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US College Students Still Aren't All That Interested In Computer Science
itwbennett (1594911) writes "Despite the hot job market and competitive salaries, the share of Computer Science degrees as a percentage of BA degrees has remained essentially unchanged since 1981, according to data from the National Center for Educational Statistics' Digest of Educational Statistics. If history is any indication, it will take a cultural phenomenon to shift the percentage higher: Blogger Phil Johnson point out that there were 'two distinct peaks, one in 1985 (4.4% of U.S. college degrees) and one in 2002 (4.42%). These would represent big increases for the classes entering school in 1981 and 1998 respectively. The former year corresponds to the beginning of computers coming into the home and the release of things like MS-DOS 1.0, all of which may have increased interest in programming. The latter year was during the dot com bubble, which, no doubt, also boosted interest.'"
Computer Science is not IT and at some time / schools not even coding, web site work and more.
More like fake job market.
More jobs for me!
I have tried to teach a handful of people how to program. Generally it either takes or it doesn't. Some people would lose their minds at how hard it can be to get some new library to compile and I think they could see that coming. The whole concept that a single wrong letter could mean the difference between success and 200 error messages just made them ask, "You do this all day?"
I don't think that it is that these people can't learn but it is simply something that is completely not part of their brain's make-up. Many people like things like writing reports where you are making a generalize persuasive argument which will be backed up with meeting and maybe even some time on a golf course; things that generally drive most programmers insane.
What?
CS degrees aren't the only game in town. Lots of programmers come from C.E., E.E., or Math degrees. I would say the number of programmers, in total, are going up, just that CS degrees are less prestigious or desirable.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
Is a CIT degree counted in the numbers? The list of degrees by subject seems to be Computer Science and Technology...
I would expect Computer Science degrees as a percentage of BA degrees to be low, as almost all Computer Science degrees are of the BS (or Bachelors of Science, if you will) variety.
The original article doesn't even have "BA" anywhere in it, though, so I have no idea where the submitter got that detail.
Wooohooo let it ride!!!!!!!!!!! Either you get it or you don't. Move on.
Let's be honest here, CS is not the easiest kind of degree you can get. And you also need to understand the crap you learn, sponge learning (soak up the crap, squeeze it out for the test, rinse with alcohol afterwards to get rid of the residue) doesn't cut it, this ain't law or business administration.
And since it ain't law or BA, it's also not the prestige and/or money that could possibly make it attractive. What's left is these people who study it because they WANT to. It's not where you go when you don't know what to study but your parents want you to go to the university, and neither is it what you study when money is your only reason why you want a degree. CS is what you study when you want to study CS.
And the number of people who're interested in computers, who have the mindset AND who have the required brains to make it doesn't change. Why should it?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
we are thick? using POT (Personal Open Terminal) the real time line is open 24/7 we cannot help but learn some things about our original equipment spirit of honor & compassion? what year was that? http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cs+degree+scams
Fascinating theories, ultimately useless.
And I thought this generation was dumb.
Nope.
All they need to do is look at how the current generation (the subset in IT) is being treated.
Come on, it's hard enough getting these kids to get up before noon let alone answer a pager at 01:00.
No brain, no pain.
When I went to college I changed from Computer Science to Business. I feel there are a couple reasons of this and why it hasn't changed... First off it takes a certain person to program, as stated above some people will take it in like a sponge and some people will just never get it right. (I had that part down)
Secondly the poor funding and options in this area for colleges, I think sports teams get more funding than Computer Science. (That's how it was at my school.) I learned more off the interweb than I ever did from the classes.
Third Computer Science was very restricted on what schools, jobs, internships that I could get. It was so restrictive that I and others changed to business, math, etc... which opened up our opportunities tenfold.
In my experience I had more opportunities going ANY other path other than CS. If it happened with me than I am sure it happened to 1,000 of other college kids.
Fuck off you worthless boomer. Back in the '60s, minimum wage buying power WAS equal to $15 today. Now you dickheads think millennials are 'lazy' and 'entitled' for expecting the same thing you experienced?
Have you ever even tried to get a McDonald's job? "Sorry, I'm the manager and you failed the application, go away."
The application includes such questions as "Do you enjoy lying to customers?" The correct answer is "YES."
If you have an ethical mindset and intellect with which to grasp anything, you're not getting a McJob, ever.
America, the land of follow your dreams of working in a technical field! Otherwise, sucks to be you, cause we don't value anything else!
If I knew what my life would be like doing software dev year after year, I wouldn't want to make this choice either.
Give me a job that involves normal, nice people - sunshine, and physical activity any day.
my kid works like a dog. Christ, she works harder than I do. And her classmates are working even harder. 4 to 6 hours of homework a night isn't unheard of. It's fsckin' nuts.
But you're right about them not being dumb. Just about everyone in IT except a few rock stars at google is here on an H1-B. Why in God's good name would anyone go into computer science?
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All the lazy ones who think they're owed something are waiting for the $15/hr minimum wage to come through so they can work a window job at McDonald's Drive-Thru.
The rest simply don't have the mindset (or intellect) to grasp even the simple stuff.
As harsh as the latter comment may sound, the truth hurts. The statistics would seem to back up my belief after 25 years in IT. You're either cut out for this job, or you aren't. External forces can only affect demand or comprehension so much.
And with the ever present threat of off-shoring (to hire non-computer science degree holding Indians), why saddle yourself with mountains of debt just to get a degree that's basically worthless for the "real world," and getting in on the bubble2.0 money? I don't mean this to say that Computer Science is worthless, but that for the vast majority of monkey work out there, it can and is being done by folks who wouldn't know a design pattern from their bosses' assholes. This is mainly because the smart guys doing the real CompSci are building the tools that make it possible for that fucking idiot in the next office over to look like a real fucking genius because he could modify a report someone else wrote to change the text a different color.
Yes yes, devs could potentially benefit from a real CompSci education. Sadly, most universities don't even teach that anymore; they've become vocational schools for the java/.net sweatshops out there. So, if you're going to be an easily replaceable cog, might as well go ahead and get in the workforce and get paid before the bubble bursts again.
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
Has more to do with Pac Man being released in Oct 1980 and the start of the Golden Age of Video Games.
Computer Science is not IT and at some time / schools not even coding, web site work and more.
Upon reading this comment, I suddenly understood why my university required me to take all those painful semesters of writing courses.
What you wrote doesn't seem specific to the topic, just generic Republican talking points. So while you're at it you may as well prescribe lower taxes on the "job creators" and corporations, and cutting regulations.
Why would the smartest students pursue CS when so many CS / IT career fields have artificially low wages due to the glut of H-1B visas that large corporations insist are absolutely necessary? So much for letting the free market work out the supply & demand issues. Government bows to the will of corporations yet again. And that's why many of the brightest students go to Wall Street rather than Silicon Valley.
Yes computer science is not website building.
This is very similar to what I was going to say.
Computer Science and Programming Job are often related, but also often not. And Computer Science and IT often don't even very much resemble one another. And I've done all 3.
There is just no way to compete with 3rd world wages. If a job can't be offshored, it will be filled by a visa worker - unless the job requires a top secret clearance.
I am doing contract work for IBM. There are barely any Americans left. And IBM is doing everything they can to eliminate what few US jobs still exist.
I am amazed any Americans want to study CS.
First: the statistic that is presented in the summary, "the share of Computer Science degrees as a percentage of BA degrees" is NOT what is presented in the article, which is the percentage of CS degrees of ALL US College degrees.
Second: I was working in a University doing CS in 1981. Nobody was going into CS because of the availability of home computers (or MS-DOS 1.0) -- that didn't happen until quite a few years later.
All the big computer-related firms in the US (Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook, etc) are working VERY hard to end the limits on importing high-tech workers from abroad and several of them are currently involved in a court battle that includes the tactics they were using to suppress the wages and benefits of all the computer-related workers in the US (As the "big guys" in the industry, THEY set the "industry standards" for wages and benefits, so their collusion to rip-off thier own workers actually hurt ALL computer people in the US).
The Democrat party is full-on in support of the "immigration reform" these big businesses want (the Democrats currently control the White House and the Senate) and the so-called "Establishment" Republicans (the party bosses in D.C., many of their wealthy funders, the "money is EVERYTHING" people from the north-eastern region, and most of the long-time office holders) are also on-board for these "reforms" and are promising/threatening to do them late this year (the Republicans currently control the House) so, without regard to what the American people may or may not want, the "fix" is pretty-much in; sooner or later the wages of high-tech workers are going to plunge further downward. Government clearly DOES NOT WANT AMERICANS DOING HIGH-TECH WORK. This is a fact, no matter what they SAY. Government TAXES and REGULATES the things it wants to reduce. Government SUBSIDIZES and DE-REGULATES (removing limits is a form of de-regulation) the things it wants to increase.
Any young American who wants a career it's impossible to be fired from, with a good salary and benefits, and with an absurdly unrealistic retirement package that will never be reduced, should major in some nebulous "public policy" field and get a job in the federal government regulating all the people who were stupid enough to try to be productive citizens. You don't have to KNOW anything or have any experience doing anything productive to be well-paid stopping other people from being productive... AND you'll be swimming WITH the currents (doing what government wants)
Wow, I can't wait to be dead at 40, right around family having age. Sign me up!
Could be worse. And at least it's a little harder to offshore since there are cultural differences.
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Here's the general (paraphrased) statistics from the article:
Percentage of degrees that year being "Computer Science"
1981: 2.2%
1985: 4.4% (noted as a peak)
2002 4.42% (noted as a peak)
2011: 2.76%
Number of graduates in a particular field during 2011:
Computer Science: 47K degrees
included Art & Performance: 96K
Communications and Journalism: 83K
psychology: 101K
The article make no mention of how many different "categories" of degrees there are, so a percentage means absolutely nothing. The article also compares the number of "Computer Science" graduates (a very specialized field) to categories like "Communication and Journalism" which include everything from newspaper reporters and tv anchors to video streaming technicians and cameramen.
These statistics actually look pretty good when you consider how many bullshit degrees are awarded in the "Art and Performance" department. Maybe we should start pushing out graduates in flash animation to try and bolster our numbers so these reporters will be impressed.
why take a computer science degree when you can just take some math classes that would apply not only to CS but other fields as well?
If you need to major your degree in CS to learn it, then it isn't for you. A computer science degree is crap, its been proven... using science.
Just ask JohnC who dropped out of getting a CS degree because it wasn't teaching him anything.
All I've got to say is I hope they aren't interested in either. Less competition, less supply, equilibrium settles on me with more pay :).
Try telling that to HR departments around the world. All too often I've seen jobs posted looking for LAN technicians saying they want you to have a Computer Science or related degree; a few of them pass on my resume when they see my degree is in Network Systems Administration (I'm not entirely sure if a person is doing it, because in these cases I get an email saying I don't meet the minimum requirement even though I meet ALL of their requirements listed, including their bonus/preferred requirements, just I don't have a CS degree, nor am I interested in getting one.)
H1B consultants are now reaching the $100+/hr rate for developers. Supply and demand at work as the result of companies not investing in college hires. The pendulum is shifting that hiring from college is actually economical again.
I make a crap ton of money off shops that got burned with H1B and offshore and need experts to fix the systems.
Why is it a problem that the percentage of computer science graduates, as a fraction of all graduates, isn't increasing? The number of students is increasing, so there are more graduates now than previously, but it's a problem because the proportion of those graduates completing computer science isn't higher? There are more degrees now than there were 30 years ago, that it hasn't decreased could be evidence of growth.
<capitalism>We should all panic if <our field> doesn't reach <arbitrary metric> within <arbitrary time period></capitalism>
How to use DOS. Seat one at a OS 390 console and they would really be befuddled.
So people aren't flocking to become programmers?Good. It's not like the current rate has held technology back in any way - there are plenty of programmers - certainly enough to keep up with the rate that technology itself demands. More programmers wouldn't increase that, it would only make salaries lower. And that's probably why there seems to be a push from industry to get more people interested: more programmers = cheaper wages.
Let me check... nope, I seem to still have a job, so you're not quite correct.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Fascinating theories, ultimately useless.
what are you typing on? a computer, running a OS, running a browser, delivered to you by multiple routers and servers all running various servers(http. dns, dhcp), guess who wrote them, the protocols they use, and the maintain the infrastructure. That is all computer science.
---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
Computer Science is not IT and at some time / schools not even coding, web site work and more.
My Computer Science class:
We didn't do much, the instructor had been there for 35 years and had it down; sitting in his office all day. We would go to class in hopes he might take that day to give a lecture. I had an appointment elsewhere and missed the one lecture in two weeks.
We were meant to teach ourselves, doing the current big things networking, and building web pages. Networking was well used playing Doom.
Oh ya, many were just flat screwed, one friend of mine graduated after that class, then called me to ask how to install a video card, I really mad at that point, and made some uneventful calls.
When it was over my saving grace was I knew enough to know I was good, as were two others. One other mentioned he was taking Computer Science and Dell hired him out of class.
One of my jobs in that class was to grab all of the old IBM 5150 PC computers, doing so I found the class used to teach programing chips, that would been very nice to train in. Had to of been taught in Assembly Language to even start. The IBM 5150 PC were given out to whoever wanted them, I got two.
This happened at Columbia Basin College http://www.columbiabasin.edu/a...
If you weren't forced to waste money on liberal arts, english, even sciences (possibly math too in a mis or databasing focused concentration). Grad school and masters during the last 2 bachelors degree years too, easily. If you're going for CS then why the hell would you need things you already qualified for on your entrance exams? To steal your money imo.
Because technically, the visa workers are supposed to be paid the same as citizens. Ok, I'll wait until people stop laughing... The other thing is that when employers try to find the cheapest employees they end up with bad employees. Offshored programmers or engineers are the worst of the worst, often because you go through a broker or large IT house so that you have no opportunity to interview the actual workers, and the foreign companies have zero incentive to provide quality (especially since American companies are stupid enough to keep paying no matter how poor the quality of the work).
You can stand out if you're better than average, only that is a hard thing to do as a fresh graduate in anything. You can also find companies that are not as dysfunctional as IBM (which was never a highly desirable employer even 25 years ago).
When I went to college I changed from Computer Science to Business. I feel there are a couple reasons of this and why it hasn't changed... First off it takes a certain person to program, as stated above some people will take it in like a sponge and some people will just never get it right. (I had that part down) Secondly the poor funding and options in this area for colleges, I think sports teams get more funding than Computer Science. (That's how it was at my school.) I learned more off the interweb than I ever did from the classes.
tour di singapore
The words floating around /. and elsewhere there's going to be/is a glut of these with Computer Related degrees. If they listen to all these helpful hints, most should be looking at the Medical career, (where I started); as it's going to be big.
The way the hospitals are growing here (Three cities, three Hospitals) I tend to agree, never saw those with medical background buy land like they are now.
Also with or without obamacare there is no more single physician clinics anymore, they've had to be brought into the fold by the Hospital support clinics, just to survive.
Yep, getting ready for us baby boomer's :}
Not quite.
"The minimum wage had its highest purchasing value ever in 1968, when it was $1.60 per hour ($10.79 in 2014 dollars[94])."
They would much rather be challenged by their major and study Mathematics, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or even Physics. CS is where you go when you fail out of real STEM areas but are too stubborn to just head to business school.
To attract more people to CS, they should tell the average business major the truth that CS is just as trivial but with a much better job outlook.
These years would also roughly correspond to high school freshman who watched Star Wars (1977) and Hackers (1995) in theaters.
Try telling that to HR departments around the world. All too often I've seen jobs posted looking for LAN technicians saying they want you to have a Computer Science or related degree; a few of them pass on my resume when they see my degree is in Network Systems Administration (I'm not entirely sure if a person is doing it, because in these cases I get an email saying I don't meet the minimum requirement even though I meet ALL of their requirements listed, including their bonus/preferred requirements, just I don't have a CS degree, nor am I interested in getting one.)
All the more jobs for the rest of us who realize that having a CS degree opens doors...
Personally, I'll never understand this attitude. Why would you not want to get a degree if it will open doors? It doesn't have to be expensive (most companies just check for the degree and the school rarely matters), you can do it online, and, if you investigate it, your employer may even pay for it.
Please don't take this as an argument against you, it's meant to argue against this chronic message that we see every month or so that everyone in the US needs to be a programmer. I agree that it takes a certain mindset to be a programmer, just like it takes a certain mindset to be a Fireman, or Soldier, or Doctor, or Plumber, etc... I'm not a programmer for a living for the same reason I'm not a graphics designer. Doing either of those things for a living requires the ability to remain in abstract thought for long periods of time, very much like an artist.
Honestly though, I don't see the big deal. If everyone in the US was a programmer we'd be naked and starve to death in short order. Our houses would burn down and our country would be invaded and taken over. The Allegory of the Artisan is very fitting here, and as with most things Socrates explains this dilemma very well.
A secondary issue is that the a large portion of the population does not want to work any more than necessary to survive. It's not laziness for most, this is a normal and rational way of thinking. I have food on the table and a roof is over my head, life is good. It's takes exceptions to move beyond that, thankfully we have always had those types of people to spare.
I agree with your points, and am more disagreeing with this latest "everyone needs to be a programmer" message. Society needs all kinds of people thinking all kinds of ways in order to function. I'm just fine with that.
If society really wanted to change things then there would be incentives to do so. Who does society compensate better, a Lawyer or a Lead Developer? Lead Graphic Artist or Politician? Technical writer or Paralegal? I could go on and on with that one all day, so will get to the point. People that are above average tend to try and get the most compensation for their abilities. If being a Lawyer has better compensation than being a Lead Developer, guess where most people will gravitate? Society does not want change, or at least executives in companies don't. If they did, they would be paying programmers with 6 years experience more money than their latest marketing "Rock Start" who just got his MBA. They don't! If you want to make the big bucks you go into the business side of the house, period.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Stop the presses! The trolls are lying! Holy Fuck! How Could This HAPPEN?
Reading comprehension please. He says he *has* a degree; this degree is in Network Systems Administration. Last I checked, this degree is *related* to Computers, right? The issue that employers have is that the title of the degree is not "Computer Science", despite it being a computer science degree. This is an issue of reading comprehension, and the lack thereof in the HR department.
---jstlook ---For that is the way of Elves, for they say both yes AND no, and mean every word of it. --- J.R.R.T.
So, the buying power was equal to today's $11, but fifty years later, with economic productivity doubled or tripled through automation, it's only between $7 and $9, depending on place. Are you sure you aren't merely reinforcing his point?
Ezekiel 23:20
What, seriously?
If you want to make an inane mobile app or stupid web site, sure, no need for a CS degree.
But if you can't explain the tradeoffs between an array, list, and hash or what a depth first vs breadth first search means you are not going to get a job at any decent software company like Google of Facebook, because, yes, these things are actually used all the time.
And seriously, "theories"? Sure, you may not need a CS PhD to be a software engineer, but you also don't need an economics PhD to be an investment banker. Doesn't mean the undergraduate degree won't help.
Where is this "hot job market" exactly? The SF Bay area, where a typical salary is just enough to share an apartment with 3 other people, unless you're willing to do the 3-hour commute thing?
It's always a fight for me to find work, usually 100 miles away from the previous job, most likely because HR rejects every resume lacking any keyword on the job reqs, and I'm one of the GOOD ones, with a resume that includes senior positions in big companies you've heard of. I swear HR has gone underground in the past few years, and is recruiting exclusively from LinkedIn or something.
You're in for hell if you've got a student loan hanging over your head, and you're trying to break-in to IT with a blank resume. Hell, those companies that even ASK for any education specifically say they'll consider years of work experience as a substitute, so why go deep in debt for 4 years when you could be earning money instead?
And those "competitive salaries" aren't that great when the companies expect 80 hour work weeks that burn-out their employees in 2-3 years, or with the above difficulty in finding positions when desired, and whatnot. A smart kid in the middle of flyover country studying IT will just be the most qualified janitor in the local McDonalds.
Don't forget some lovely hoops, like companies requiring you meet recruiters in-person before even submitting a resume, or the horde of foreign spammers/telemarketers-cum-recruiters who don't know what state you're in, what you're looking for, or how much of your time they're wasting, and don't care.
Why not have your kid learn to weld, following big construction jobs around the country, earning time and a half paid overtime, more than most IT Pros working the same total hours?
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
You heard right.
I don't get it either, I'm assuming a translation to English issue. The "insightful" score just makes it more confusing.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Nope, I was told I was getting laid off and given 5 weeks (or leave that day) to train my cheaper (but non-H1B) replacements. One was a fairly junior sysadmin with zero unix/linux or java experience (for an environment that was 80% unix & java), and the other was actually pretty well rounded with unix/linux and java (WL) experience, who left after a couple months apparently for a better paying job. My coworker and I were just both at the top of our salary ranges (with several decades experience between us) and the new boss that came in several years earlier pretty much hated us both from the start because we had the 'nerve' to have and speak up about our own 'ideas' and not be obedient lapdogs when we thought something was doomed to failure.
People SAY that CS is this big thing - but is it the real computer SCIENCE part - or do they mean code monkeys? CS was always meant to be much more theoretical than practical. About solving really hard problems in operating systems, efficient new kinds of hardware resource management, compilers, programming languages - not just writing the next web app.
I think computing is undergoing just as big a change now as it did when the .com era came for the first time in the last 90's. Programming is actually getting EASIER and more accessible to everyone. Heck, we've got game makers almost exclusively using engines off the shelf to make massively successful games - and most of them are barely programmers at all. They're script monkeys in Unity. Web companies are making online applications solely from java/ruby and other high-level script and database languages. None of these things require nor touch the difficult problem computer science traditionally focuses on. They're technology jobs - not science.
If I had to predict, the more traditional need of CS degrees are going to shrink and shrink as advances no longer require the bit-twiddling madness of the early years of computing. Hardware will easily have advanced so-as even the most inefficient algorithms for daily tasks will be just fine. No special knowledge needed. The small blobs of very high-perf code that will be needed will be done by small, very skilled CS majors (drivers, OS's, database cores, distributed memory systems, etc), but the majority of code/apps will be simply scripted/assembled together on top of these high-perf, highly-accessible API's. We already see it with abstractions like PhoneGap, Unity, etc.
Kids may be young and a bit naïve, but they aren't dumb. All those big headlines about moving everything to India, Philippines over the last 20 years, and the utter lack of entry positions in big companies IT departments in the west would lead to this.
Honestly how can anyone be surprised?
That is the joke of STEM, all those jobs are quickly, and easily outsourced, so why bother?
But it's always been about "and more" ..
Let me check... nope, I seem to still have a job, so you're not quite correct.
I don't know.
My own company has never once hired an H1-B; nor have any of the Fortune 500 companies we've worked for.
Personally, I think that means we're doomed and they took er jerbs.
Programming in America (and Western Europe) is not as much appealing in comparison to other job options, as it would be in India or in Eastern Europe.
I bet that the Average-programmer's-salary / Average-salary ratio is higher in poorer countries - even without emigrating!
WTF?
What does installing video card have anything to do with CS? Or web pages?
That site you linked to list several different areas of IT janitorial jobs under "Computer Science". Most of that list has as much to do with Computer Science as construction worker has to do with Physics.
Assuming that you've understood that he already has a degree, what you've just suggested is that each university graduate should come out having studied - and passed - every degree.
The founders of the US designed a country that put NO tax burden on the average citizen. The federal government was funded by taxes on imports (traiffs). If you wanted to buy a chair (a place-holder for any manufactured good), that was fine: no tax to buy it and no property tax on owning it. If you wanted a chair made of imported wood, you paid a tariff to import the wood, this made the chair more expensive of course. If you wanted a chair made outside the US, you paid a tariff on that imported chair that was higher than a tariff on just the wood. This encouraged the use of BOTH domestic resources AND domestic labor, AND it made a natural link between foreign entanglements and the federal government funding to deal with those entanglements. More imports yielded more money for the state dept and military. When the US finally added a federal income tax, it was tiny (about 1%) and only applied to the super-rich. Most of the initial economic development of the US happended in this economic environment.
The investor class HATED this; they looked for all possible ways to avoid the taxes and shift the burdens to the middle-class. Of course, to pay for the government, some other revenue stream was needed and that's been setup as a mix of taxes on the middle class and borrowed money. They convinced the middle class to accept more taxes in exchange for promises of new government benefits which they made more-attractive by not raising the taxes required to fully-fund them. They gave us programs like Social Security and Medicare which provided a couple generations of middle class voters with more benefits out than they had paid in with taxes. The borrowed money option will evenually expire, of course, and you hear politicians always talking about the inevitability of higher taxes... because having lied about the basic economics for so long, they cannot now admit the truth and either cut those programs NOW or massively increase the taxes NOW. Ever notice how the rich insulated themselves from the Social Security tax? It's the biggest tax many people pay, and yet the tax only applies to approx the first $100K of your wages. Without that arbitrary cap, super-rich guys like Warren Buffet and Bill Gates would face enourmous taxes and Social Security would remain solvent for another century (it's still a pyramid scheme that will fail, but it would last much longer if the super-rich were forced to pay-in over ALL their incomes like the middle-class do). The Social Security tax is even intended to be hidden from the middle-class... they pay it ALL but half is taken off-the-top of their paychecks (as a so-called "employer's share" of the "contribution", which seems to be aimed at your "rich" boss - people without employers, however, expose this deception, as they have to pay the full tax)
The investor class pushed the agenda (in BOTH political parties) for so-called "free trade" which was designed to open the floodgates to higher-profits for investors by forcing the American middle class to compete with slave labor and prison labor in the third world. Labor costs were, after all, one of the major costs the businesses they invested in had to pay... so lowering labor costs would boost profits and stock values. Foreign goods (made with cheap labor and few environmental regulations) could be imported without taxes, and big business could "outsource" labor to the third-world, importing the finished products tariff-free. The "free trade" push got a big boost in the boom-times of the 80's but was still significantly hampered by all the trade restrictions on high-tech associated with the Cold War. During the Bush41 and Clinton years, however, the Cold War had supposedly ended the related barriers were dropped... which lowered the barriers to exporting production of nearly everything and both presidents (Republican AND Democrat) did their masters' bidding signing treaty after treaty. They distracted their base voters by pretending to fight eachother over social issues like abortion, and gun control while running nearly i
What's this reading comprehension thing you keep talking about. Is that something I can get with a Computer Science degree?
> easily outsourced
Oh please. Show me one outsourced project that was successful. I've been doing development since 1982, and I've managed teams on five continents, and I haven't seen a single one work. There's a reason that people that want a project to succeed never outsource.
Okay wise-ass... what do you propose to do that isn't undercut by the third world? In the end it's net value delivered, is it not?
I have seen that same kind of thing happen way too many times in my Corporate life.
It wasn't the job that was so incomprehensible - that could be broken down, studied, and a workable solution ironed out.
Something far harder for me was office politics. Especially when the ones in charge apparently were put there because someone needed to make a "good job" for someone else in return for a political favor. That's all I could figure out because trying to speak to them of technical matters would only be countered with blank stares followed by evaluations saying I had no "people skills".
I do not even try to work for Corporate anymore. The pay was good, but the working environment was a nightmare. I will forego the expensive things in life to enjoy some peace of mind.
Hell, I am over sixty now, so nobody's gonna want me anyway. I've been in this thing since the vacuum tube days and have been in about everything imaginable.
What I have is the knowledge of how to do things... what I no longer have is the drive to get up at 5AM and fight through an hour of commute and not nap in the afternoon. I am going to nap whether I want to or not. The suit and tie crowd cannot stand having a guy nap on the job, and I can see that. So this old gray mule is off to pasture.
WTF?
What does installing video card have anything to do with CS? Or web pages?
That site you linked to list several different areas of IT janitorial jobs under "Computer Science". Most of that list has as much to do with Computer Science as construction worker has to do with Physics.
Coming out of that course they should of known the basics of a computer, how to build a computer if need be, it was in the syllabus -no matter what Computer Science is suppose to be. It was a Community College you purchase your degrees. It was after the fact that I realized that.
I haven't been to school since around '96 when I created my web page it was only in HTML, Java was just coming out.
I'm retired, before most of my jobs require schooling/training, mostly in house; as I'm sure most of you are required.
When electricity was new, a LOT of people were bitten by the bug. Electrical tinkering was everywhere. You don't see that so much now. Occasionally you will see something interesting, but those individuals who still have an interest in it are rare. For most people, electrical devices and electricity are just a part of life.
Cars and roads and all the things that make civilization are all the same in this respect. And computers and all that? Moore's law is dead. The excitement is dead with it. More and more it is just business and daily communications and the like. It's not rare, novel or unusual and therefore not interesting to the masses.
We're witnessing the maturing of an industry. It will remain important, but the players will be fewer. And seriously, when was the last time you saw people lined up outside of CompUSA to buy the next version of Windows? That's literally decades ago and things have seriously gone downhill since that time. It's all normal and common infrastructure now.
It kind of makes me wonder what the next great technological wonder will be and how everyone will jump on it the way we all did with computers over the last what? 30+ years? We're kind of due for it.
Success depends on the ability to ignore quality issues and the costs that come with them. And it's RACIST to say that people of other nations can't do it as well as we can in the US.
outside it there are lots of crappy "IT" jobs. Basically internet support and crap like that is everywhere.
The trouble is that a CS degree doesn't prepare anyone for the harsh reality of the above captioned.
Well, the armoredgragon's of the world got in there. I have a BSc. from an accredited university but like 40% of BSc. graduators, some "hands on" (read: knows a laser beam subset of CS) graduates get the jobs and end up out of their depth. ""IT"" is unregulated and is the laughing stock of the sciences. It's also a passage for 'jobs for the boys' - all the rich private school kids that graduated in origami and philosophy - they get ahead of you in the end one way or the other..you're not from money - you go the hard way, if at all..
Boomer? Uh. I was born in the 70's Beiber-boy. And I've been working since it was legal for me to work (so, about 25 years). I know all about shit jobs, having held them whilst working towards better jobs.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Hmm.
So in your "ethical" mindset, it's better to just mooch off mom and dad and bitch about not getting that 6-digit salary and a corner office because you have no work experience?
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
The former about the lazy ones aside, the latter isn't really meant as an insult. Just an observation.
It's no crime not to have the mindset to work CS/IT. It takes all kinds.
As to the dumb ones? Well, they keep our business plentiful (even if we want to kill them ten times a day) right?
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
For a LAN technician job, a network systems administration degree clearly counts as "related" to a CS degree. Therefore, this is a situation where blatantly lying on your resume is ethical (just explain once you get to the interview).
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Ah. So someone wants to make it about politics now.
Not playing your game. But feel free to rattle off your political diatribe. Maybe if you get it out of your system you'll feel better.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
I've managed teams on five continents, and I haven't seen a single one work.
I wonder what the common factor could be...
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Time to lie on resumes? Or tell the truth that HR doesn't recognize?
Because I spent three years fixing the results of software outsourcing?
Network System Administration is a trade. Computer Science is an academic discipline. Those aren't related degrees or at least shouldn't be. A computer science undergrad degree I'd expect the person to be familiar with ideas from history / philosophy of science about the limits of positivism. I'd expect them to have taken theoretical math courses. I'd expect many of their programming courses to be in languages which teach them about computer languages not in practical computer languages. Languages like Oz are good for Computer Science while Network System Administration I'd want C, Java... In short I'd expect them to be prepped to go to grad school. On the other hand I'd have no expectations that they have any particular skills to a meaningful extent. Network System Administration I'd expect skills but not necessarily an education suited for academic work. Narrowly focused and more practical.
Now. Don't get me wrong 95% of employers want the Network System Administration degree not the computer science degree. But in the abstract they aren't equivalent at all.
If you want to work nights, weekends and holidays.
Have low status and be viewed as a "cost center" by the business unless it is a software company.
Face regular "stack" ranking if it is a software company.
Hit a very hard age discrimination wall at age 45 to 50.
High likelyhood of your job being offshored or outsourced if your pay is good.
It's amazing more students don't go into the field.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
As of 2012, A major houston based food distribution company laid off over 400 IT people and replaced them with offshore / onshore employees of a major Indian INFOrmation SYStems firm with 110,000 employees.
The indian company used a combination of offshore (at $30 an hour), onshore ($60 an hour) and a novel "physically here in the US but legally employed in India ( at $30 an hour)..
The employees lacked the promised Sucky Ass Program skillset. Didn't matter.
The Sucky Ass Program is enormously late (as often happens).
As bad as things are- it will be a new person (maybe you) who is hired... not the 400ish people who were laid off. They get the shaft.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Then, ten years later, they realize they chose one of the most goddamn boring jobs in the world.
Yes CS degree can give you that and a recipe for snake oil too which together with a marketing course can make you rich in no time.
Smart people spend their time and money getting an education in a field
which is impossible to outsource.
Computer Science is among the very easiest fields to outsource, and
your worth as an employee will be defined by the cost of alternatives
from India or other countries, especially as long as the US government betrays
the average US citizen by continuing to allow foreign workers into the US such
that the job prospects for US citizens are seriously undermined.
Life is short. Computer science is now for people who wipe their ass with their left hand
and eat with their right hand.
Computer Science is not IT and at some time / schools not even coding, web site work and more.
Indeed, with the current state of technology, it is MUCH easier to design some algorithm and proof it correct, than it is to write a working website/app, that is guaranteed to not break at some point in some browser on some platform.
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
If you want to slave away at some startup working all your waking hours for a fixed sallary just to make the company grow then sure, the job market is hot. If you think that will get you anywhere other than out of a job when the company either folds (90% of the time) or is bought up by a bigger player you are just another naive kid.
Don't get me wrong, there are some good programming jobs out there. I found one! But they are the exception, few and far between.
Oh, and for you program all day long 50+ hours a week types... all those hours sitting at a computer.. that is NOT kind to your body!
You can call it net value, but I make good money consulting out my services to un-fuck-up projects that the "undercut by the third world" bunch screwed up badly.
They'll do it almost all the time. Offshored stuff needs an on-site skilled engineer watching them like a hawk. Even then, more often than not, the quality there shows- which is to say there is none. All that money some idiot MBA claims and feels he saved the company? It doesn't exist. Worse, there's *TONS* of things you just LEGALLY can't outsource like that as well.
It's all a damned folly and it won't end well. Seriously.
> Let me check... nope, I seem to still have a job, so you're not quite correct.
I guess, as long as there is one job left in the US then everything is just fine.
WHo needs a practical language in CS when we have MIXAL.
His degree is a diploma mill fake degree.
Good salary base, but every day I fight with ding-dong execs to ensure my team doesn't get completely overloaded. The constant pressure to work 16hr days 365 days/year while not being compensated for OT is draining and makes life hell at times.
I won't suggest my kids go into high-tech, unless they can get a sweet-sweet senior mgmt position.
Why would I not want a degree? Well, I actually would like one, but it is cost prohibitive at this point in my life.
I started programming computers in elementary school and did nearly complete my degree. During graduation check I was told an independent study didn't count because I didn't file some required paperwork. At that point I was tired of school and said, "screw this, I already have a job". I had already been working in industry (unix admin/dba/developer) since my sophomore year.
Employers want skills, not pieces of paper. With my background and experience, I've never had a problem getting good work. In fact, a startup just recently asked for me by name. I'm at a big investment bank making a six-figure salary with 401-k match, pension, bonus, etc. For me to go back to school for even two years would cost about $250,000 dollars. That includes tuition and lost income. Not really worth it in my opinion.
I'm not disagreeing with you that you want to open as many doors in your life as possible, but the values of college degrees sometimes don't offset the costs.
Wrong.l 90% want the Computer SCI degree.
There is an assumption you learn business technical support skills with that degree. You can tout theory all you want but it is a big problem. Computer science should include these kinds of courses and certifications for it if employers demand them. It is irresponsible not too as other majors do just that to give real world experience.
Even electives like Biology these days teach powerpoint skills as it helps students who are non medical majors a real world use in the business world. Same should come from CS to get out of the ivory towers and become more practical.
Personally, I'll never understand this attitude. Why would you not want to get a degree if it will open doors?
Because I'm a man of principles. I didn't stop trying until I found a job that would actually evaluate my understanding of the subject and my skills; they didn't care about pieces of paper at all.
Such work environments tend to be superior, because you're not working with worthless morons who consider pieces of paper to be all-important. The employees here (including the ones with degrees) are better than a grand majority of degree holders.
Basically, getting a degree is the same as supporting the illogical and unfair status quo and doing so for personal gain; I can't accept that.
Also, people who get degrees for the purpose of getting jobs miss the point of university and college, which is to aid people in understanding the universe around them and provide a well-rounded education. Corporate bullshit shouldn't ever factor into it, and if it does, universities and colleges will just get dumbed down to accept all these losers, which is what's happening now.
Why would a Network System Administration degree have any classes on anything except scripting languages? A Java class makes little sense for that type of degree.
Like "KoRpoRaTe-AmeRiKa" mgt. does - on things you have no clue on with degrees you don't possess (I do) which I corrected you on here http://news.slashdot.org/comme...
* I've got BOTH degrees (CS 90/120 credit hours into the Bachelors over time, Associates 60 cr. hr. LONG ago done, chipping away @ it betwene jobs over the years now for the bachelors in fact...AND - Business Admin with MIS minor/concentration (where I was also a lettering NCAA athlete in the sport of Lacrosse for a national champ too ("bonus") - see 1985 Letter "K" -> http://lemoynedolphins.com/spo... )
APK
P.S.=> Don't mean to be rude, but... before you put down the degrees of others (or anything)? At least WALK A MILE IN THEIR SHOES first, & speak from actual experience (I can on attorneys really - I took a good chunk of their coursework as stated in m original post earlier to you)... apk
I've actually "been there/done that" on BOTH degrees -> http://news.slashdot.org/comme... and I have decades of experience in BOTH... hands-on, "in the trenches" professionally.
* QUESTION: Have YOU? How about Opportunist??
(Answer that...)
IF NOT?? You boys should REALLY 'walk a mile in the other guys' shoes' FIRST - before you talk out your behind on things you have NO CLUE ON 1st hand!
On my subject-line: MOSTLY, it's not CS folks that came up with the formulas involved... it's MATH folks - computer folks & engineers merely APPLY them, adapting them to computer 'math' (discrete math especially - nuttiest "math" I ever took in fact, not really 'math' imo, but more THINKING CRITICALLY using formulas to apply to solve difficult problems generically... like a computer algorithm does!).
APK
P.S.=> I didn't do them on software (but I had to implement their algorithms in COBOL back in academia in the late 1980's though) but usually BY HAND on paper "back in the day" (such as shortest parth which STILL 'sticks out in my mind" to this very day... ugh!)... apk
Computer Science has been undesirable since 1981 because, like other majors, it comes with a hefty price tag. Take for example a Computer Programming major instead. I can finish that Computer Programming major in less time, taking less classes and spending less money. Why would I take Computer Science when it costs 10k more????? I am not looking to come out of school broke. Besides, the earlier I get into the market, the better.
It think that it is ABSURD what they charge for college. I am talking about IN-STATE tuition. Let alone out of state tuition and such.
That's a bad assumption and one that should be changed. There should be and needs to be a clear distinction between forward going degrees and terminal degrees.
Academic degrees are not driven by what employers want they are driven primarily by what professional / graduate schools want. That's one of the distinctions between academic and technical degrees. Academic degrees are not meant to be terminal.
First off PowerPoint is rather easy. So if you mean that biology classes use PowerPoint, then that's fine. But how does biology teach PowerPoint? But in general I agree that colleges are polluting academic programs by teaching trades. They shouldn't be doing that, trade skills for an academic program belong in a professional or graduate school.
OK, so the percentage of college students studying Computer Science as a major is between 3-4% annually for the last 30 years, but what percentage of the workforce is employed in careers that require computer science degrees? Do Computer Science careers really amount to more than 3-4% of the workforce? Using computers in your job doesn't require one to major in computer science in college, and many, many workers do things that don't require the ability to design and code an operating system or compiler...
Ken
From a fair challenge like a chickenshit blowhard http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
From a fair challenge like a chickenshit blowhard http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
I don't understand this enthusiasm for getting more people into CS. There are plenty of people trained in CS, but they're trained wrong. We don't need more engineers, we need better ones. And we have the technology to make them better, faster and smarter.
I worked in Microsoft Research on component software, and I learned as much in those two years as I did about computer science in the 15 years leading up to that point. That's because of the level of rigor in that team's approach to development. I was forced to completely understand the problem space and then develop a solution - and then verify that solution. Not mathematically, which would have been ideal, but by using techniques such as white box testing.
The primary lesson that I learned was that a chunk of software has a purpose, and if its purpose is not clearly understood, it's going to be written badly. If it's written badly, it's going to be buggy. If it's buggy, nobody is going to want to use it.
So start training CS folks in using a rigorous development process so that they clearly understand what they're building. When management makes some vague demand of them about the product they want to build, these new CS folks are going to push back to some degree. As more are educated in the rigorous techniques, the push back on management will grow. That push back will take the form of informed explanations as to why slapdash software hurts companies. I think it's pretty clear that management is not going to originate any changes in this regard and it's going to have to come from the engineers themselves.
Unfortunately, we're seem to be a bunch of lawyers bickering over where the commas go.
And?
Hundreds of millions of Americans own cars and use them daily, but that doesn't mean they need to study automotive engineering and design for four years in college...
I'm shocked that 3-4% of all college graduates are studying Compiler Design in college... (That is still a required course for CompSci majors, isn't it?)
Ken
From a fair challenge like a chickenshit blowhard http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
From a fair challenge like a chickenshit blowhard http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
Why? Are all American programmers of one race? Do we not have, for example, Indian programmers here in the US that "can do it as well as we can in the US." since they are here in the US?
I think you went looking for race in the previous comment and believe you found it - the statement is either a correct or incorrect one, it is not racist in and of itself. You imagine the previous poster meant to say "people of other nations can't do it as well as we (white programmers) can in the US.". but they didn't say that.
Ken
I would think that a lot of the required classes for a Network Systems Administration degree would be the same for a CS degree...why not look into what it would take to obtain a CS degree?
In fact, better than fine. Deflation is good for those with an income
I have classic on the main page. When I click on an article to read the comments it shows Beta.
What kind of happy horseshit is this? If I am using classic, I expect comments to be displayed
in the classic mode. If I ever choose beta, I would expect the comments to be in the Beta.
I'll bet that the Beta never displays comments in classic - strictly one-way.
So you people doing the web site are really being obnoxious, stupid and rather arrogant, deciding
what everyone should get. Kinda like Adobe and Microsoft. beware the karma dogz!
Fuck BETA!
Long hours, lots of stress, and treated like crap by management.....
I've been out of school a long time, but the market for CS people was pretty hot in the mid-80s and this was the pattern I observed: People would head down the CS path, thinking they would cash in on the great opportunities. However, a lot of them would switch majors after their first programming class, and more would drop after their first advanced class (data structures, or something like that), I have had many, many people tell me over the years that they took some programming and didn't like it. It's just not something everyone can do, or that everyone likes.
Proverbs 21:19
"the share of Computer Science degrees as a percentage of BA degrees"
I am not mathmagician however last I checked a Computer SCIENCE degree was part of a Bachelor of SCIENCE...
Therefor the answer to that question should be about 0%.
A more meaningful statistic might be as a percentage of BSc degrees.
Even comparing it again the total isn't really fairplay statistcally, as all it could be showing is that BSc are down, and that BA's are up (all those MBA's looking for Wall Street foolsgold perhaps). In fact you could have an increase in actual computer science degrees, but if the ratio of BA's has increased by more then 1:1, it will look like a decline.
Anyway when I went to school it was sexy, however after two bubbles, and employers treating graduates like cattle rather than professionals, it isn't so much. Most of the fairytale stories you see of people making it rich, are not about uber technical skill, but rather being a snakeoil salesman con artist, able to sell to investors, or screwing over everyone around you at the same time.
I am not sure I would ever recommend anyone get into the field as a primary field of study anymore. That said, I think everyone in all degrees should have some exposure to some basic computer science, otherwise they are not doing themselves any favors. At least enough to get some basic understanding and competence.
Maybe, but the tradeoffs between an array, list, and hash or what a depth first vs breadth first search means are basic, knucklehead programming ideas, and shouldn't require a 4-year degree to explain.
Wouldn't that be "Nationist?" What if the people of that alleged other nations are of the same race?
There should be and needs to be a clear distinction between forward going degrees and terminal degrees.
You do know that there are many postgrad programs for network design, theory, administration, and so on right?
Masters in Information Assurance and Computer Forensics are particularly lucrative right now. They tend to require massive numbers of credits though. It is a mix of several disciplines. Exciting for those that have the will for it. I am pursuing one right now. Imagine the shock of requiring over 160 credits just to meet the prereqs for for these programs. Double majoring in IT and something else is expected; be it CS, math, business, criminal justice, or in logic focused philosophy disciplines. It varies with the specific program and university.
Why does the intro refer to BA degrees? ICBW but I'd imagine most CS degrees are Bachelor of Science degrees (mine is).
Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!
Why should students be interested in computer science? Employers want only the "best and brightest" non-citizens from India. The only saving grace of my decision to study mathematics and computer science is the cultivation of analytical skills that it afforded me over the years. At this point in my life though I am tired of the declining wages combined with escalating "must have skills" laundry lists. Don't get me wrong I thoroughly enjoy analysing problems and implementing solutions; I don't enjoy being treated like a disposable commodity or interchangeable gear in a machine.
CS is one of the harder degrees to get because it is crazy math heavy. a CS degree doesn't get you into using network equipment, it gets you into creating network equipment or network stacks. When my cousin started his CS degree, he told me how 80% of all students who take the 100 level courses drop out in the first semester because it's too hard, and that ignores students who may drop out later when it gets much harder.
You don't just "get" a CS degree, unless you get it from a crappy uni for the sole reason to have a piece of paper to get you past the HR filter. Have some pride.
With people like Zuckerberg saying that he only wants people under 30 and the reports of ageism in CS and IT fields, I can see why people aren't going into CS and IT. Some are going to do well but many are going to drop by the wayside. Why not go into a career where you are still valued are 50 or 60?
Competition Good, Monopoly Bad.
This is very similar to what I was going to say.
Computer Science and Programming Job are often related, but also often not. And Computer Science and IT often don't even very much resemble one another. And I've done all 3.
The biggest farce is the requirement for a BSc(CS) for a damn help desk job. I freaking BSc(Psychology) or BA(Psychology) would be much more useful in such a role.
All of you are overly paranoid, but if you're really worried about being replaced by a foreign national get a job in the aerospace/defense industry. Only US citizens for any real engineering job.
Well, they keep our business plentiful (even if we want to kill them ten times a day) right?
Wow, you're greedy. I just want to get to kill them once, then I'd be happy.
he turned 30 yesterday
No I don't. But if that is the case then a BA Computer Science, MS in Networking would be a good approach. The BS in Networking should be terminal not forward going.
Excellent choice of Masters.
Being 40 is so far off! If you are retraiinng for anew career in 30s you may consider skipping professional baseball and IT.
Well, they keep our business plentiful (even if we want to kill them ten times a day) right?
Wow, you're greedy. I just want to get to kill them once, then I'd be happy.
Only once? Then you're a miraculously phlegmatic specimen of CS/IT personnel.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
More money for me!
>> How about affine tranformations (or virtually the entirety of 3d graphics)? Markov chains? FFT? Force/tension distribution? State space modelling? Covariance matrices? Projection of an m-brane onto a n-brane (or any shift in dimensionality, really)?
^This. The work I do with computers (pattern recognition; data mining / clustering, classification, detection, etc) relies HUGELY on linear algebra and abstract mathematics (Mercer's Theorem, kernel theory, and the many other roads). You need a solid grasp of several types of advanced math just to scratch the surface and have a basic understanding of what is going on.
If you are coding up cute little apps, sure you don't need to know tons of math...but you also don't need a CS degree, perhaps just a trade school certificate. If you want to actually do heavy lifting and analysis of data, you need a much deeper understanding of the mathematical and computational underlayment. The computer vision or machine learning guys would eat you for breakfast.
If a company hires a H.R. henchman that can't see the value of your degree for the position, then you shouldn't work for them.
No. Just very, very thorough. ;)
Edit it on your resume. Write it as Computer Science (Network Systems Administration). That way it matches the buzzword bingo and tells a real human what you have when they actually READ IT. (No pun intended)
I assume they also want their electricians and plumbers to have degrees in physics. It makes about as much sense.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
I am there. I'm doing that. And I'm still walking that mile (feels more like a lightyear) in those boots. Unfortunately I can't (rather, should not) got into detail, but if anything can cure you quickly from any kind of respect you have towards C-level management, it's having to sit down when them in meetings regularly. You get to find out that they are little more than the sum of their insecurities, coupled with the fear that anyone could shatter their carefully crafted air of infallibility by finding out that their main source of information is the management journal they subscribe to and the snakeoil peddling consultant they hire every now and then.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
And you can't get hired to fix what the offshored guys did?
India has some very cheap programmers. India has some very good programmers. I haven't noticed an overlap.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Yeah, I hear this. I got three semesters in before I decided I was wasting time and money. Got a job as a software engineer and never looked back. Now with 16+ years of experience, there is no point in adding that piece of paper to my resume. My personal network of contacts plus volumes of experience working on all sorts of projects from startups to huge companies makes it pretty much moot. It will never be worth it for me to finish a CS degree.
Also, people always cry, about how important the math background is... but I've actually even had a few jobs where calculus/statistics were pretty important and I just got some books and did my homework and it was no problem. If you are a smart person you can figure out whatever you need.
Funny on those consultants you note: The BEST BOSS I ever had filled me in on them (protecting my job & those of my fellow programming colleagues), i.e. - "You're coming to this meeting with me to destroy these contractors MY boss is interviewing" & I asked "Why?" He said "They're out to take your job or those of your co-workers"... I did as I was told, with facts (this particular one, first in fact of a few, was a company that did Cold Fusion BEFORE it could do DB access... that was their weakspot, I hit them there repeatedly since the company routed food across the nation (refrigeration & logistics firm)).... Did I like doing it? Not really, but... it was MY JOB & those of others on the line, MORE than potentially... so had to be done out of self-preservation really more than anything.
* Good part about THAT boss I had was that HE actually did the job for years, hands-on "in the trenches"... one of the few in the 90's I had met that actually did the job & understood it end-to-end in programming (midranges mostly, IBM stuff that I programmed Windows 32-bit NT rigs to talk to and get data from/put data up to, from PC's).
APK
P.S.=> It's a "dog eat dog" world sometimes... heck, a LOT of the time! apk
Try telling that to HR departments around the world. All too often I've seen jobs posted looking for LAN technicians saying they want you to have a Computer Science or related degree; a few of them pass on my resume when they see my degree is in Network Systems Administration (I'm not entirely sure if a person is doing it, because in these cases I get an email saying I don't meet the minimum requirement even though I meet ALL of their requirements listed, including their bonus/preferred requirements, just I don't have a CS degree, nor am I interested in getting one.)
All the more jobs for the rest of us who realize that having a CS degree opens doors...
Personally, I'll never understand this attitude. Why would you not want to get a degree if it will open doors? It doesn't have to be expensive (most companies just check for the degree and the school rarely matters), you can do it online, and, if you investigate it, your employer may even pay for it.
Have fun at your job.
With all the high profile investigation and legal cases (both criminal and tort) on what would think are seemingly normal behaving computer science professionals - I submit that the risk and liability of computer science puts off any wannabe's. Such risk and liability as where unknown 30 years ago. Today, Engineering, Chemistry, Math, & Biology seem relatively safer in that regard. Also my guess this leads to the glut of Law graduates lately. Today one needs a law degree to protect thyself.
In regards to one recent case, alternatives such as suicide have apparently become an attractive option.
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
http://empire.openmpe.com/
BT
Computer Science Degrees are nice. But really the market isn't as hot as its claimed. Its better then others, but the job quality is very unreliable. My brother is has such a degree, and is a pretty Senior experience programmer. He is employed very well, but would like more interesting work. But only places that will take offer him a job, want to pay entry level for his experience. That may be annoying for him, but its worse for those graduating because businesses wont even give the new people in the field a chance. They just keep looking to poach experienced people for lower pay.
Politicians in California are all on the bandwagon about teaching students to program, let alone computer science. The reason for the flat interest in CS is that very few people in the population can do CS or should, and that not many more can write programs of any value. The idea that you can teach everybody to do programming is just wrong. It is roughly the same problem as teaching people to do mathematics of any depth or write fugues. Very few people will ever master either, and the percentages of people who are good computer scientists, or mathematicians or composers of music is pretty small and costant.
You might be able to teach more people how to use computers, even how to manage them, just as you can teach many more people some competance in quantative thinking, or how to listen to musical form. The idea of at least one Congressional candidate who comes from Stanford School of Economics that every child should learn something about how to code, or a similar idea from the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, is just a stupid pipe dream. If they wanted to really prepare students, they should teach them how to use technology, but maybe their resources would be better used to teach students to think and write critically. Judging by the traffic on social media they are doing neither and maybe that is what the business leaders really want.
Of course the other side of the coin is the unfulfilled promise of the digital revolution that it would enable everybody. That has not happened and I think that one of the reasons for the lopsided income distribution in the economy and the accompanying political elites is that CS and programming are skills for an elite. They are not skills that a majority of people can use. So, the argument about automating work so that more and more people are marginalized from their traditional jobs has not been met with compensating opportunity and the earning power of most has declined as that of the technical elite has raised. This is resulting, not going to happen, but happening right now, in push-back on the elites who have been given free reign in places like the San Francisco Bay Area. That is going to continue as the perception that the venture capitalists investors and tech firms don't really benefit the lives of but a very few and at the expense of a large majority.
I've managed teams on five continents, and I haven't seen a single one work.
I wonder what the common factor could be...
The fact that they don't read English so they can't read product specs? Or, the fact that they can't communicate with product people or managers?
One does not need to have a college education to be a good programmer; however, one does need a degree to get past the "HR Incompetent Firewall"! Too many businesses put too much value on college degrees.....its pathetic.
Having said that, E.E, Math and C.E. degrees doesn't prepare someone for programming, unless the student studies programming on the side. The amount of programming those degrees require to graduate is not much at all. As a matter of fact, I have seen Computer Information Technology (CIT) programs require much more programming courses than E.E, Math, and C.E. degrees. Unfortunately, CIT is looked at in a negative way by some simpletons out there, however, two of the best computer guys I know only have CIT degrees.
The sad thing is that many students come out of college with very little practical skills. I have met some supposed "computer geniuses" coming out of college who couldn't properly troubleshoot basic computer issues.
Btw, I have an E.E. degree from a prestigious University, yet, I had to re-learn most things once I began working in the "real world". College simply does not adequately prepare a student for the workforce.