvertently act as a "student quality filter". Industry can use this barometer in this manner -- "if Little Johnny got in to Harvard, then SURELY he is a high quality candidate!"
"The mere imparting of information is not education." --CGW
Employers don't actually care about experience or education. They care that you can get the job done well and done quickly. Experience and education are only ways of estimating your likelihood of doing the job well and quickly. So when your degree comes from Snale, or Harberd, or Harmony Yellin', an employer has a slightly better idea that you will be able to handle the work load. But if you have one or two internships in the very field for which you are applying along with former supervisors who will attest to your ability, you will breeze past other applicants. Bottom line: go to school where you are happy and where you believe your education is best. Keep an eye for what career interests you, and make efforts to get experience in that area.