I got my degree in Electrical Engineering. One of my good friends got his masters degree in Cryptography. There are countless other engineers that got their degree's in technical fields. I loved EE because it just brought my brain to a new level of thinking. I am a much better problem solver than I would have ever been had I not studied EE. It also gave me the confidence that I could brake apart any problem into sub-problems and then solve each of those sub-problems. BTW, my boss, who was also a developer before he became a manager, has a PhD in Mathematics. Therefore, my advice is to study something technically challenging (and hopefully enjoyable) and learn software development in your language of choice on the side.
-----Original Message----- From: PILGRIM, Peter, FM [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2003 8:23 AM To: 'Struts Users Mailing List' Subject: RE: Does a degree matter? > -----Original Message----- > From: Craig R. McClanahan [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > On Sat, 29 Mar 2003, Arron Bates wrote: > > > Date: Sat, 29 Mar 2003 20:36:21 -0600 > > From: Arron Bates <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > > Brandon, > > > > If you can do the deed (which it sounds like you can), I > would hazard offering > > my opinion in thinking that it wouldn't be the best use of > your time. By --////-- > > My personal experience (both for myself and for folks I have > hired over > the years) mirrors this -- indeed, my personal opinion is > that a Comp Sci > degree is worth less (to me as an employer) than a degree in > some field > that is more closely associated with the general needs of potential > employers. > > Why? A couple of reasons: > > * Many folks who go for Comp Sci degrees obsess over learning the > particular technologies being taught in their classes, at > the expense > of courses to improve your general thinking skills. Any specific > technology you learn in your first year is going to be totally > obsolete by the time you graduate from the program anyway, so why > bother? The important skill to employers (at least from my > viewpoint) > is that you've learned how to quickly adapt your existing skills to > new technologies as they become available. Also, the fundamentals > of good architecture and design practices tend to change much more > slowly than the favorite language de jour -- so if you decide to go > for Comp Sci, focus on fundamentals like O-O, design patterns, > and so on. I got my degree over 10 years ago, and technology justs moves to fast to keep. THe first year I learned Pascal. Then second year, I learnt Concurrent Pascal with a classic book, by Isreali fella, maybe you might know of it, Ali, Adi. I also learnt Assembly language. In the forth year I finally learnt Fortran and C, pre-ANSI. > > * Many folks who go for Comp Sci degrees are so focused on > the technical > things, and don't accumulate any domain knowledge along the way that > would make you *more* valuable to potential employers than another > Comp Sci graduate with similar skills. If you're building > e-commerce > systems, do you know anything about the fundamental accounting > principles involved in tracking purchases? If you're building > systems to introduce novices to the world of online information, > have you ever studied any human factors engineering? If you're > building trading systems for a Wall Street broker, do you have the > slightest idea how stock and commodity exchanges work? > Definitely. If there a modular course in Investment Banking back in the 1980's and being where I am now. Knowing what I know now. I would have go for it like a rancid dog! > It may surprise some of you to find out that I don't have a Comp Sci > degree at all -- instead, I got a BA in Business with a focus on > Accounting. This was ***tremendously*** helpful in setting > me apart from > everyone else who was learning programming and systems > analysis in those > days -- I could immediately communicate with the end users > responsible for > the systems we were building, using their vocabulary, without > having to be > trained -- in addition to the fact that I was a fair-to-middlin' > programmer :-). > > If you are looking at going to college today (either because it's that > time in your life, or because the job market sucks right now), I would > suggest thinking about a primary major other than Comp Sci > (with a Comp > Sci minor to keep your hand in on all the technical stuff). > The name of > the game is making yourself more valuable, relative to > everyone else out > there -- and, quite frankly, there are more interesting things in the > world than just computers and web apps :-). > > Craig > If you are die hard techie, then you should get "first honours" or "second class honours" from a Computer Science degree, at British University at least. But I would recommend, strongly, that you also look at a ``Combined Degree'' such as computing and international economic, computing and biotechnology (hot!), computing and engineering, or physical sciences. Also I would seriously look at humanities, arts related degrees for good combination. If you are interested in digital arts, photography, graphic, design and web, you might something computing related. Dont do what a lot of people did/do. Bog standard boring. Mathematics and Computer Science unless, of course, you instead to be Professor at Oxbridge. Mix it up -- Peter Pilgrim, Struts/J2EE Consultant, RBoS FM, Risk IT Tel: +44 (0)207-375-4923 ******************************************************************** Visit our Internet site at http://www.rbsmarkets.com This e-mail is intended only for the addressee named above. 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