Getting a good paying job without a degree/certification: autodidacts

[bushman505]

Because I am significantly more skilled.

Interesting.

 

[bushman505]

Is this your new gimmick? You went from med school student to avoid Will Hunting?

Also, the time spent studying is only part of it. The rest is like I said before, writing papers, applying the knowledge, doing problem sets. You don't do that. More does anyone else here. Sorry, but doing a lot of reading, and watching a lot of YouTube videos, is not the same as going to college no matter how much you want it to be.

This is 100% true.

 

[bushman505]

First, I never had TAs. It was always the professors lecturing. Second, nobody is going to study as rigorously outside of school. Maybe a couple of people are capable of that. But most people aren't going to spend 8 hours a day for 2 years, studying a particular subject matter, after having spent 8 hours a day for the previous 2 years, studying a number of subjects covered in general education. Not to mention that with the subjects that aren't simply memorizing and regurgitating facts, you need to bounce your questions off the lecturer and other classmates.

I know everyone on here thinks they're fucking Good Will Hunting. But you're not. I dropped out of school for a while. Then I went back and I'm glad I did. Because if you don't do it, you don't know how much you are missing in terms of knowledge.

I think a lot of people didn't finish college, or just didn't go, and those are the people trying to justify that decision by saying they could get just as good an education on their own. Yeah, theoretically you could. But none of you did. And that is obvious to anyone reading your posts (not you specifically).

I'm ado glad I finished school and continued on with my education. My life has without a doubt been significantly better than it would be otherwise, not just financially but opportunity wise.

 

[MMA IAN]

Back in 2002 a friend of mine moved out to Gilroy, CA for a programmer job with some company called Diversified Software. It was paying pretty good. I think he started at around 70K.... again, it was 2002.

He had just graduated that year from UW Madison with a degree related to that field.


This company flies him out there. His interview was some program code written on a dry erase board.
That program was currently running on the computer. There was an intentional error on the board. he had to fix it on the board as well as fix it on the computer.

He does the task and they offer him the job. He was alittle stunned asking if they where going to talk about his resume that he had originally sent to them. They said it didn't really matter. He asked "what if I was just some kid who knew programming, didn't attend college, and still was able to fix the issue?"

They said, "we would have hired him".

Anyone have similar stories of not taking a formalized education route but still getting a degree in a field where most would think you'd need a degree?

I think it was less important back in the day to advance, like my old man got high up in his occupation without going to university, just through long term life experience, but he says now if people want to get to where he is they are expected to have a degree.

So for climbing the corporate ladder, yes you need a degree/s now but you can be very successful yourself without it. Your friend may have got the job but he may find to advance the degree will be the difference breaker. He will get the promotion over someone with the same skills without the degree.

For starting businesses, anyone can do that, my mates little brother can barely read or write and left school at 14 but worked in concreting for the next 8 years and now he's running his own successful company getting 6 figure contracts. He gets people to do anything he can't do and he just worries about the concrete.

Same story, another dude, left school in year 11, did some networking, bought a road traffic management business on the cheap, 3 cars and 9 employees, now he has more than 40 cars, over 100 employees and is getting multi-million dollar contracts.

 

[lakersfan45]

Medical education is basically paying a school $200-350k to self-study and take tests for a few years before applying to residency, which is where you actually learn how to practice medicine. Medical schools could be completely eliminated. People could self-study to pass licensing exams and then do an apprenticeship.

And how many classes have you taken in med school ?

Med school classes constantly challenge their students in many ways -- not just by tests. For example, they have to constantly analayze and present current literature and have discussions. They also get to have unique hands on learning opportunities. I took a pathology class at a med school (not as a med student but as a PhD biochemistry student, they let me in because I was considering joining a pathology lab with a mix of MDs and PhDs). We got to go to a local hospital twice in one quarter to see the organs of people who were recently deceased and disseminate diseases the people had and causes of death. I'm not sure what other classes or years of med school are like because I only took that one class, but I assure you it's more than reading and taking tests.

I think you are just talking out of your ass here.

 

[SoberAwakening]

Working with drones, UAVs, RPAs are paying six figures right now.

 

[Shaved Rabbit]

I am also a highschool drop out - modded this place TWICE. Not bad for a national statistic.

Being a high school drop out and spending all your time moderating a human cockfighting online discussion meme board, for free.

If that's not a good reason to tell kids to stay in school, I don't know what is.

 

[Lubaolong]

And how many classes have you taken in med school ?

I finished, so all of them.

Labs are an inefficient use of time. Spending countless hours dissecting a body is a perfect example. Some schools have finally wised up and started using prosections. My school wasn't so enlightened, so I never attended anatomy lab and instead learned everything out of a book. An anatomy book and a board prep book were the only 2 books I ever purchased in med school. Everything else I learned off downloaded PowerPoints or the Internet. I feel like I should have paid 1/2 my tuition to Wikipedia.

 

[Lubaolong]

This is a late 14th century painting depicting a professor expounding a favored topic from the cathedra. It's easily identifiable because not much has changed. Students sit in rows, some look bored, some are chatting with their neighbors, one looks to be asleep. Despite great advances, technology has done little to change education for many of you it seems.

 

[Cool Hand Luke]

Being a high school drop out and spending all your time moderating a human cockfighting online discussion meme board, for free.

If that's not a good reason to tell kids to stay in school, I don't know what is.

 

[Huked on foniks]

So far with what I've seen in the IT industry certifications is all companies seem to care about.

 

[aldeniro78]

Go to college, kids.

 

[KBE6EKCTAH_CCP]

I could have never gotten my career without going to business school.

However, 90% of what I learned in business school is useless to me and mostly a bunch of bullshit.

If I had spent that time reading the right books and maybe attending very targeted seminars instead I would be much more competent in my job, which I couldn't have.

So yes, for many fields, like mine (banking), higher education is more of a right of passage than something that truly grants much knowledge.

That probably isn't the case for technical and scientific fields like chemistry or engineering, though.

Lastly : I believe that the truly greats (think Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, etc.) were born with what made them great and didn't learnt sh1t from business school.

A notable exception is Warren Buffet though, who gained exposure to value investing as he attended classes from Benjamin Graham himself.

All these guys mostly were already doing weird things as kids that signalled that they were special.

 

[KBE6EKCTAH_CCP]

Cisco certs?

The best thing about a degree is getting your foot in the door and not getting cocked blocked by HR early on in your career. I will say as time goes on it's getting harder and harder to even get in. For example I know a shit load of guys back in the 90's who just took some programming classes at a community college who ended up with jobs pretty easy and they weren't exactly talented, the market was so hot at the time. Even with a degree today it can be pretty tough for someone trying to get in without any experience unless they luck into a college hire program with a company which is basically a guaranteed job.

Yeah I was going to say that. For every qualified job opening there are more and more qualified people with a degree applying for it.

Why would firms even consider anyone without a degree when almost everyone applying has one?

And that is regardless of the amount of bullshit behind that degree.

 

[Oblivian]

First, I never had TAs. It was always the professors lecturing. Second, nobody is going to study as rigorously outside of school. Maybe a couple of people are capable of that. But most people aren't going to spend 8 hours a day for 2 years, studying a particular subject matter, after having spent 8 hours a day for the previous 2 years, studying a number of subjects covered in general education. Not to mention that with the subjects that aren't simply memorizing and regurgitating facts, you need to bounce your questions off the lecturer and other classmates.

I know everyone on here thinks they're fucking Good Will Hunting. But you're not. I dropped out of school for a while. Then I went back and I'm glad I did. Because if you don't do it, you don't know how much you are missing in terms of knowledge.

I think a lot of people didn't finish college, or just didn't go, and those are the people trying to justify that decision by saying they could get just as good an education on their own. Yeah, theoretically you could. But none of you did. And that is obvious to anyone reading your posts (not you specifically).

He's bringing up a point that our education system has it's flaws which cannot be denied. And depending on the class + major, he is right that a lot of time spent learning is done on your own. When I took the average 15 credit hours, my Mon/Wed/Fri was typically 3 classes for an hour each. Tues/Thurs was two classes for an hour and a half each. Some of these classes I absolutely had to attend daily due to several assignments being turned in per week. Other classes solely relied on exams, and maybe a couple projects.

For the classes that were exam based, I honestly was ok not going to them a lot of the time and cramming the week before exams. For the others, a lot of my learning came from following the slides and the book. The professor/TA would maybe drop a couple things per lecture that helped me understand.

With the rise in technology, there has to be more efficiency to this. Obviously this is being explored with the ability for online courses which is basically self study. I think there are several classes that I could have done fine in just from the books and some online help.

College is a huge financial industry. The cost is absolutely ridiculous now, and it's exceeding inflation. There is also a strong argument that the value of a degree is going down. You cannot have the price of a good going up while the benefit is going down. Even if you don't believe the value is going down, there is no doubt that the price is increasing a greater rate than the benefit is increasing. I think it's important to look at ways to improve that, and I do feel like self study/online learning is a valid avenue.

FWIW, I have to be licensed in my industry. The old way was going to continuing education seminars which were typically out of town with a lecturer. Now we are able to just watch them online, have copies of the slides, and take a test at the end. It's just as valid as the previous way, but much cheaper and efficient. Why not look at that with all forms of education?

 

[Tamriel Terror]

I was expected to go to college (since my brother was the screw up), and I'm really glad i decided to and even more happy i actually got a useful degree.

Its not rocket science to know that getting a degree in something like Finance, accounting, management, MIS, tech, engineering, etc. is going to massively increase your chance of gettting a really good job. Nothing is funnier than someone who spends hundreds on thousands on education for a crap degree and then complains about not being able to get a job. (the entire history major department complained about not being able to get a job all the time where i went).

 

[KBE6EKCTAH_CCP]

This is 100% true.

This cannot be universally applied, though.

I maintain that in business school most of my time was spent studying absolute horseshit.

From a knowledge POW that time would have been much better applied reading books.

But business schools are also notorious for BS.

 

[coopdro]

Cisco certs?

The best thing about a degree is getting your foot in the door and not getting cocked blocked by HR early on in your career. I will say as time goes on it's getting harder and harder to even get in. For example I know a shit load of guys back in the 90's who just took some programming classes at a community college who ended up with jobs pretty easy and they weren't exactly talented, the market was so hot at the time. Even with a degree today it can be pretty tough for someone trying to get in without any experience unless they luck into a college hire program with a company which is basically a guaranteed job.

Working at big legit companies far outweigh my certs on my resume, but they don't hurt. I started with 4 MS Server certifications when I was trying to get into the industry. My primary relevant certifications now days are my VMware professional accreditation.

When I worked in the insurance world, the college diploma was going to be a very aggravating limiting factor for my career. Not so much in IT. I've yet to encounter a single issue without having it yet and have worked for 3 of the largest IT organizations in STL in the past 10 years.

 

[Organic Damage]

Go to college, kids.

Why? From the replies in this thread, it seems you don't even need highschool to hit it big in IT.

 

[Foxflechette57]

a

Yeah I was going to say that. For every qualified job opening there are more and more qualified people with a degree applying for it.

Why would firms even consider anyone without a degree when almost everyone applying has one?

And that is regardless of the amount of bullshit behind that degree.

You can join a bank or whatever with minimal diploma and get a nice position if you are good and have a good reputation inside your company. Just not the most usual road, but everything is possible there is no define career path that works for everybody.

The head of trading in my bank started as a worker in a garage in the 80s with no diploma and he is now making more than most. The thing is that he is a killer with Charisma who was 1st in last out in the office for 10 years.

I just have a 2nd degree in accounting, working in a team of 4 my colleagues have a MBAs+FRM // PHD+FRM // and Master+CFA. We are doing the same job I just took the life experience path.

Top management positions are a different story though..

But I am working in Luxembourg not in the US.