Is college worth the cost?

One option that makes college more viable: Delay going to college and work for a few years. Being able to pay for your own education and avoid crushing debt is a huge advantage. The added experience and maturity also help to make the most out of a college education.

Yeah pretty much. Most of what I learned in physics I could've learned from the engineer next door from my parents' home, most of what I learned in programming is on the internet, and nearly all of my bacc core classes were roughly equivalent or outright inferior to high school. But none of them come with a shiny degree that say "you know this and learned it from a nationally recognized source that employers will respect".

edited 2nd Jun '13 5:57:31 PM by Pykrete

^^Can't stress that enough.

edited 2nd Jun '13 5:58:47 PM by joeyjojo

Thing with that though is you might be moving out and paying bills by that point depending on how many years/how well or not any job you manage to get pays. For some it is best to go to school early on, for others it can be bad. You have to decide early on I think. I wouldn't recommend going right away if your major is undeclared.

edited 2nd Jun '13 6:01:19 PM by Wildcard

@Pykrete: Also, trying to learn things on your own can be quite difficult. Having an expert around who knows how to help you learn (that is, a professor/instructor) really helps.

That is true too, maybe hire a private tutor though if a person is looking for an alternative? Though that can be it's own problem depending on their experience.

edited 2nd Jun '13 6:03:17 PM by Wildcard

Yeah. Like in programming, a coder who learned online is considerably less likely to know how to manage memory and caches, and considerably more likely to make 2D RP Gs that run slower than AAA titles before crashing your computer with a memory leak.

edited 2nd Jun '13 8:02:58 PM by Pykrete

@Jauce: show me a career you can work in for 2 years without a college degree that you can actually make enough money to save enough to pay for college, and I'll show you a job you probably shouldnt fucking leave to go to college.

edited 2nd Jun '13 8:48:11 PM by Midgetsnowman

Yeah you're lucky enough to find a job that pays rent, food, and bills in a city. Forget saving 40k for college.

edited 2nd Jun '13 8:46:49 PM by Pykrete

Well, I'm not an American, but I managed to land a decent paying job as a Web Developer. I decided to return to college because of the better pay and prospects a college degree offers.

See, in America, I went to college for six years, graduated top honors in computer science, and I still had trouble landing a developer job because they're all demanding 3+ years professional experience.

And this is a field that's doing relatively well in our recession.

Wherever you are, I wish our tuition and employment landscape was half as green.

edited 3rd Jun '13 1:48:34 AM by Pykrete

@Jauce: The problem is no one is freaking hiring right now unless they have both A) 3+ years of work experience and B) A college degree...

Well, theoretically that problem will eventually resolve itself when no-one in the job market has any experience because no-one would hire them. It might take years, but it'll happen eventually.

Not until the baby boomers retire.

edited 3rd Jun '13 4:53:29 AM by joeyjojo

Connections are also a huge game changer. If you know someone in the field, they can help pull some strings for you to get ahead. If you know no one, you're on your own. You're always encouraged to keep an open profile and talk to everyone to see if you can get anywhere, but that is not always the case,

As someone said earlier, employers want the "perfect" employee; one that has a clean record, one that already has experience so they don't need to be trained as much, and one that will stay with the company for a long time. No one wants to take a risk because it equates loss of profits for them if things don't work out. There's also the problem of not being hired because you're "overqualified". I know some common jobs that anyone can get into, degree or not, may refuse to hire someone if they have a college degree in, let's say Computer Science, because the employer is thinking "Why should I hire this guy who has so much knowledge and experience in a field that is not related to his background and could bolt out the door the moment something better for him comes along?"

Something will break sooner or later.

The problem is of course this person who can't get into their field is a lot of people with college degrees nowadays. Trying to find jobs to pay off the student loan and make connections in and out of college is the best thing to do right now.

Don't forget the forced internships. I overheard a coworker talking to a buddy about how he wasn't able to graduate unless he did an internship, and of course most internships are unpaid, so you're mostly doing work for free.

This is a good thing about the British loan system. You don't pay it back until you're earning over a certain amount (15K p.a. when i took mine out, and I think it's 21K now.) so if you can't get a job you don't have to pay shit.

It really does suck out there right now, huh. Sometimes it feels like the only thing you can do is keep working, looking, and be hopeful for the future.

It also doesn't help that some parents pressure their kids to enroll in college right away and to think about what their career path should be; this can cause some people to pick something out of pressure and not think about what they're getting into, thus jumping the gun before they know what is going to come out of it. Honestly, I don't think it's going to cause any harm to wait 2-5 years before deciding if college is the right thing for you.

schools do that too.

I jumped right into col,lege in computer programming because high school was all about convincing me to go to college. I flunked out in a years time and spent 3-5 years working oddjobs before discovering a passion for the arts and returnuing to college regardless of financial incentive to do what I love.

But its a double edged sword.

High schools push you to go to college because "colleges ensure your financial future" and colleges push you to pick a major early (even if most professors think thats a terrible idea) because costs mean that taking a year or two to sample all your options before deciding a career path means wasting a lot of money.

edited 3rd Jun '13 8:41:47 AM by Midgetsnowman

The British system requires one pick a "major" before they even apply.

yeah. American Colleges dont..which used to be one of their upsides back in the days when colleges didnt cost so much that you could take a year or two to try everything and find your passion.

These days, it just means colleges have to hire a lot of counsellors to help you pick a path posthaste,

It's not just that. I remember in my final years of high school, I had to take a bunch of tests that would "determine" what path in my career life I should go for when I go into college. Needless to say the tests were a waste of time because I had no friggin clue at that point in time on what I wanted to do with my life.

We did that. I was advised to become a farmer, based on nothing more than my childish Wangst about "not getting along with others" and my stated love of the outdoors.

I could not be a farmer in a million years. Even then, one doesn't just "become a farmer" - it usually requires some land, which I don't got.