Would a CS Degree Be Good for Someone Over 30?

mbuckingham asks: "I'm 39 and have been programming for 20 years. By 'programming', I'm talking about the usual business applications type of stuff. Easy stuff really. I went to college for a while, but never got my degree. It bugs me that I've never completed my degree, but since I've always had decent jobs, it hasn't really mattered too much. I'm really bored with what I do every day, and I'm thinking about going back and getting the degree, because I think it will make it possible to move towards doing some more advanced, system-level type stuff. I know I don't want a MIS degree, because that would be rehashing everything I'm already bored with. Does this make sense? Would a CS degree or a Computer Engineering degree be better?"

Comments

Nope

[JanneM]

No, it's useless. So would any other degree, be it in engineering, health care, medieval Italian or croquet. You're damaged goods. At 39 your life is over and all you can do is coast in your current non-career until retirement when you and the missus move to Florida and you spend the last waning, bitter days playing bad golf with Hank, a former insurance salesman that smells of cooked cabbage and keeps droning on about the life insurance business.

On the other hand, if you forget the career thing for a moment, then yes, a degree in cs - or in medieval Italian for that matter - may very well be an excellent choice. You get to really dig in on something you're interested in, expand your horizons and meet and work with a (probably pretty diverse) group of people you would never had the opportunity to do otherwise. Is it something you yearn to be doing? Then do it. You may even pick up a story or two to shut up Hank.

CS?...

[TemporalBeing]

Honestly - I've finished my 4 year CS degree, and do agree with some about the

you need this little piece of paper to get past HR to get a job interview mentality - it's there. That said, a degree in CS (whether a BA or BS in CS) is utter crap - and worth less than the piece of paper it is printed on. What I would really suggest is finding a good Software Engineering program and getting a degree in SE, or if you like do a Systems Engineering degree - but again, find a good program where the graduates actually know what Software Engineering and Systems Engineering is. (A lot of them do not, sadly enough.) The CS degress (typically out of the Math departments) are just crap, and full of useless theory; find a good program that is out of the Engineering department (with no relation to the Math department) and you should be good.

Also, as noted by others, you may see a bit of a pay cut, but that depends on the kind of jobs you look at and how you play your experience. Technically - a lot of companies simply count a 4 year degree as 4 more years of experience; but they don't give you the pay grade for it. So, if you do go for the degree, make sure to keep up with the field you've been in for the last 15 years, and then market yourself into that field with the degree; then you should come out on top - assuming you kept up with it. (I.e. don't give up your day job.)

Hope that helps.