'College is overrated' is usually said by someone who became successful (I know, we can debate what 'successful' is, but I think everyone on HN can agree on a somewhat similar definition) without a degree or with a degree and then looks back and thinks they could have been successful 4 years sooner if they didn't waste time getting the degree. The problem with the statement, even if it 100% correct in their situation, is that it is not overrated in a lot of other situations.
I'll agree that there are a lot of degrees that have a low benefit to cost & time ratio (liberal arts, political science, etc.) where the statement probably applies well, but it is inaccurate for professions like medical doctors, electrical engineers, nuclear physicists, lawyers, and similar specializations.
The reason Obama, Bill Gates, et all promote college is because there's a huge difference between a Google and a Facebook--not to underestimate the latter. And notice that they more likely usually promote STEM (Science, Tech, Engineering and Math), not just any college.
Could Brin/Page or anyone, for that matter, have come up with a Google without finishing an undergrad degree in CS and some graduate Studies at a school like Stanford? Very unlikely. Google required a bit more than creativity. It required great hacking and also knowledge of the complexity in information retrieval problems which you didn't get back then with online lectures (what lectures?) on dial-up, etc.
Meanwhile, Facebook as great as a company that it is, mostly borrowed ideas and tweaked them a bit with "exclusivity," a clean design, etc. Not saying that isn't admirable, but yes, it doesn't require graduate level work, just creativity and a lot of hard work to get jumpstarted. And I bet Zuckerberg didn't start hiring high school dropouts/grads to help him scale his site, etc. Surely there were a few, but I doubt they accounted for many.
So if you want to build the next Facebook, you better be hard-working, smart, and creative.
If you want to build the next Google, you better be that and learn about the next challenges in machine learning, information retrieval, data parallelism, etc. And that more than likely requires that you learn it from the experts--ie, more than likely not your average college/high school dropout.
Every time I walk out of class at uni, I keep thinking about this "You dropped a hundred and fifty grand on a fucking education you coulda got for a dollah fifty in late charges at the public library. - Will from Good Will Hunting
I agree completely that college is completely overrated, but only regarding its ability a to create a successful professional. I think everyone should get at least a bachelors degree in their life on whatever field they are interested in, but they should do so because of a drive to expand their knowledge instead of making a degree a proverbial stepping stone to great-dom.
That being said, if you have the determination, patience, and drive to extract such education yourself by means of books, practice, and mentors, why should you not be allowed to become a Doctor, a Nuclear Physicist, or an Architect?
Our educational system is broken, a degree doesn't mean scoot, and everyone should be able to take a test (of various tests actually) to prove that he posses the skills and knowledge to do a job. I understand not letting a 20 year old operate on a patient because he passed an exam, but if the kid passed a standardized exam that proves he has the knowledge and capability to become a resident, why shouldn't he be able to? The same applies to all careers that are potentially 'dangerous', the requirements should be simple, pass an exam and get some experience under a mentor (via an internship, paid or unpaid).
I definitely agree with your statements, and I think this is in line with the mission of Skillshare, the author's new startup. People should be learning for the sake of learning! We need to rework our terminology when it comes to speaking about the value of an education; we should be thinking in terms of learning, not economics.
By the way, if you guys are really into the topic, then you should check out Skillshare's latest project on Kickstarter, an animated video (one of those kinetic typography types) about the impending Student Loan Crisis: http://kck.st/d0MG8o
I agree. It's a faith vs. good works type of argument. If you love your field, it's not necessary that you put the footwork in to land a degree in it....but typically a degree can be considered a sign of one's drive to learn more about a subject they personally enjoy. A degree is a reflection of desired personal growth in an area. It's not meant to serve as a certification of one's command of a subject.
College is a time for exploring the expanses of human knowledge, the beauty of human relationships, and the depths of the human soul (1).
I can think of no other social construct or institution that provides as many broad avenues for personal growth as college (2). Children are limited by their lack of sufficient socialization, professionals and laborers are obligated to focus constantly if not narrowly, and those who have committed to marriage or parenthood pour energy into their loved ones.
College is not life's panacea, nor, I hope, is it the best time of your life, but it certainly can be more than just a bad bet.
(1) Let's not forget bottles, bongs, bottoms, and beats.
(2) There are plenty of alternatives for the intrepid.
>It doesn’t lead to a higher salary or better career.
>All the data I can find at least suggests that it does.
It can lead to a higher salary or better career. But you can't pretend, as people are wont to do, that all college degrees are made equal. A degree in science or engineering or medicine is probably a pretty solid investment. A degree in grievance studies probably isn't.
There are a whole bunch of majors that used to be feeders for law school, but the hiring market for new lawyers has collapsed.
I think actually the opposite is more likely to be true (despite having studied CS myself). A degree in computer science is probably among the easiest to do without, career-wise: solid coders are employable without a degree, especially if you get some stuff up on github or elsewhere on the internet.
But non-technical people with no degree are not very easily employable at all, at least outside the service industry. A nontechnical person with a generic B.A. gets qualified for all sorts of office jobs, like most companies' HR departments, many jobs in advertising, etc., that are closed to the same nontechnical person with only a high-school diploma.
"A degree in computer science is probably among the easiest to do without, career wise: solid coders are employable without a degree..."
That's like saying an MD is easiest to do without if you're looking to be something other than a doctor. Coders are not Computer Scientists. It's like comparing a physicist to an electrician. Being a good coder is a craft much, much more than it is a science. While I'm very tired of college being a requisite for middle class lifestyle in the US, I also feel like these threads wind up being areas where people write off the CS degree as unnecessary without applying enough context.
Career-wise, if you're looking to do research in computing, computational theory, develop novel algorithms, solve deep problems on the frontier of what it means to be "computable", or just effectively reinvent your own wheel and prove that it works..CS is still VERY relevant to this end.
While I don't perceive CS as a program to inherently producing good coders, I also don't perceive the generic good coder as someone I'd turn to to help me create novel algorithm (read no prior documentation, no prior code, very little academic work) to solve a previously unsolved problem. Look at Facebook and Google...Google at its early form and Facebook as it reconciled its data into the form of the social graph while wrangling a huge codebase...do you think they got where they were by hiring armies of people who were "good coders" that decided to forgo the foundations of algorithms and Computer Science? No way. Thus, if this kind of work what you want as a career path, the CS degree is still very relevant as its topics can be very relevant to your career's future.
TLDR: Are good coders very employable? Very yes. Does that mean that CS is readily discarded for all as a good career move? I likely think not.
I do CS research in academia for a living, so I certainly agree that CS research is interesting, and that universities are relevant to it. ;-)
But I'm not sure that a CS bachelor's is actually as a career move necessary for that. Most people with CS bachelor's degrees do not get researchy jobs, or even vaguely algorithm-creation jobs; and many of the companies doing algorithm-type stuff (you mention Facebook) are the most willing to hire people without degrees. The vast majority of jobs for CS majors are programming jobs, though; that's who hires and is looking for the degree, and where most majors end up. If anything there's pressure on CS programs to move more towards preparing them better for that career path--- more C++, more software engineering, more team projects, less theory.
I think you're right. I think it's unfortunate that it's come down to this point where the degree is making itself less and less relevant by getting away from its own roots. Glad to hear you like it too :-D!
I just want to point out my own (different) experience with college. College was a life changing experience for me. I went there to learn and get as much out of it as possible. And I did! It definitely was not overrated for me.
So college might be suited for some people, and not others. But just because it doesn't suit some people, it doesn't mean that the statement 'College is overrated' is true per se.
Reading the article it seems like a big advertisement for his startup. Collage isn't overrated, people yammering about collage being overrated are usually the ones that didn't go and don't understand that nearly all students go to it because they want to learn more from brighter minds about what they love.
Becoming a well rounded human being has definitely become underrated. College isn't just for votech. It's where you learn all the civilization stuff that locates you in the human family.
College is completely overrated. We need to debunk the myth that a college degree leads to success. It doesn’t lead to a higher salary or better career.
Well, it can. Though to me college is mostly my gateway to the careers I think I will enjoy and the knowledge & skills I desire.
If I hadn't gone to college, I would have ended up in a dead-end janitorial or factory job, stuck in a small town and never have been exposed to fine arts and web development.
I'll agree that there are a lot of degrees that have a low benefit to cost & time ratio (liberal arts, political science, etc.) where the statement probably applies well, but it is inaccurate for professions like medical doctors, electrical engineers, nuclear physicists, lawyers, and similar specializations.