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Thank you for your comment.
I am a computer programmer. I love to program. I find programming to be one of the most intellectually challenging experiences of my life. Without programming, I would find myself adrift.
If I were nominated, I would not accept.
But seriously, when you mention a fix to the education system, I believe that the only way that will happen (for the software related subjects) is by organizing programmers. Not professors. Not leaders of industry. But programmers. The last time I mentioned a computer programmer "union" to one of my managers, I thought he would collapse. Can you imagine the power of uniting all US programmers under a banner they could accept. A journeyman/tradesman organization. Apprentices learning from mentors. Remember Dune? But time is short so I am not up to that challenge. Maybe one or two of our readers.
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Well put.
Knowing the problem area is always more important than the programming element. Languages and technology move so fast that by the time you have done a programming degree your knowledge is out of date anyway.
We took on some new programmers a while back, all with degrees, some masters degrees and MS qualified to the hilt. They were useless to a man. They could program (well, some of them) but as they never understood the problem area any code produced failed to solve the problems. They have all since left, and we remain with those of us who understood the problem area in the first place, and learn't the coding bits from these so called experts.
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Thank you for your comment.
I fear this is what happens more often than not. One exception is web pages. As I like to point out, producing web pages is assembly, not programming. Making things worse is Microsoft’s continued release of frameworks, each of which is another level of abstraction that hides the basic underlying algorithmic structure.
I would prefer to teach someone to program in some domain (finance, chemistry, and the like) than to be faced with someone who knows only the tradecraft of programming and who thinks he can program.
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but majored in Management, focused in Entrepreneurship.
That sound so Internet-Bubble era.
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B.S. in Zoology with Chemistry Minor.
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Had to work hard to forget all the math and physics I learned at University 
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Have you succeeded yet? 
--
Kein Mitleid Für Die Mehrheit
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I have a Bachelor's of Science degree in Computer Engineering (Wright State University[^], class of 1984). My academic training was a mix of software and hardware classes. Graduates in the program had a somewhat broader spectrum of career choices than the traditional computer science or electrical engineering major.
The truth was, at the time, neither the computer science program nor the electrical engineering program particularly wanted us. We weren't interested in the compiler design classes, nor did we care about learning the mysteries of transistor amplifiers. We were all excited over this odd new thing: the microprocessor[^].
My career has been primarily spent developing software, including a lot of data acquisition and process control applications. My computer engineering degree has helped me know how to deal realistically with hardware, which never follows the 'perfect' model that computer science majors think it does. It's also helped me interact with hardware engineers, who often have some odd notions on just what might be easy (or not) to do in software.
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I can think of a fair few people I know that would put themselves into either
I write software and I have a computer science degree
I write software and I do not have a computer science degree
but in reality they woud be firmly in
I do not write software and I have a computer science degree
I do not write software and I do not have a computer science degree
in their programming jobs.. lol
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Yeah, they call themselves managers right?
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Me too... 1 from six, not half bad.
Anyway, I'm not in programming, but information security.
AE
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When I started programming, there wasn’t such a thing as a computer science degree. Computers were built by Electrical Engineers and programmed by Industrial Engineers. They were programmed either with patch boards or flipping switches. Once you got a subroutine written and tested you burned it into ROM and memorized the start address. 2Kilo bytes of static memory and 16K of ROM, paradise. Now even “scientists” can program, not that they understand the scientific method or have ever run an experiment. I suspect very few of them even get taught the second law of thermodynamics. With all the graphics and such they ought to call it a “computer art” degree. They don’t even plan their effort anymore. Pathetic, they expect their testing to find their errors. It won’t be long till it becomes a minimum wage job.
Although, with the information wars starting up, the trend might reset. But probably not within the US, too many conservatives pushing for it to be cheapened into an “art”.
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My two favorite hobbies.
I have a degree in Mining Engineering, but after 5 years and 7 jobs, I was looking for something a little more predictable.
Chris Meech
I am Canadian. [heard in a local bar]
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. [Yogi Berra]
posting about Crystal Reports here is like discussing gay marriage on a catholic church’s website.[Nishant Sivakumar]
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Chris Meech wrote: Drilling and Blasting
That's just reorganising a different kind of "bit", isn't it?
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Chris Meech wrote: I was looking for something a little more predictable.
Oh yeah? How'd that turn out for ya? 
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LOL. Let's just say that the boom and bust cycles of the mining industry have a much higher amplitude than the boom and bust cycles of the financial services industry.
Chris Meech
I am Canadian. [heard in a local bar]
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. [Yogi Berra]
posting about Crystal Reports here is like discussing gay marriage on a catholic church’s website.[Nishant Sivakumar]
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In fact, I got 2 diplomas.
The first one I got in 2006 would let me code. In Montreal, we call it a "Technique" and last 3 years after our high school.
The 2nd one is a 4-year university course in Software Engineering which is mostly project management, requirements elicitation, quality management, etc.
In Quebec, not everybody can call itself a Software Engineer (which I am not yet because I don't pay to have it). So, I simply have a diploma in engineering without behind an engineer.
Finished all this in august. I'm still fresh out of school.
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Here in Ontario too. You don't call yourself an engineer unless you're certified as an engineer. We call all software guys "software developer" not "software engineer". That doesn't prevent us from doing software engineering jobs.
Best,
Jun
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I have been coding professionally in various languages for almost 12 years, and I do not have one single tertiary qualification (OK, I have a Microsoft Exam that my company requested me to do earlier this year, to make up points for our Gold Partnership). I have seen far too many people with all the degrees in the world come in with ABSOLUTELY NO CLUE how the "real world" works, they suck, they hate it, and eventually they resign.
In my experience, I'd rather have spent 4 years in the real world, getting real world experience, than have spent 4 years on "education". Experience trumps Education every single time, without exception!
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Experience + Education = WIN
They're both entirely different things and both are important. I've seen too much old crooks basing everything on experience and doing everything to avoid changes that would make them completely irreverent even if it made sense.
Mix both and you get total win.
School is far from the holy grail however. I've seen people getting the diploma and they really didn't know anything. Seriously. It's kind of a double-edge sword... With spikes on the hilts.
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I used to work in construction and just shook my head sadly when
the architects (fresh out of school) came to the job and started
to "explain" to us how things should be done... we just listened
then went on building it the way it would actually hold up.
Vast difference between book learning and how things really work.
My point: to be truly effect - both should be obtained, because
there are somethings that will get better with theory and some things
that will get better with experience.
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Subject said it all!
God is REAL unless declared int
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I have a bachelor of science in mathematics.
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It helped me get my current job but I learned almost everything that I know now from my mentors and on the job hard-knocks and not from my formal College education. As far as I'm concerned my College education was a waste of money in many respects (not all).
--My $0.02
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