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Since the end of the year is coming up, I started to do a little bit of math to see how much I earned to prepare for tax season. It turned out that I made six figure through stocks, regular job and freelancing. Looking back, i realized something... None of the things I am currently doing require skills or tools that I didn't have back when i was 18.
-I took Accounting 1000 in high school and learned the fundamentals. Those basic knowledge is enough to pass an interview for my office job. Most of what I do revolved around things I learned as I go by playing around their accounting system and database.
-Stocks and Web development freelancing are things i learned by reading, watching videos and practicing.
Yet, there is no way in hell I would have the courage to do these things 8 years ago when I finished high school. So, anyone else felt like college was just a confidence booster?? Unless you want to get into a field where you need a license to practice..
Last edited by Liar_Liar; 12-09-2017 at 12:24 PM..
Its a good formality to throw on your resume and check off boxes. But ultimately having connections high up the food chain is what gets you hired, promoted etc or just being born into LUCK and WEALTH It definitely does NOT prepare you for life after. Thats for sure. Its more of a business now than a true period of life learning and "growing" Its a ponzi scheme.
There are so many useless garbage degrees that SHOULD be discontinued and not offered. They have no bearing on your future prospects. But.. Because its a money Making scheme, the useless degrees remain.
I see no valuable reason for college anymore except for the following criteria
- Checking off a box on a job application for a generic corporate entry level job
- Stepping stone for Law School or Medical School
- Finding a niche discipline that is in demand today. (Probably won't be tomorrow however)
You're probably better off just learning a trade unless you go the Doctor-Lawyer root however. But you also have to have a passion for those. You can't just pursue them... Because
If I could do it over again I would get the degree but thats because I tasted private sector hell before college and just wanted to prolong having to go back to it. It was just a temporary escape from the contemporary rat race.
Try to actually do the work of a mechanical engineer without having taken the degree. How many high schools offer Strength of Materials, Metallurgy, Heat Transfer, or Vibration Analysis?
Mechanical engineering is scarcely a "niche discipline that is in demand today".
Try to do the work of an Electrical Engineer without having taken the degree. How many high schools offer courses in the design of high voltage transmission lines, or power transistors, or synchronous motors, or switching power supplies?
Electrical engineering is scarcely a "niche discipline that is in demand today".
Try to actually do the work of a mechanical engineer without having taken the degree. How many high schools offer Strength of Materials, Metallurgy, Heat Transfer, or Vibration Analysis?
Mechanical engineering is scarcely a "niche discipline that is in demand today".
Try to do the work of an Electrical Engineer without having taken the degree. How many high schools offer courses in the design of high voltage transmission lines, or power transistors, or synchronous motors, or switching power supplies?
Electrical engineering is scarcely a "niche discipline that is in demand today".
Engineering is yesterdays news in America. From all accounts, they are treated horribly and so many of those jobs are gone. I hear more negative feedback from the engineering field today than positive feedback. Not to mention, we hardly make anything in this country anymore. Its far smarter to go into the medical field
Engineering is yesterdays news in America. From all accounts, they are treated horribly and so many of those jobs are gone. I hear more negative feedback from the engineering field today than positive feedback. Not to mention, we hardly make anything in this country anymore. Its far smarter to go into the medical field
+ 1 ...Not only that, but you can absolutely get alot of engineering jobs with with little more than any multitude of certifications that simply show proficiency in the engineering discipline you specialize in.
It is always dangerous to say things like: "Because Bill Gates didn't need to complete college, therefore who needs college"? These types of statement are really what drives me crazy. Statistically speaking, for every college drop out who ends up making it, there is a huge number of drop-outs ... who end up in Jail or working a dead-end career or never find a job.
We can't say that because of a best scenario of circumstances, we are going to pass a law that applies to the majority of people. It is simply absurd.
There are a few people, for which college might not be needed, however for the majority of people, college is still the best way to get an education, a good job.
I used to work for company, whose management decided they didn't really need engineers, because they could hire people off the street with certifications to do the job. The engineers left, and the company contracted the Engineering job to people with Java certifications. They wrote the applications and it ran and got deployed into production. However, the application was full of bugs, couldn't scale well, was a nightmare to maintain and service and ended up getting pulled. But the damage was already created.
Based on 20+ years of experience in Software Engineering, I can tell with certainty that there is a massive difference between a guy/gal with a certification and an engineer.
I definitely needed college. To keep employers from knocking me out in the beginning stages if nothing else. Others can manage to get plum jobs by only having a GED. Not people like me.
+ 1 ...Not only that, but you can absolutely get alot of engineering jobs with with little more than any multitude of certifications that simply show proficiency in the engineering discipline you specialize in.
Not in REAL engineering, you can't.
Here's a typical problem: Calculate the reaction rates and remaining fraction of a batch of reagents, to determine how much cooling is required, how long the reaction will take, and when the undesirable byproducts will exceed an allowable amount, in a chemical reaction vessel. What's the certificate that will teach you to do that in a few months of part time classes at the local junior college?
Or, alternately, develop a differential equation where the reaction rate of each constituent depends on its concentration, identify the boundary conditions, and solve for the values of concern. Or, if the differential equations don't have a solution, devise a method for numerical solution of the problem, write the relevant code to run the numerical solution (with iterations) and then develop an approximation whose error term is small enough. Or use your knowledge of the nature of the problem to choose from among multiple simulation methods to develop an approximation of the answer. To do these things you have to have the knowledge of chemistry and of chemical engineering that is only available through a Ch.E. degree, or through years of experience examined with the help of serious mathematics.
Engineering is yesterdays news in America. From all accounts, they are treated horribly and so many of those jobs are gone. I hear more negative feedback from the engineering field today than positive feedback. Not to mention, we hardly make anything in this country anymore. Its far smarter to go into the medical field
You said "a niche that's here today and gone tomorrow", now you are contradicting yourself when I propose a field that is not a current faddish niche, and yet which requires a specific set of educational material be mastered.
I would suggest you ask the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the Society of Manufacturing Engineers, IEEE, or the American Institute of Chemical Engineers how many members they have, and whether engineering is "yesterday's news". It's true that REAL engineering doesn't get a lot of attention in the mass media, but I assure you there are still thousands of us out there designing the stuff that you use every day.
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