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Comment by munk-a | Hacker News Reader

> four years is a long time to spend treading water wrt employable skills.

Only if your sole goal in life is the pursuit of money. Most of the people I know enjoyed their time at university, they got to learn in a structured manner about philosophy and other interesting topics while having freedom to indulge in intellectual curiosity. Life isn't a race to get on a career path.

I do agree that flunking out is probably the worst outcome though, so if academia isn't for you don't feel pressured to pursue it - it certainly won't make any difference in terms of your job prospects by the time you're 30 as a developer. We just need to stop treating university as a vocational training session.

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> We just need to stop treating university as a vocational training session.

Is it treated as a vocational training session? I thought university was more about signaling some combination of socioeconomic status and ability to learn/motivation. More selective schools and more difficult coursework (such as hard sciences or engineering) signal a potential employee who is able to learn and manipulate the system they are put in, as well as possibly bringing useful connections.

People joining boot camps are often later in life than your typical college student and time is at a greater premium.

> Life isn't a race to get on a career path.

Presumably life isn't a race at all, which makes you wonder why everyone is in such a rush to attend university when they are young and don't yet have the resources to pay for it. It will be still be there when you are older and the pursuit of knowledge will still be every bit as enjoyable. It may be even more enjoyable as you then have the life experience to appreciate it. Retirement is meant for these types of hobbies.

> Presumably life isn't a race at all, which makes you wonder why everyone is in such a rush to attend university when they are young

It’s the networking opportunities (i.e. “the college experience”) which suffer as the age gap grows between you and the other students. Since networking is the bulk of the value of university, your age during attendance is of disproportionate consequence. I’m speaking from personal experience here — going into a post-grad program, it was immediately obvious to me that the age gap would act as an all but uncrossable chasm. And I’ve seen this chasm in action in undergrad, where it was even more pronounced.

Simply put, university is a lot harder to justify when a significant age gap exists. To your point, maybe most people should wait a few years before attending university, but they don’t, and those who’d otherwise prefer to wait before starting university — which is doubtlessly a wise move for some — have to risk their college experience to do so.

> It’s the networking opportunities

The move to taking university online, and the masses of students following, through the COVID period suggests not. Online university does not provide any unique networking opportunities that aren't already available through every other online service, HN included.

I don't want to spend my whole life waiting for a retirement that might never come - I might die, my mental faculties might degrade, even if everything went right I might still burn out.

If I thought I could take a three- or four-year break to study in my thirties or forties without it hurting my career I absolutely would. But employers seem to be suspicious of that kind of thing (unless it's something like a 1-year MBA). So if I want a sabbatical without hurting my earnings too much, a college degree seems like my best option.

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