<p>Blossom must be at one of THOSE firms that only hires from Ivy schools plus Oxbridge. That really helps the more typical liberal arts grad feel like they have a shot. You know, the other 200,000.</p>
<p>barrons,
most places out there pay for college education. I got mine all paid thru MBA by various employers.</p>
<p>Barrons, it luk like when brains was handed out, us poor sci/tech folks got short-changed. here we went and done studied all that boring quantitative stuff, when we coulda just gone to work for blossom and got trained on the job! and on top of all that we even had to pay for it, too, unlike miami who got a free ticket. dang it all - lac rules!</p>
<p>I think the college education of a world created and developed for the generation of young people enter the world of science and knowledge of science and technological basis for life</p>
<p>agree 100% alseed (i think) - nobody from the sci/tech world could have said it better, 'cept maybe a lac ■■■■■</p>
<p>Who is poor sci/tech? According to you, I am not the one, but has been a computer programmer for 30 years. So who am I if I got my college education for free taking classes after 8 hours at work and sometime unpaid overtimes just like any salaried employee? I am confused.</p>
<p>That’s a tough row to hoe and you miss the total college experience IMHO going part-time for years and years. Admirable but I would not want to go that route given an alternative. Some of our people did the MBA night/weekend thing and it was an awful grind; also, they had a tough time doing justice to both plus family time. Many firms have cut this type of benefit the last year or so.</p>
<p>Missed nothing, I have more college than just Computer Science. It has been fun, meeting all kind of people, working and not, changing jobs in bad economy and raising my family, reading textbooks by poolside in a summer. I would not do it any other way. I actually would have not done it if it was not paid. My job responsibilities did not change much since my first job. But all of them have been great fun, the last is the best. Hey and very high GPA too.</p>
<p>But were you up at 8am to go drink green beer all day with your friends?</p>
<p>Beer is just a pop drink in my world. I have it in a summer when thirsty. I add cognac to all my sweets, have you tried adding it to ice cream? Have to confess though, I have never been drunk, not a single time in my very long life and I do not miss this experience. Well anyway school is a big plus in job searching, but nobody should go there if they do not enjoy it imo.</p>
<p>MiamiDAP: Well, then, just as an informational point for the future, your tech job market there is not representative of the larger tech market. I’ve have friends in tech all over the US (I was a computer person WAY back) and many of them are in high paying programming, systems archictecture, or computer engineering jobs without degrees. My partner isn’t unique – I know rafts of people just like him here in the bay area. There certainly are <em>some</em> employers biased towards degrees; it’s a joke here that at Google, even the janitorial staff has top LAC BA’s. <em>grin</em> But even at Google, I know people who were self-taught. At the risk of sounding very pesky and elitist, I’d say that one of the reasons that Silicon Valley <em>is</em> such a source of innovation is the number of people from diverse educational and experiential backgrounds working in the industry. Different ideas from different minds with different backgrounds = dynamic innovation.</p>
<p>Yes, but most of the major firms were started by those with a computer science or engineering background including the Google founders, the creators of the net search functions, and the founders of HP. Steve Jobs worked with a CS expert in founding Apple.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>TrinSF:</p>
<p>I fully agree that college should be a mix of work/fun. However, why must the ‘work’ part be a liberal arts field? I think students from any field can enjoy ‘training’ or ‘education’ and still lounge on the grass. Perhaps I was not clear about my reasoning.</p>
<p>I think it’s key that blossom says that her company hires “really smart people” and trains them. The niece of a friend of mine graduated from one of the Ivies with a degree in anthropology and was selected for a program in a consulting firm in which she was trained as an accountant (who knows, it could be blossom’s firm!). </p>
<p>I submit that there is a big difference between the opportunities for Ms. Ivy and the opportunities for a woman with the same major at Tier 3 U. If I was the parent of Ms. Tier 3, I’d make sure she had a plan for what she wanted to do after college with that anthropology degree.</p>
<p>Yeah, 'cause all the smart people have Ivy degrees, and only the mediocre folks attend other schools. <em>grin</em></p>
<p>TrinSF,
Self learning is extrememly important. I had to learn new platforms, software and languages at each one of my 9 jobs. What I mentioned before is that some companies (ones of the best) have official policy that do not allow hire computer professionals without degrees as my current place of employment. Living in extremely depressed economically region of the country, which has been depressed for all the time that I have been living here and not able to relocate because of H’s job here, certainly gave me better chance at finding my next job which I have been told at several interviews. I have MBA and we do not have good paying jobs here, I am thankful that I am not driving to Michigan on a daily basis as I was used to and as some of my friends still do even the ones in medical field. I just heard on NPR that Michigan real unemployment and underemploymnet rate is about 22%. If some of us are still going there, imagine how bad it is in my city? In market like this you want to be as flexible as possible and as highly qualified as possible.</p>
<p>I disagree with the “college is just for career training” group because that group seems to think there is nothing more to life than getting a career and making money. Do well in high school to get to college, study hard to college to get a job, work hard so you can retire… I think a portion of the people in the career training group think that there is nothing more to life than working and making money. If you don’t want to go to college for personal growth, don’t - but don’t bash those of us who aren’t getting a science or tech degree because we don’t care as much about money, and don’t bash those of us who enjoy “the college experience” for more than job training.</p>
<p>I think each person can do with their college career as they wish. They just need to know that today some choices have consequences–moreso than they did 30 years ago.</p>
<p>wouldn’t be useful for everybody to study sci/tech in college - there’s already more than enough competition offshore driving down the compensation for such work here. study something in college that applies to a job description and you just might have more options in adult life to pursue your personal interests (“passions” here - aka “hobbies” in less effete circles). college studies done in anticipation of work during your adult years doesn’t mean you endure those years waiting for retirement.</p>
<p>Every major applies to a job description, but not all of them do so directly. I think a lot of people fail to understand that with an anthropology major, say, you don’t HAVE to be a professor - there are lots of things you can do with an anthrolopolgy degree. You can be a museum curator, you can work for a historical society, you can work in countless overseas organizations - especially aide organizations, you can work with businesses - especially those that work with marketing or overseas, you can work anywhere that just requires “a bachelor’s degree”, etc. They may not have “high paying prospects” but a lot of people don’t mind if they’re job doesn’t pay over $100,000 if they’re enjoying it. I can’t imagine majoring in pre-med, getting my MD and having “more options” - you have few. You can be a doctor, you can work with doctors on the administrative side of things… With a degree in engineering, you can work as an engineer as well as numerous other tech jobs, but a lot of the work is very similar. Liberal arts and other non-directly related majors offer variety of work, whereas with “job majors” you have a variety of workplaces and atmospheres, but the scope of what you’re doing is pretty limited to what you learned in college and the applications thereof.</p>
<p>College is four years of life. Working is 40 to 80 hours a week, every week, for basically the rest of your LIFE. Don’t do something you don’t like or are not particularly interested in just because you’re not going to make a lot of money or because you might actually have to look for a job instead of falling into one. Education is never about “a job description”. When you went to elementary and middle school, there was nothing about “a job description”. In high school - except for vocational high schools - there’s not a whole lot to prep you for “a job description”. You’re learning because you need to learn. In college, you’re learning because you want to learn. If that doesn’t translate directly to “a job description”, don’t discount it. Plato’s education didn’t do much for his “job description” but he did a lot of good for the world (theoretically speaking).</p>