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Google, Apple and 13 Other Companies That No Longer Require Employees To Have a College Degree (cnbc.com)
The economy continues to be a friendly place for job seekers today, and not just for the ultra-educated -- economists are predicting ever-improving prospects for workers without a degree as well. From a report: Recently, job-search site Glassdoor compiled a list of 15 top employers that have said they no longer require applicants to have a college degree. Companies like Google, Apple, IBM and EY are all in this group. In 2017, IBM's vice president of talent Joanna Daley told CNBC Make It that about 15 percent of her company's U.S. hires don't have a four-year degree. She said that instead of looking exclusively at candidates who went to college, IBM now looks at candidates who have hands-on experience via a coding boot camp or an industry-related vocational class.
Apple has never required a college degree. Neither Woz nor Jobs had a degree when they started Apple.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
To the extent I help out with hiring iOS developers, my primary concern is apps in the store, and their quality. How you learned how to make a quality app is less important.
How many non-college degree holders at those companies are getting the huge six-figure salaries vs $10-15 an hour support roles? And for those lucky enough to get more productive roles, is their pay comparable with their coworkers who have 4 year degrees, or are these companies using this as cost-cutting and just bringing in cheaper people to do the same roles?
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
There is a difference between formal education and intellectualism.
The problems is having College degrees being a prerequisite for a good job, means more people will get a college degree, and being that the paper to say you have a degree is a major factor in your life. Colleges will need to lower/adjust its standards to accommodate. The hard working but dumb as a box of rocks student will often still pass and get the degree, because they are a hard worker, and the college and professors see the person as a general asset to the community and can probably do the work assigned to him. But he isn't really college material.
College should have the best of the best, and people who are in college to study the topics they are interested in, not for people who need the paper to get a job outside of education.
Back 40 years ago. An Employee with a college degree was actually someone special to employ and wasn't given entry level work. Today a college degree is the requirement for entry level work, because they are handed off so easily.
Growing up, Expectations from my parents were the following.
Graduate from high school: a Must
Then.
Go to college (preferred path)
Join the Military or the Seminary (Secondary path)
Go to a trade school (if all other options are out of the picture)
Going to full time work out of high school would be just bad parenting.
However for some people they just want a job not a career. And they are skilled at a job and should be able to do it without extra education to delay their earning potential.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
> In my experience, many people who have a degree in computer science are worse coders because they are taught that there is a specific way to do something rather then being able to creatively solve problems.
In my experience, the exact opposite is true. When you don't have a background in thinking about the structure of code, the algorithms it will use, how that will translate to memory and CPU usage, you are likely going to code your way into a big mess. A good CS school will not teach a specific way to solve each problem - they teach various programming styles, algorithms, and concepts. If you think that a coding bootcamp can make you a good programmer, I simply beg to differ. What makes a good programmer is having the right knowledge and the right experience. That's not to say that all CS schools do a great job of this, or that the right hands-on experience and post-graduate learning can't replace it. IMO it can if someone is passionate enough about their craft. That is the key - passion, experience, and studying the craft. And talent. I just take issue with the idea that somehow having a background in CS would make you a worse coder. I have never experienced that. Maybe you've just worked with people who had degrees but no passion or talent? That I have experienced.
With new programmers fresh out of college with their shiny BS in CS degrees, eager to impress with their knowledge, only to have them spend hours arguing over every decision I make as an architect, because that isn't what they taught them in school.
You know, I've never had that problem. I expect some discussion, of course: you should be able to explain your design convincingly to anyone technical. But I've never had a lengthy argument over choices of data structure or algorithms or the like from junior devs. They ask "why don't you do X instead, isn't X better?" and I reply with the ways X will fail in production and make life suck for everyone. It's pointless to have philosophical arguments, but practical explanations based on experience shuts them down, and is useful and educational to them. Maybe they can avoid some of the mistakes I made.
All of my painful arguments about architecture have been with semi-technical managers, who think the thing they once did 5 years ago must be the best possible way, but aren't technical enough to understand how it will fail.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.