I've been in school for umm...(muffled)seven years now and I think I now know what college can do for you and what it can't. I doesn't teach you think thats for sure, if you don't have problem solving capabilities by nature this is the wrong field. What it does do that is beneficial is force you to do things you may have never wanted to or never thought you had to learn. For example the person who ask the question that started this was asking what colleges taught c++, asp, etc etc. If that person doesn't go to college where will he find out that being a programmer isn't about the languages you know, but the concepts you understand. I know I wouldn't have gone right out and bought a discrete math or algorithms book if I wasn't forced to, I would have bought a visual c++ book and learned later on that I missed out on foundation topics. Thats my take on it...college is about structured learning and thats all. You can get a lot out of it or very little depending on whether or not you realize that these boring topics ARE important.
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I've been in school for umm...(muffled)seven years now and I think I now know what college can do for you and what it can't. I doesn't teach you think thats for sure, if you don't have problem solving capabilities by nature this is the wrong field. What it does do that is beneficial is force you to do things you may have never wanted to or never thought you had to learn. For example the person who ask the question that started this was asking what colleges taught c++, asp, etc etc. If that person doesn't go to college where will he find out that being a programmer isn't about the languages you know, but the concepts you understand. I know I wouldn't have gone right out and bought a discrete math or algorithms book if I wasn't forced to, I would have bought a visual c++ book and learned later on that I missed out on foundation topics. Thats my take on it...college is about structured learning and thats all. You can get a lot out of it or very little depending on whether or not you realize that these boring topics ARE important.