What's your educational background?

[vinnywright]

Re: What's your educational background?

I'm surprised. I thought there would be a lot more Computer Scientists or Network Engineers or something similar.

he he ....a roofer's roof leeks ...a mechanic's car needs work...... and a painter's house needs painting .......... as usually people don't want to come home from work and do what they have been doing all day at work ..............following this logic I don't think a Computer Scientists or Network Engineer would want to spend their time off answering support questions

☢VINNY☢

[Jarfish]

Re: What's your educational background?

Well I finished high school and I am a trained clerck and assistant-librarian. Wish I was a real one

[darkduck]

Re: What's your educational background?

Engineer-economist in my diploma.
SAP consultant in my every day life.

[MoonRise]

Re: What's your educational background?

Just a comment. Although education is important, do not let yourself think that education equals intelligence. I have met many educated fools in my lifetime.

++1

That said, BS in Chemistry and Computer Science. Originally started out as a Math Major but decided on a different path though the other two required quite a bit of high math classes. Should have stayed and got that as a BS as well!

[Detonate]

Re: What's your educational background?

Well I finished high school and I am a trained clerck and assistant-librarian. Wish I was a real one

Jarfish, I sense you are very young. If your goal is to be a librarian, I strongly urge you to get a degree in library science. In my 20 years as an employment counselor, I never saw a job posting for a librarian that did not require this degree. In today's world, I'm sure the curriculum will involve a lot of emphasis on the digital aspects of this profession.

[sithlord48]

Re: What's your educational background?

i have no degree, well i have GED, i have been to a few colleges, mostly for Comp sci classes, i have maybe 3 classes for a BA in comp sci from a certian tech school. i had to stop going and decided i don't care about leaning C# and being forced to use .net for my projects.so i have been lately working w/ Qt instead using C++. i have tought myself much of what i know. this is the other reason i opted not to finish college since i was not learning anything and basicly paying lots of money to help ppl in programming classes.

[Snowhog]

Re: What's your educational background?

High School graduate and about two-years of various college courses (no degree). I never saw the need (for myself) to pursue a degree in college. I felt strongly that if I didn't have a target to aim for - a reason to seek a degree - that it was pointless. Going to college just because it's 'what you should do after high school' wasn't a good enough reason for me.

I agree with Detonates's comment that "Although education is important, do not let yourself think that education equals intelligence." I too, have met many people in my time on this earth, who had degrees, even higher degrees, but while being 'educated' were not 'smart.'

My father (retired) has a PhD in Genetics. He is the most intelligent person I know, bar none. The degree's he's acquired 'qualify' his educational training, but don't make him 'smart'; his 'smarts' are innate. His IQ is, litterally, off the charts. I inherited some of the 'smarts' but I am not classically 'educated.'

The acquisition of (higher) education is not a 'one size fits all' or 'be all' proposition. I have always viewed it as a tool to be used when a need arises for which it is suited.

[Detonate]

Re: What's your educational background?

As a former employment counselor let me expound more on the relation between degrees and job requirements. You may see many job announcements that require a certain level of education to apply. Even though you know that you have the experience and skills to do the job, you may be automatically eliminated from consideration if you do not have the specified education. In some instances, a proper resume and cover letter can still get you considered, but many times it will not. This is especially true with government jobs and large companies where the job requirements are codified and basically unwaivering. So if you want to find work in jobs that require certain skills concentrate on small employers who are not so bureaucratic in nature. Remember that the first person in a government or large company bureaucracy to see your application or resume is a clerk in the personnel or human resources department. Their job is simple. Make a little stack out of a big stack. The approach is to go through all of the applications and find a reason, any reason to disqualify the candidate. So if you don't meet the exact requirements of the job as stated in the announcements your application will end up in the big stack. The big stack goes in the round file cabinet on the floor.

If you are in a position to do hiring, please do not eliminate prospective candidates based solely on education or certification. Take a look at their experience and acquired skills.

Many times I have argued with employers about this. I would tell employers who insisted that that would not hire someone without a high school degree in an entry level job. I explained to them that I had seen many high school graduates that could barely read and write, but if someone has a GED, a least I know they can read and write, and had to pass a difficult test to get that certificate.

[dibl]

Re: What's your educational background?

Well said, Floyd. My career featured 12 years working for a very large organization (the U.S. Govt.), a decade with a couple of fairly large aerospace corporations, and a decade with a couple of really small consulting and engineering outfits. You have described the scenario precisely. Small outfits hire "what you can really do", aka skills. The big ones hire "qualifications", although to be fair, in recent times the corporations use fairly sophisticated interview techniques to try to winnow out the real performers from the "paper-qualified only". The best small company that I worked for literally used the existing employees' Rolodexes, when additional employees were needed, figuring that a swamped employee would only recommend someone who could actually provide effective assistance to the group. It worked pretty well, to my observation.

[vinnywright]

Re: What's your educational background?

speaking of GED's .........hear I am 48 and just starting this week an on line GED class with the local community collage

VINNY

[Detonate]

Re: What's your educational background?

I could go for days about this, but I don't want to turn this thread into a job hunting thread. But I do want to say a couple of more things. Ninety percent of all good job openings are never announced to the public. The good jobs are almost always filled internally. So if you want to work for a big company or the government, find an entry level position and apply for that. Also jobs that are filled from the outside are many times filled by the "who do your know?" system. A company has an opening, they will go to their current employees and ask them to make a recommendation as dibl provided an example of. So if you are job hunting, keep your network alive.

[GreyGeek]

Re: What's your educational background?

My original goal in college was to be a HS chemistry teacher, hence the BS Ed. But, after I acquired that sheepskin I evaluated what I had learned and realized that I really didn't know anything about chemistry or teaching. So, I stayed in school and leveled out with a real BS with a chem major and physics and math minor, then I stayed in school to get the MS.

I taught for 18 years, 10 in HS and 8 in college, but my science and math background made it easy for me to pick up other programming languages after learning Fortran in grad school. While teaching in HS I purchased an Apple to use in my classes and personal explorations. There were LOTS of powerful but inexpensive languages available for the Apple between 1978 and 1983, but the three best were BASIC, UCSD Pascal and Turbo Pascal 3.02A. I also learned Forth and Prolog. Forth remains my favorite language and the first language I used to earn a living programming.

In 1980 I was the highest paid teacher in my school district, and I took home $700/mo. My first Apple sale netted me $1200 and my first program sell returned $1500. The programming tail started wagging the teaching dog and within a short while I resigned teaching and began earning a living programming full time.

When I was looking forward to retirement, before I did retire in June of 2008, I anticipated using my programming skills to write GPL software for Linux using Qt but now that I am retired I found, for several reasons, that the passion for writing code has burned out. The most significant reason is that I have problems recalling language structure, syntax and parameters without having to "re-learn" what I used to know. Having to, in effect, re-learn the language or the API every time I started working on a project. These memory problems are also affecting my recollection of Linux bash commands, and various techniques and processes for installing, updating and maintaining Linux. I am increasingly thankful for the GUI desktop and the mouse. Answering questions in a forum like this, which a few years ago I could do off the top of my head, often take hours of Google research and re-learning to post an answer for a single problem, even if I knew the answer to that problem 6 months ago. Sometimes I read an answer to a problem and am stunned to see that I posted it, and that sometimes the posting was only a few days ago. I had no memory of making that posting. The only positive thing I can say at this point is that I am not leaving my car keys in the refrigerator. (Refrigerator -- spelling is another area where I never needed help, but now depend on the spell checker to make me look literate.)

We start life knowing nothing and it appears that we can end life in the same condition.

[ScottyK]

Re: What's your educational background?

Started college in 1989 after graduating high school that year. Took about 1.5 years of classes, before the funds dried up.

Then decided to shake things up and go into the US Air Force, and spent the next fifteen years finishing up the bachelor's degree in Management while severing full time.

Now the degree sits on my wall at work, and I'm the boss of a one-man shop. But I accomplished something that none of my siblings have not (and probably won't at this point), so thats satisfaction enough for me.

[ardvark71]

Re: What's your educational background?

Even though you know that you have the experience and skills to do the job, you may be automatically eliminated from consideration if you do not have the specified education.

Which I feel is a load of nonsense. No offense, just an opinion.

@ScottyK: The same year I graduated high school, too.

Regards...

[Guest]

Re: What's your educational background?

BBA in Computer Information Systems. Degree obtained in my 40's -late bloomer.