Are you educated?

[leadegroot]

Hmmm, how did I miss this thread?
I have a Bachelors degree in Mathematics and a Masters in Cognitive Science, both before the web was around.
While much of my undergraduate work was programming, and thats where I've earned my bread and butter, it was pre-web, so I learned none of the specific skills I now use everyday there.

Honestly, I think one of the joys of the web is that there are so many resources online to allow you to self-teach.
But formal training can be valuable in 2 ways:
* teaching you how to learn (having to hand that stuff in forces you not to dabble) and,
* if you are lucky, which isn't common enough, showing you the areas you need to get skills in. But so many courses are either useless, or just not quite set to meet the needs of someone looking for website-relevant skills

[aneil4lom]

I'm still in University doing Political Science and wondering why I'm doing it.

Everyone here goes to College right after High school and starts working right after they graduate college.
When I started University, I was just going with the general flow, but after some time there I realized that I want to be able to live in different countries, travel alot and be self-employed.

My first website recently started paying for itself and I want to start monetising a second one in a different way.
I also built websites for clients twice.

Sometimes i consider switching to something related to web design at school but all of the programs seem to wide. Just one or two courses end up being about web design.

[crabfoot]

Everyone here goes to College right after High school and starts working right after they graduate college.
When I started University, I was just going with the general flow

So many people I went to school with didn't need or use the degree they eventually gained - they went to work in the family business, whatever it was, because it was already providing the family with an easy lifestyle. I didn't have a family business to join, or anyone to guide me into a lucrative career direction, so I went into a field that I found interesting but was never going to pay particularly good wages.

The best thing I can suggest for a Political Science graduate is to go into accountancy, work at that for five years to get the professional qualifications and pay off the student debt, while building the web sites on the side.

That way you have a piece of paper that lets you freelance in a lucrative field, and learn how a business should operate - any business you might consider starting.

The large accountancy firms take people from any discipline - they just want to see good grades as evidence that you can apply yourself to the work you are given, however disinteresting that work may be. And accountancy itself is actually an interesting subject when you get into it, and get above the paper shuffling.

My friend's son has a degree in web design - the job market is so crowded he's making more as a wedding photographer than he is out of web stuff. OTOH he's so naive about SEO and the real aspects of owning and running websites that he really needs another degree to learn about how to use what he knows.

[Clinton]

Over the last year or so I've become convinced that the best way to educate kids is to take them out of school. I've taken my own children out and am home educating them (related thread). That's despite being heavily into education, once owning a primary school, having numerous teachers and head teachers in the family and having served as governor of a local primary school.

One of the biggest complaints I hear from university students and recent graduates is that they chose the wrong course, or wrong subjects. Why these regrets? I wonder if their choice was, at least in part, a product of their schooling ...and being channeled along those subjects which are curriculum based because they are easy to cater for in bulk?

We often see people go through university in a subject they don't like/weren't best suited to, take up a job that made them miserable and then leave to follow their heart - whether it is to sing, be a stand up comedian, full time gardener or photographer. They end up following their passion even if that sometimes means going back to university. Did they have to experience life first to realise what they really wanted to do ... or could that time spent in the depressing job have been avoided altogether if they weren't subject to the "careers advice" schools dish out formally and informally?

[Chabrenas]

TGM, the classroom vs tutored online/correspondence courses vs reading and doing things yourself choice depends heavily on both the way you learn best and whether you have the time and the self-discipline to work without external control.

In my youth, I was bright but lazy. I determined that I'd keep going until learning became hard work, then find happiness by looking for a job at that level - one step below the Peter Principle. That got me through the whole three years of a BSC course in Physics & Maths, but no degree. One option was to go back for another year, only to be awarded a 3rd class (i.e. Pass) degree no matter how well I did in my finals. I became a programmer (initially, of tabulator plugboards) - in those days known as employment for the otherwise unemployable.

I was lucky enough to move three years later to the development labs of a major IT company, where I was re-educated at regular intervals and changed jobs as the lab's mission changed in response to the way the outside world was changing. I didn't ascend the hierarchy very far, but I enjoyed the life most of the time, especially after I learned the knack of getting foreign assignments. And I got used to the idea of being told to learn a new skill and start using it within a couple of months, which I consider more important than high-level initial qualifications in a world where less than half the working population is in 'till you die, retire or get fired' jobs, unless you want to go to PhD level.

Choose the way that suits your character and personal situation, but definitely keep on learning.

[aneil4lom]

The best thing I can suggest for a Political Science graduate is to go into accountancy, work at that for five years to get the professional qualifications and pay off the student debt, while building the web sites on the side.

That way you have a piece of paper that lets you freelance in a lucrative field, and learn how a business should operate - any business you might consider starting.

The large accountancy firms take people from any discipline - they just want to see good grades as evidence that you can apply yourself to the work you are given, however disinteresting that work may be. And accountancy itself is actually an interesting subject when you get into it, and get above the paper shuffling.

My friend's son has a degree in web design - the job market is so crowded he's making more as a wedding photographer than he is out of web stuff. OTOH he's so naive about SEO and the real aspects of owning and running websites that he really needs another degree to learn about how to use what he knows.

I think that when i graduate from college, I want to work for a couple years while still doing my own business on the side (other then the web design, i want to start 1 or 2 brick and mortars). I'm exploring a couple options to work or teach abroad for a year maybe and then when I come back home i'll either do an mba or law.

Luckily i have no student debt so i save a bout a quarter of everything i earn right now!

We often see people go through university in a subject they don't like/weren't best suited to, take up a job that made them miserable and then leave to follow their heart - whether it is to sing, be a stand up comedian, full time gardener or photographer. They end up following their passion even if that sometimes means going back to university. Did they have to experience life first to realise what they really wanted to do ... or could that time spent in the depressing job have been avoided altogether if they weren't subject to the "careers advice" schools dish out formally and informally?

I think I want to educate my kids at home too (when I have kids). I remember that in one holiday to Margarita, I learnt more Spanish than 3 years of school. lol


Going to college right after high school is the norm here and nobody questions it. I realized eventually that a college graduate salary here could provide me with a nice life but not the life that i wanted. I don't want to be tied down to a physical location or have to work hard at someone elses company where only a fraction of the effort i put out would be reflected in my pay-slip.

One of the most difficult things for me is that I have few people to look to for advice. Most people my parents age can't understand the business ventures that I want to get into, and people my age aren't really enterprising and don't see why I want to own my own businesses.