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Ask Slashdot: Best Alternative To the Canonical Computer Science Degree?
connorblack writes "I want to be a web developer, and everyday I ask myself the same question: why am I wasting my time getting a computer science degree? I feel like I'm trapped- most of the courses I spend all my time on are far removed from the skills I need to succeed as a web developer. But on the other hand, I can't imagine another degree that would allow me to stay in a programming mindset. The fact is that web development has taken huge bounds in the last few years, and sadly most universities haven't caught up. Computer science is a field that overlaps with web development, but getting a computer science degree to become a web developer is like getting a zoology degree to become a veterinarian. Close, but no cigar. So here's the deal: I'm in my second year of a computer science degree, and the thought of wasting two more years, getting left in the dust, and becoming irrelevant has me horrified. I want to start my web development career now. Or at least as soon as possible. I can drop out and devote 6 months to teaching myself, but I want something more structured. Something that has the benefits of a classroom and an authority figure, but which teaches me exactly what I need to know to do what I want to do. Any suggestions?"
Make your own website, get a job working for a firm as an intern. I went to school for computer science and learned a hell of a lot more 'in the field'.
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
*Degree == Paper(employers want to know you can stick it out)
*Comp Sci teaches you fundamentals
*The first two years usually don't focus too finely on the specific area of the degree(you'll learn the more pertinent info towards the end)
As a Professor at a top ranked Engineering University, I thought I could give you a little bit of perspective. If you find CS not challenging enough or not on target enough, you might want to get a degree in another engineering discipline like Electrical Engineering or Mechanical Engineering. Countless superb programmers come from another engineering discipline such as Electrical Engineering, Mechanical, Aerospace, etc. The reasoning for this is that if you find that you don't like programming 60 hours a week, you will have in demand skills in another sub-field to fall back on. Also, typically with majors such as Electrical Engineering, you can take courses that cross over into CS liberally, but also understand how computers work down to the Silicon. So my advice is stick it out and finish a degree as that is something that will never go away.
Translation : I'm a retarded web monkey "programmer" (actually just a glorified scripter) and am too dumb to see the benefits of learning CS since it's hard and stuff. Halp me!
I can't agree with this any more. I had some similar thoughts when I was getting my CS degree, but I now consider the things I learned in college invaluable. Most online tutorials don't teach you about reliability and efficiency and it's good to have the theory you learned in college to back up the programming you'll do as a web developer.
I second this comment. The "college is a waste of time" mindset seems to be popular on Slashdot and couldn't be further from the truth. If you can't understand how some of the formal learning you're getting in college doesn't help you as a developer, you're not thinking hard enough about what you're being taught. College isn't about teaching you to write a web page for a specific job. Formal education is teaching the best way to tackle fundamental problems the most efficiently.
I just completed a degree after about 14 years in the field and I took A LOT from my curriculum (and I mean in EVERY class).
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
It's getting a stupid meme, but again: this.
I got a job as a web developer (though the job title is actually Senior Software Engineer). I did a Bachelor's in Computer Science and a Master's in Software Engineering, and it sure paid off. Of course going to college didn't teach me how to do PHP or HTML or CSS, but it did teach me about time complexity, algorithms, data structures, and all the stuff needed to solve scalability problems. It taught me database design, which you better firmly grasp before even thinking about using a NoSQL solution. It taught me about testability, software processes and design patterns, all stuff which any developer should know, web or not.
I remember when I was young and just about to start going to college. I was a self-taught programmer, was working as a programmer part-time already, and I still had the arrogance to even doubt if college could still teach me anything useful. Boy, am I glad I finished my studies anyway.