[nfbcs] Research

Sun Feb 26 18:31:18 UTC 2017

I'm not sure I understand everything that you're saying.

My point wasn't that to get an entry level position you needed a college 
degree and five years of experience. My point was that without a college 
degree then you would need that experience. I was also pointing out that 
if you're looking for a job right out of college then internships or 
other experience, such as contributing to an open source project, would 
help a lot. Internships may just cost you a few summers during your 
college years. Similarly, you could spend that time working on an open 
source project if you can't or don't want an internship. Obviously, 
companies looking for college graduates aren't going to expect five 
years of experience.

My experience is that a lot of large companies are looking for college 
graduates as opposed to professional hires, so I don't agree with you at 
all that the trend is away from hiring college graduates. I've always 
assumed that large companies were looking for college graduates since 
they're so much cheaper then professional hires. The large company I 
worked for used their internship program as their primary source for new 
hires, and I know this is true for other companies in other fields.

On 26/02/17 12:08, Andy B. via nfbcs wrote:
> If you can get experience through opensource projects. Most hiring managers
> around here require boat loads of experience. Who wants an entry level (jr.
> developer job) when it requires a B.S. in CS and 5+ years of experience? Iam
> sure contributing to opensource and building personal projects doesn't pay
> the bills for 5 or more years. Most graduates have at least a $40K bill from
> school to pay back as well. We know the trend is for hiring organizations to
> keep the jobs just out of reach of recent graduates. What are we going to do
> about it? Most people start their own business, become freelance developers,
> or create a startup. Never forget that working for someone else is not your
> only option.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nfbcs [mailto:nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Christopher
> Chaltain via nfbcs
> Sent: Sunday, February 26, 2017 11:54 AM
> To: NFB in Computer Science Mailing List <nfbcs at nfbnet.org>
> Cc: Christopher Chaltain <chaltain at gmail.com>; David Andrews
> <dandrews at visi.com>
> Subject: Re: [nfbcs] Research
>
> It is true that a CS degree will not guarantee you a job, and it's also true
> that not everyone working in the technology field has a CS degree.
> I've been a hiring manager in the technology field for over 15 years, and
> I've worked for three different companies during that time. Most of the
> positions I've helped staff have required a CS, CE or I degree or equivalent
> experience. Obviously, if you're a recent college graduate, it's going to be
> hard to have that equivalent experience if you don't have a technical
> degree.
>
> My advice to anyone going into the technology field would be to pursue the
> appropriate degree. If you want to go into software engineering then I'd
> recommend a CS or a CE degree. If you want to go into some other area of IT
> then an associates degree or a relevant certificate may be appropriate.
>
> Whether you have a technical degree or not, internship experience is key. As
> I think someone else pointed out, nothing prepares you for the real world
> better than experience. Volunteering or contributing to an open source
> project will also help you stand out by showing your commitment and
> demonstrating your experience. All college graduates, especially from the
> same university, look the same. Internships and other experience can help
> you stand out.
>
> On 25/02/17 14:19, David Andrews via nfbcs wrote:
>> Greg, I have no doubt that what you say is true. On the other hand,
>> most people who hire entry-level people are going to consider
>> blindness a strike against a person. Not having a CS degree is
>> another, and this isn't baseball -- two strikes and you are out.
>>
>> We always need that little extra edge to end up in the same place.
>> You can talk about overcoming countless accessibility obstacles to get
>> your degree. This is a plus.
>>
>> Dave
>>
>> At 01:49 PM 2/24/2017, you wrote:
>>> This is going to sound odd but I work for a major technology company.
>>> I can not think of a single person in my group with a CS degree. More
>>> common in fact are fine arts degrees, like mine, history and
>>> humanities and music. We have some people including a supervisor who
>>> have no college degree at all, he came out of the military. We are
>>> all doing very technical work much of which involves coding which we
>>> all seemed to have learned as we needed it.
>>>
>>> So is having a CS degree a guarantee of a good job at a technology
>>> firm? Silicon Valley is filled up with CS graduates working at
>>> Starbucks so the answer is clearly no. IS not have such a degree
>>> going to keep you form a career at such a firm, well my experience
>>> the answer no as well.
>>
>>
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>
> --
> Christopher (CJ)
> chaltain at Gmail
>
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-- 
Christopher (CJ)
chaltain at Gmail