Comment by evanrmurphy | Hacker News Reader

Comment by evanrmurphy | Hacker News Reader

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The only way to get a piece of paper with B.S. and your name on it is to go to a big name accredited university.

But having the piece of paper is starting to matter less [1]. Most people want a degree so they can get a better job, but who would you rather hire as a developer: someone who spent 4 years getting decent grades and a CS degree, or someone who spent 4 years contributing to open source projects and teaching themselves to hack? Of course some employers would choose the former, but a smart one would at least strongly consider the latter.

What does this mean for families? Many will undoubtedly continue supporting the institutions, but others may question the merit of spending years saving for and paying off debt from college when there are alternatives available. It's easy to imagine cheaper ways to work with mentors and spend time at the library, after all. :)

[1] Trends would suggest that the paper actually matters more now than ever, due to degree inflation, but I think this will prove itself to be a bubble.

According to Spolsky, he'd take the CS degree. Since he is an internet celebrity, people will use him as a credible source to justify their hiring reasons. Also, the HR filters don't really care what open source you've done in your spare time. They won't have much knowledge on it. They will understand what a Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Yale graduate can bring to the table. But your contribution to Apache won't mean much to the filterer.

Now, having personal contact and a network throws all of this out the window. I don't have a CS degree, I've never gotten a job offer without someone having personally reviewed my application. A friend in HR says they use software that looks for competitors (aka work experience), degrees, languages in that order.

They will understand what a Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Yale graduate can bring to the table.

How about people attending less prestigious schools?

Now, having personal contact and a network throws all of this out the window.

Exactly, and this is part of what makes open source exciting. Want an internship at Google? Becoming a key contributor to Chromium OS is arguably a better strategy than going back to school, because if you're good you can get a Google employee to notice you.

>How about people attending less prestigious schools?

Nothing wrong with less prestigious schools, but most are specialized in a few focused areas. My own school is not a prestigious school, but it is in engineering and biomed.

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