Guess 24 years experience programming in all kinds of environments with
15 or so languages does not constitute a profession then based on your
position that it requires a degree. I have no degree. I have very
little formal training.
The problem in today's world is that too much emphasis is put on a
degree, and not enough emphasis is put on experience. I'm not trying to
denigrate degrees, I wish I had one ( especially considering the heavy
emphasis ). But, when I entered the programming fray, degrees were not
emphasized. I suspect that the dearth in competent coders at the time
was a heavy influence.
I very much like the lawyer example considering Frank Abagnale Jr.
Frank was made famous by Leonardo Dicaprio's portrayal in "Catch Me if
You Can". While the movie is an exaggeration of the reality of the
story, according to Frank, he did pass the bar exam without any formal
education. Now Frank may be an exceptional intellect, but I think it
does draw out that it is fully possible for individuals to rise to the
industry standard without a formal education.
I consider myself a professional in a profession even without the
degree. In fact, I consider myself a craftsman rather than an engineer
because I take pride in everything I do and apply ingenuity and
creativity rather than rely on a canned set of solutions.
Once again, I do not disregard formalized education, it forms a very
good foundation on which to build a profession. But to assume that no
formalized education denotes a non-professional elevates formalized
education to the be-all and end-all for the profession. If that were
the case, then, students coming out of college should be fully prepared
to BE what they trained to be. I can't tell you how many interviews I
have conducted with graduates who obviously lacked the skills to do the
job. Ability should be the bellwether, not how that ability came to be.
The real discussion is not on what qualifies one for the profession, but
rather, how do we accurately measure ability. I don't have the answer
to that question. And, I think that were an answer to that question
readily available, there would be no need for this discussion. Maybe
part of the licensing process should borrow from the medical community
and require a period of "residency".
Kristina Anderson wrote:
For all intents and purposes, a software engineer/application developer
must have a bachelor's degree of some sort, and certainly after 10
years of doing this, I consider that it takes considerable training and
specialized study to be reasonably good.
My question to you Urb: Would you consider me, a person with a non-CS
university degree (B.A.), and 10 years of actual paid experience, to
be "self taught" or merely "non traditionally formally educated"...?
It's true that the skills to be a good programmer were learned "in the
field" and not in a classroom but isn't that true of everyone? And to
say "self taught" is to really underestimate the contributions of very
brilliant people I have learned from over the years including one Dr.
Jerry A. who posts to this list, and many others.
I would sure welcome a NYS professional license for software developers
and want to know would anyone else want to get active on that? It
could require a certain number of years of actual paid experience and a
test and whatever else...I'm 100% in favor of this if it helps us get
more respect. As Urb pointed out, other types of engineers do have
licensing.
(My previous polemic having been somewhat out of place because we were
talking about a "webmaster test" -- but it's one thing if you are
looking for someone who can hand code a little HTML...that's not
necessarily a "profession" -- but if you are looking for someone who
can administer your LAMP environment AND design & develop your LAMP
applications then you are looking for someone with a sh*tload of
experience and broad based experience at that...you are looking for a
LAMP engineer not a "webmaster". Calling this person a "webmaster"
with all those skills is another way of keeping respect, and pay
scales, down.)
My point having been that (no offense to the lawyers out there) it
takes WAY MORE BRAINS to design & develop working code than it does to
write a divorce complaint or a commercial lease -- which is what most
lawyers do -- most of them are not litigation experts who deal with
arcane Supreme Court decisions and get on Court TV -- and by the same
token most software developers are not dealing with the highest, most
arcane levels of software (whatever that might be deemed to be).
But it is a profession requiring a 4 year degree (de facto) and
CONSIDERABLE training and specialized education...!!
By definition, programming and website design is not a
profession.
Really? What specifically is that definition?
profession: "An occupation, such as law, medicine, or engineering,
that requires considerable training
and specialized study"
Houghton Mifflin Dictionary.
Even an engineer must have a professional engineering (PE)
designation to perform certain types of design.
I don't have a problem with a self taught programmers, I've known
some great ones, however, a field having
a large number of practitioners without formal training is a trade
not a profession. A profession is also
self-regulated.
It's another thread but, should there be certification available for
programmers and web designers? If we
ever want to be considered a profession, that's the first step. I was
in the stock brokerage business when
the designation Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) first came into
being. It was extraordinarily difficult
and it took almost two years after the announcement before the first
designation were awarded. It required
two 8 hour day testing sessions. It made a huge difference in the
industry and these days you will not get
a senior level job in a research department without a CFA. Same thing
happened with Chartered Financial
Planner (CFP).
I'm unsure of the procedure, but how/when does one change the subject
when we have drifted into a new
area?
Urb
Dr. Urban A. LeJeune, President
E-Government.com
609-294-0320 800-204-9545
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
E-Government.com lowers you costs while increasing your expectations.
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