Hacker News Reader

Comment by spikels | Hacker News Reader

College-style education is both expensive and risky. Expensive not only from tuition but also four years of lost earnings and missed actual experience. Risky because academia is only loosly connected to the working world - so much of what is taught will turn out to be irrelevant.

While still unproven alternative education techniques such as online or internships/apprenticeships may turn out to be more effective and much less expensive. If employers become convinced traditional diplomas and degrees are unreliable indicators of quality and better alternatives exist, we could see a sudden shift away from traditional education.

Would you rather hire someone with a middle ranking college degree or two years experience and a letter of recommendation from their boss? Or a certificate from a reputable online program in the exact skill you need?

View on HN

Still sucks for workers though. College is about acquisition of general human capital which, in theory, can be used in a variety of jobs. Thus the higher wages commanded by college graduates: they can go elsewhere. A certificate, on the other hand, provides only a very limited skill set, effectively reducing the options for the employee and thus lowering the expected wage.

For many people the certificate might be worthwhile, of course. There have always been people willing to take jobs that were inherently risky (working for the only factory in a small town, for example). So my point is that even if alternatives become more popular, they probably won't provide what a college education typically provided in the sense that the balance of power will be shifted away from the employee and toward the employer.

I would hire the one with the degree (in computer science), absolutely no question about it. The person with 2 years experience or certificate with the exact skill might be able to do 80% of the work (the easy stuff), like writing some front end code, but as soon as they encounter anything requiring more than basic understanding of computer science and math and some scripting skills, they'd be stumped most likely. Not only that, but someone with extensive math knowledge will see math and elegant solutions where others would see nothing.

University is a great place for people to learn the fundamentals in a structured way and learn how to learn. While a few very talented and motivated folks can pick it up themselves by reading, the vast majority can't reach that point by themselves (me included).

(Note, I'm only talking about sciences and engineering, those are the only ones I know anything about)

I would hire the one with the most impressive GitHub account.

I have hired both types of candidate. In my opinion, a four-year college degree is worth roughly the same amount as two years of real-world experience. There are exceptions on both sides, but on average four years of college seems to be roughly equivalent to two years of work experience.

Someone with college experience will probably know more theory, which is useful. But they rarely realize that large projects are significantly different from their college work, and they don't understand why you have to do what your users want instead of what the theory says is correct. So when I hire someone with a degree and no experience, I know my team will need to teach them those things.

On the other hand, people without college degrees can get into a lot of trouble if they don't learn the theory behind their work (especially algorithmic complexity). So when I hire someone without a degree, I know my team will need to teach them those things.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com