<p>
[quote]
Sakky that looks to me as MIT's civil engineering IT department. Not a academic program.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Uh, it IS an academic program. If you want to study IT, that is the department that you go to. How is that different from an academic program. Read about it. Here is the "IT" PhD program academic structure.</p>
<p><a href="http://cee.mit.edu/metadot/index.pl?iid=4290%5B/url%5D">http://cee.mit.edu/metadot/index.pl?iid=4290</a></p>
<p>Now, I agree that it is 'weird' at first glance for MIT to run the IT department within Civil Engineering. The underlying philosophy is that IT is a form of infrastructure, akin to transportation networks or utility networks. But the point is, you asked for a school that offers degrees in IT, and I gave you an example.</p>
<p>But forget about MIT. Here are some more examples.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.it.rit.edu/it/undergrad/itbs/%5B/url%5D">http://www.it.rit.edu/it/undergrad/itbs/</a>
<a href="http://www.rh.edu/academic/does/it_degree.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.rh.edu/academic/does/it_degree.html</a>
<a href="http://www.umuc.edu/grad/msit/msit_home.shtml%5B/url%5D">http://www.umuc.edu/grad/msit/msit_home.shtml</a>
<a href="http://www.capella.edu/schools_programs/business_technology/masters/information_technology.aspx%5B/url%5D">http://www.capella.edu/schools_programs/business_technology/masters/information_technology.aspx</a>
<a href="http://www.ggu.edu/academic_programs/information_technology%5B/url%5D">http://www.ggu.edu/academic_programs/information_technology</a></p>
<p>
[quote]
At my recent Internship at Martha Stewart Omni media, I didn't meet a single IT guy that had a college degree, nor one that even went to college. Same at other companies.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I have actually worked in IT for a number of years, and I have met PLENTY of people in IT who have degrees. </p>
<p>
[quote]
There is no need for a degree on any level of IT work, anything other is not IT work, its a sort of engineering. Like I said before IT is the implementation of technologies for the combination of Information and technology. It has nothing to do with development.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Nobody is saying that you "need" a degree to work in IT. When did I say that? Please point to the quote where I said that you needed a degree to work in IT. You can't do it, because I never said. I am saying that degrees PLAY A ROLE in your hiring. In particular, there are companies out there that prefer to interview only people with degrees. And when it comes to the hiring process, somebody with a degree wiill have an advantage. A decisive advantage? No. But an advantage nonetheless. </p>
<p>This is particularly true of the CS degree, as let's face it, other than a degree in IT itself (i.e. one from one of the schools shown in the links above), a CS degree is probably the most useful of all other degrees in terms of getting into IT. It's certainly more useful than, say, a degree in Art History. </p>
<p>
[quote]
IN my view, CS majors wouldn't be adequate for IT work, they would be to dumb. Sure a CS major is good at coding, but the implementation of different hardwares and software wouldn't be in there spectrum of academics.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Nor did I ever say that it was 'adequate'. That's what training is for. I have always agreed that IT and CS are 2 different things. But somebody who knows CS well can quickly pick up IT skills through proper training.</p>
<p>Look, let me put it to you this way. I used to work at several companies where EVERYBODY had degrees. Even the secretaries. Even the security guards. Heck, many of the secretaries had master's degrees (in various subjects). I think one even had a PhD. </p>
<p>Now, it's obviously true that you don't "need" a degree to be a secretary. But that's not the point. The point is, when we're talking about a competitive environment, where a company offers a desirable work environment, lots of people are going to want to work there. So the company has to use a screening process. For example, one hiring manager told me that when she put out a job spec for a secretary, literally thousands of applications/resumes would show up. Nobody actually has time to read thousands of resumes. So what the company did was they began to start requiring that applicants have degrees. That whittled the pool down to a manageable number. </p>
<p>Now you might say that it's not really "fair" for a company to require a credential that you don't really need to do the job. I agree. But what are you going to do? That's the reality of the situation today. A lot of companies require credentials/capabilities that you don't really need to do the job. This extends to experience too. I know a company who, for their network IT job, required that applicants have at least 5 years of Cisco experience, including strong experience with Ciscoworks. I know what that job entailed, and, frankly, probably only 1 year of Cisco experience was enough, maybe only 6 months, and you didn't really need to know Ciscoworks very well at all (because somebody else was in charge of the Ciscoworks and that job simply entailed interfacing with Ciscoworks, which is not that hard). Basically, It was a very simple job. But the company required 5 years of experience because they knew that they could get people with that kind of experience, even though the job was pretty simple. I know people who applied for that job and never even got a callback for an interview, even though I knew that they could do the job, just because they didn't have that 5 years of experience or the Ciscoworks knowledge, which they didn't really need to do the job. So in some sense, it was 'unfair' to these people that they weren't even considered for the job, just like it wasn't really "fair" that people who didn't have degrees could never be secretaries at my old employer. But it doesn't matter that it's not fair. Life is not fair sometimes. </p>
<p>I'll also give you an example related to training. I know a number of people who have humanities degrees (English, Art, French, etc.) who got hired to become investment bankers. Now, I think we can agree that humanities have nothing to do with investment banking. So why hire them? Well, probably because they are highly trained and smart people. These people that I am talking about graduated from Harvard. What the Ibanks were doing is not hiring them for the specific content of their degree. No, they got hired because they came from Harvard, and specifically because their degree proved that they were good enough to get into Harvard in the first place, as well as stick it out all the way to getting their degree, which indicates that they are sharp people who can be trained to learn a variety of things, including Ibanking. So you say that CS people aren't 'adequate' for IT work, but that's just the same as saying that English majors aren't 'adequate' for investment banking work. The point is not whether they are 'adequate' for it at that moment in time, but whether they have the work ethic and potential to be trained for it. Otherwise, Ibanks would hire only finance and business majors. </p>
<p>In fact, as a general principle, most people will not actually get jobs in whatever it is they studied. For example, most history majors will not become professional historians. Most sociology majors will not become professional sociologists. Most math majors will not become professional mathematicians. The point of a college degree is not to train you for a specific career. The point is to teach you how to think and learn quickly, so that you can obtain the skills you need quickly. Just like my old employer hired people who had degrees to be secretaries not because that job actually required the knowledge of a degree, but because the company wanted secretaries to be sharp thinkers who could pick up task knowledge quickly. CS people are not 'adequate' in terms of IT knowledge, but they can pick it up fairly quickly. </p>
<p>That is why a CSdegree ** plays a role ** in terms of getting an IT job. I never said it was decisive. But it plays a role. Experience is obviously important, but it is not "100% about experience".</p>
<p>I'll give you this thought exercise. Consider 2 candidates. The first guy has 10 years of IT experience. The second guy has 10 years ** and one day ** of experience. So is the 2nd guy automatically better than the first guy? Why not? If it really is "100% about experience", then the 2nd guy must be better, right? After all, he has more experience (by one day) than the first guy, right? I think that clearly shows that it is more than just about experience, otherwise you really would just mechanistically pick the second guy every time. If the first guy has a degree and the second guy doesn't, you might end up picking the first guy. Heck, you might pick the first guy even if he had only 5 years of experience. After all, IT is a fast-moving field and the value of experience beyond a certain point levels off very quickly.</p>