Best college for IT

[Jonseyc]

Looking to get my associates in computer science/IT. For some background I have absolutely no prior knowledge on anything computer related and will be starting with a blank slate.

[starsmine]

3 minutes ago, Jonseyc said:

Looking to get my associates in computer science/IT. For some background I have absolutely no prior knowledge on anything computer related and will be starting with a blank slate.

probably want to limit your search some more, like in-state, are you fine going out of state, and then dont focus on finding the best, anything abet accredited is abet accredited, and half the point of college is the networking so look around at clubs that you may be interested in joining. 

Weather is huge for mental health so look at regions that match up with your mood.

[Jonseyc]

So I work full time so it will be have to be online. 

[Levent]

Undergrad programs are (especially the ones are remote) are not even considered as a pro where I am at. If you want to learn, do it yourself, instead of wasting money on associates degree imo.

[BootlessBuck]

In your position, I'd start with CS50 (Harvard's intro to Computer Science available for free on edx). From there, there are many directions you can go... if it's still something you want to go after you get through it. That will give you exposure to C, Python, SQL (databases), and web stuff.

 

If you want to get an associates degree, I'd suggest a local community college. I would guess some of them would have online option, or ones that offer night/weekend classes for someone who is working. I think this would be better than most online colleges, which have historically been full of scams.

 

If I'm being really honest, when I was doing hiring for entry level positions (as far back as 2015), we got a lot of applicants from a couple for-profit college, or those that advertised on TV (ITT Tech and DeVry). I felt like a jerk at the time, but I pushed to basically throw those resumes out. I would have preferred no degree over those ones. To me, simply attending those colleges showed poor judgment. We still ended up hiring a few people from those place, in spite of my protest, and they were all disasters. I felt rather vindicated when DeVry and ITT student loans were cancelled due to alleged fraud in 2022. I'd hate to see you put a lot of time and money into a degree that turns out to be useless, because it's from a diploma mill.

 

If you have no current base, CS50 should help you figure out if it's a path you want to venture down, and there is no risk. The only cost is your time.

[Lurick]

Community college local to you will likely be your best bet, check to see if they offer online classes which most these days should but you can't be 100% sure

@undergroundbeef made some great suggestions too.

[wasab]

community college and then transfer to a 4-year public school it has a relationship with. school you go to matters little as long as it is accredited(regionally and ABET). it is more down to what you do, the connections you make, and how much value you wanna squeeze out of it. You can do the minimum and graduate with a 2.0 GPA but you can also be a top performer and seek out all the opportunities your school offers and the doors it opened up. 

 

btw, anyone telling you that the average mid-tier school is not worth going to probably has never gone through higher education, lacks a lot of real-life experiences, and frankly speaking, has a lot of growing up ahead of them. I have coworkers with degrees from Ivy League and coworkers from some average universities. we are all at the same place, doing the same thing, and no one looks at anyone any less based on the school they went to, and no one at the office is impressed if you did graduate from whatever fancy place. In fact, after two years or so of work experience, we don't even look at that on your resume or LinkedIn profile. Your past work, what you have already accomplished, and what you can bring to the table speak volumes, not your educational background. 

 

Edit: if you are in the States, for the love of God, please go to an in-state public school so you can take advantage of the discount tuition rate. max out all the scholarships and grants you can get your hands on. if you go down this path(cc plus 4 years) and assuming you are from a low-income household, you can have your degree entirely paid for by the in-state tuition assistance and the Pell Grant. at least it did that for me. Online programs generally have a pretty abysmal graduation rate. i would check up on that before i decide to enroll. I would generally advise against part-time students and full-time working if avoidable for the same reason, these students have poor graduation rates on average and many never end up completing their degrees wasting time, money, and resources. Instead, especially if you have no kids and family to take care of, save up enough savings so you can study full-time and work part-time. 

[starsmine]

18 hours ago, wasab said:

community college and then transfer to a 4-year public school it has a relationship with. school you go to matters little as long as it is accredited(regionally and ABET). it is more down to what you do, the connections you make, and how much value you wanna squeeze out of it. You can do the minimum and graduate with a 2.0 GPA but you can also be a top performer and seek out all the opportunities your school offers and the doors it opened up. 

 

btw, anyone telling you that the average mid-tier school is not worth going to probably has never gone through higher education, lacks a lot of real-life experiences, and frankly speaking, has a lot of growing up ahead of them. I have coworkers with degrees from Ivy League and coworkers from some average universities. we are all at the same place, doing the same thing, and no one looks at anyone any less based on the school they went to, and no one at the office is impressed if you did graduate from whatever fancy place. In fact, after two years or so of work experience, we don't even look at that on your resume or LinkedIn profile. Your past work, what you have already accomplished, and what you can bring to the table speak volumes, not your educational background. 

 

Edit: if you are in the States, for the love of God, please go to an in-state public school so you can take advantage of the discount tuition rate. max out all the scholarships and grants you can get your hands on. if you go down this path(cc plus 4 years) and assuming you are from a low-income household, you can have your degree entirely paid for by the in-state tuition assistance and the Pell Grant. at least it did that for me. Online programs generally have a pretty abysmal graduation rate. i would check up on that before i decide to enroll. I would generally advise against part-time students and full-time working if avoidable for the same reason, these students have poor graduation rates on average and many never end up completing their degrees wasting time, money, and resources. Instead, especially if you have no kids and family to take care of, save up enough savings so you can study full-time and work part-time. 

The biggest thing ivy gets you is broader networking, aka feet in the door. I wouldn't say that its overblown, but so long as you are doing well in any school your school likely has industry contacts at many companies you can utilize. Like South Dakota state is buddy-buddy with IBM because of Ahmdal. Virginia schools all have contacts at Micron because of the Manassas plant. Also like you said, after a few years of experience, you no longer need that foot in the door for 98% of jobs. 

IMO go out of state if you can, many states have reciprocity agreements with neighboring to give you instate and schools in the midwest have out of state the same price as your instate, just fucking move. go and meet new people and new perspectives that you don't have at home. And even if the out-of-state school you go to doesn't have a reciprocity agreement, you can move your permanent address there after a year and get instate after that. (I like having my parent's house as a home base, constantly moving your permanent address is paperwork)

The CC route works well, and i understand it completely, I half did that. Something you can always use is sign up for your community college at home as a non-traditional student and you get cheap credits when you come home for the summer, or any semester and transfer them around as needed. I just do not like that doing that makes the only financially wise choice of staying at home rather than getting out there. 

College isn't just about learning new academic material, it really is to try to make you a more worldly and well-rounded person. Critical skills of taking information from multiple fields and applying it to your own. 

I fully agree, if a class has online options and in-person options, in person is the way to go. It puts you in a position to hold yourself more accountable. 

However, for a carrer in IT, CC is best, because you dont need an BS, just an AS. Just get the AS and move into the market. Use the school to help pay for certs. IT is a cert field, an AS is just like a baseline cert, but jobs will want more certs then that.

[overbuilt_gaming]

A career in Information Technology is way too big to just get some college and go.  You go get some 2year degree you'll be lucky if you can end up at a helpdesk doing level 1 tech support for users who don't understand the difference between left click and right click.  It's like saying I'm going to be a doctor.  You have to do more research and search within yourself and find exactly what you want to do in IT.  Do you want to be a security analyst, a server administrator (Linux or Windows?), a VMWare Administrator, Citrix, etc etc it goes on and on.  Do you want to do cloud things like with AWS or Azure?   Maybe you like data and want to work with Databases like SQL or Oracle. 

 

Then once you figure it out, you go get those certifications.  I've never not gotten a job because I did or didn't have a college degree.  However, I have gotten plenty of jobs and contracts because I have certifications.  

 

That being said, you then also have to figure out the job markets.  Once you do get your certifications, can you get a job in that field?  I can tell you server administrator jobs are pretty hard to get if you're stateside.  Most of those jobs went to india where those genius's reboot all nodes in a windows cluster at the exact same time for patching (hint:  don't ever do this!).  Same with VMware to a point.  Citrix is on its way out with the AWS and Azure offerings.  Security is pretty hot because it's the latest of the buzzwords. 

 

Your best bet may be to get on Linkedin, and find some recruiters in your area that recruit for IT firms and network with them.  Talk to them and find out what's hot and what's not in your area.  Who wants to spend 6+ months learning something only to find out there are none of those jobs in your area?  Then you'll have to move or spend another 6+ months learning something else. 

[wasab]

2 hours ago, starsmine said:

The biggest thing ivy gets you is broader networking, aka feet in the door. I wouldn't say that its overblown, but so long as you are doing well in school your school likely has industry contacts at many companies you can utilize. Like South Dakota state is buddy-buddy with IBM because of Ahmdal. Virginia schools all have contacts at Micron because of the Manassas plant. Also like you said, after a few years of experience, you no longer need that foot in the door for 98% of jobs. 

People at the IVY league come from influential families. Their parents are often celebrities, bussiness executives, and politicians. They will have great network and connections regardless. All mid tier schools have couple of alumnis in high places, some students from wealthly/influnetial families, professors with industry contacts, and a few Nobel Laureates here and there so I wouldn't say you missed out too much. You do need to make more an effort to network and seek them out yes but it is possible to do this even without college. Most of my networking come from linkedin and are ex-coworkers/recruiters who I work with or contacted in the past for example. Idk if companies show favoritism towards recruiting from any particular place or not but the HR department of many companies have a recruit all over the place policies. Doing otherwise is pidgeonholing yourself to a tiny talent pool and increase the risk of missing out on top talents.

 

As long as you have in state tuition rate I guess it works. Moving is a lot more complex than just pack up and go though. It is financially risky to move without a job line up and moving also costs a small fortune. Lease requires security deposit, first and last months rent, and background checks as well as insurance which you pay out of pocket and many are 1 year in length and have a penalty if you break. I would not do this without serious consideration but I guess if you have a better deal or opportunity at some other place, this can work out fine. 

[starsmine]

15 minutes ago, wasab said:

People at the IVY league come from influential families. Their parents are often celebrities, bussiness executives, and politicians. They will have great network and connections regardless. All mid tier schools have couple of alumnis in high places, some students from wealthly/influnetial families, professors with industry contacts, and a few Nobel Laureates here and there so I wouldn't say you missed out too much. You do need to make more an effort to network and seek them out yes but it is possible to do this even without college. Most of my networking come from linkedin and are ex-coworkers/recruiters who I work with or contacted in the past for example. Idk if companies show favoritism towards recruiting from any particular place or not but the HR department of many companies have a recruit all over the place policies. Doing otherwise is pidgeonholing yourself to a tiny talent pool and increase the risk of missing out on top talents.

 

As long as you have in state tuition rate I guess it works. Moving is a lot more complex than just pack up and go though. It is financially risky to move without a job line up and moving also costs a small fortune. Lease requires security deposit and background checks which you pay out of pocket and many are 1 year in length and have a penalty if you break. I would not do this without serious consideration but I guess if you have a better deal or opportunity at some other place, this can work out fine. 

I move constantly. Doing it for school isn't particularly financially risky. You are already planning on being in the area for however many years, and if moving for school most schools rightly force freshmen to live on campus (people complain it is more expensive... But it forces you to be involved on campus, which has a very significant rate on graduation rates) 

No, its not as simple as pack up and go, but it also kinda is. You can leave a lot of it in storage in your parent's house until you settle down more permanently (this assumes a non toxic family)

Another option not said so far.
Military, they have a lot of need for IT and a lot of the Rates/MOS are for IT and they will train you while paying you your full time rank, and you can convert those skills into certs and get security clearance jobs after doing a single contract with them as well as give you GI money to go to school during or afterwards if you want to.  Getting your AS first will allow you to go in as an E3 from the start of boot camp. So it doesnt mater if you go to school first or military first really. 

[wasab]

1 hour ago, starsmine said:

Another option not said so far.
Military, they have a lot of need for IT and a lot of the Rates/MOS are for IT and they will train you while paying you your full time rank, and you can convert those skills into certs and get security clearance jobs after doing a single contract with them as well as give you GI money to go to school during or afterwards if you want to.  Getting your AS first will allow you to go in as an E3 from the start of boot camp. So it doesnt mater if you go to school first or military first really. 

Depends on what "IT".  IT can encompass many things. Technically Best Buy Geek Squad can count as IT. i am a software engineer. I don't need any certificate for that just like a product manager. More specialized roles like salesforce or IBM something might.  

 

Military recruiters always like to advertise all those fancy specialized roles to you but you aren't guaranteed to get what you sign up for. everyone in the military is a soldier first and whatever roles they are assigned 2nd. You would need to get everything your recruiters said to you in writing because some are very much like snake oil salesmen, they just want you to sign on the dotted line so they can meet the quotas and whatnot. Also keep in mind that you should be physically fit. The pool of qualified military recruits has shrunk greatly due to the obesity epidemic.

 

Note, if you are on officer track and they paid for 100% schooling then go for it, assuming that is what you want to do. it does sound like a somewhat decent deal. 

[starsmine]

16 minutes ago, wasab said:

Depends on what "IT".  IT can encompass many things. Technically Best Buy Geek Squad can count as IT. i am a software engineer. I don't need any certificate for that just like a product manager. More specialized roles like salesforce or IBM something might.  

 

Military recruiters always like to advertise all those fancy specialized roles to you but you aren't guaranteed to get what you sign up for. everyone in the military is a soldier first and whatever roles they are assigned 2nd. You would need to get everything your recruiters said to you in writing because some are very much like snake oil salesmen, they just want you to sign on the dotted line so they can meet the quotas and whatnot. Also keep in mind that you should be physically fit. The pool of qualified military recruits has shrunk greatly due to the obesity epidemic.

 

Note, if you are on officer track and they paid for 100% schooling then go for it, assuming that is what you want to do. it does sound like a somewhat decent deal. 

You get a high enough ASVAB score you pretty much can pick whatever you want, especially if its a role that has a sign on bonus. Recruiters dont really get much of a say on what happens at MEPS. 

And yes, be physically fit. That isn't hard to do. Not talking about special ops here, just a standard sailor/airman/guardian/solder 

one trick to piss off your recruiter. if MEPS does not offer your preferred rate/MOS to you. You have not signed on yet and you can still walk away. 

[Agall]

On 11/11/2023 at 2:01 PM, wasab said:

Military recruiters always like to advertise all those fancy specialized roles to you but you aren't guaranteed to get what you sign up for. everyone in the military is a soldier first and whatever roles they are assigned 2nd. You would need to get everything your recruiters said to you in writing because some are very much like snake oil salesmen, they just want you to sign on the dotted line so they can meet the quotas and whatnot. Also keep in mind that you should be physically fit. The pool of qualified military recruits has shrunk greatly due to the obesity epidemic.

You're generalizing quite a bit here regarding military recruitment and roles. The 'everyone is a soldier first' isn't true in the Navy and Air Force, where plenty of people get through a whole military career without firearms training/use outside of boot camp (if you even get it in there, some people skip that part due to various reasons). Navy as an example, if stationed on a ship, is a firefighter first, especially if you're in Engineering.

 

On 11/11/2023 at 4:26 PM, htimsenyawed said:

 

Go SF and become a high speed operator. Do four years and get 100% disability whether you're physically or mentally damaged. Profit?

 

Actually, disregard what I said.

 

Military is an interesting option though - it would allow work experience (and maybe you don't even like IT once you start doing it and want to be a heavy diesel mechanic instead) while also, upon honorable discharge, qualifying for both a college education and housing.

 

IT field in the military gives someone pretty much everything they need to succeed. Most (not all) programs require them to maintain Security+ which the military pays for, so once you get out and likely end up working for the Fed or civilian side, you'll be setup to jump right in. I will mention though that not every IT field in the military actually gives you the skill/knowledge required to manage a network, since a lot are so compartmentalized that most people only get a small piece of the pie. That's also true about the civilian side though, since IT in totality is an exceptionally broad field with dozens of specialties required to know the whole picture.

 

On 11/11/2023 at 2:10 PM, starsmine said:

You get a high enough ASVAB score you pretty much can pick whatever you want, especially if its a role that has a sign on bonus. Recruiters dont really get much of a say on what happens at MEPS. 

And yes, be physically fit. That isn't hard to do. Not talking about special ops here, just a standard sailor/airman/guardian/solder 

one trick to piss off your recruiter. if MEPS does not offer your preferred rate/MOS to you. You have not signed on yet and you can still walk away. 

If you get a high enough ASVAB, you'll be pseudo disqualified from a lot of fields, especially the ones that are generally for people who score lower on ASVAB. They'll either flat out decline that MOS/rate or push you towards a higher ASVAB role. It depends on the recruitment branch, but I've seen it in a few.

 

Physical fitness outside of boot camp is very easy to maintain, I spend a few years not doing physical fitness outside of the 2 times a year PT test and would get well above satisfactory, mind you, I was a year round athlete before hand and that wasn't the experience of everyone. Plenty of people would regularly workout and struggle on the PT tests to even pass. Though with the way it works now, as long as you get through boot camp and don't balloon to morbid obesity, its very hard to get kicked out because of it.

[wasab]

9 hours ago, Agall said:

You're generalizing quite a bit here regarding military recruitment and roles. The 'everyone is a soldier first' isn't true in the Navy and Air Force, where plenty of people get through a whole military career without firearms training/use outside of boot camp (if you even get it in there, some people skip that part due to various reasons). Navy as an example, if stationed on a ship, is a firefighter first, especially if you're in Engineering.

pretty sure you will be forced to fight should the situation require it. everyone is a solider otherwise they would be labeled as civilian contractors or something. 

[starsmine]

12 minutes ago, wasab said:

pretty sure you will be forced to fight should the situation require it. everyone is a solider otherwise they would be labeled as civilian contractors or something. 

yea, fight, not a ground war though. 

Sailers are firemen first, as in firefighters, you generally are strongly dissuaded from firing guns on boats. Airmen are also not doing ground warfare, they are supporting the fleet or intelligence. Yes, some get to go off and have fun with p90s, but that requires specific jobs, generally not related to IT 

 

A war is 90% support roles now. Your battle station is keeping the nuke engine running on the boat. 

You are not civilians, because you follow the military chain of command and the UCMJ

Corpmen are not required to fight ever. 

[Agall]

15 hours ago, wasab said:

pretty sure you will be forced to fight should the situation require it. everyone is a solider otherwise they would be labeled as civilian contractors or something. 

I'm speaking from experience, as someone who was Engineering and Surface Warfare qualified on a carrier and have been out to sea. If the carrier was boarded, 99% of the ship doesn't have arms available to them whatsoever, so you'd be no different than a normal civilian who's deliberately disarmed in that scenario. Maybe grab the nearest torque wrench or extinguisher...

 

If it puts it into perspective, a substantial amount of people in the military are never issued a firearm, even while deployed. The caveat comes when you're in a combat zone where even someone like my father was issued a rifle or handgun (he was given a choice, he chose one of the niche 10" M4 Commandos that were somehow available for him because it was more compact than an M4 and he wasn't experienced on handguns to be comfortable with that) while in Afghanistan in joint headquarters as a senior NCO. Everyone there had arms, which included other NATO countries, where everyone's arms were in condition 1. Was close enough to get mortared on the occasion. Otherwise, there's plenty of MOS/rates in DoD that are never in a combat zone, or not in a combat zone in that context (like a ship in a combat zone). 

 

You're simply ignorant to the way the Navy and Air Force especially handle a substantial amount of their forces, but that's not uncommon. I can speak more on the Navy side because of my experience, but I do have immediate family members who are still active duty Air Force and a father who spent most of his career pre-GWOT era in the Army. The Air Force and Navy especially don't waste time training technical personnel who will never see combat on combat training, which can include basic firearms qualifications a lot of the time. There're niches within each field that may need it, and they'll give that training as needed since its a niche temporary duty. 

 

In the Navy, stationed on a ship especially, your primary role is as a firefighter, not a 'soldier', there's MP's or MA's to handle security. Otherwise you're simply a technical expert in your field, which is how the Air Force looks at it. They have even less generalized skills like you would otherwise have on a ship, where firefighting is everyone's responsibility, some more highly trained and have special roles in the firefighting locker reward extra off-ship training, like the Advanced Shipboard Firefighting course.

[wasab]

5 hours ago, Agall said:

Snip

Okay, but in a war, these people are all military targets right? Enemies will shoot at them and should be shooting at them no? They participate in war. 

[starsmine]

1 hour ago, wasab said:

Okay, but in a war, these people are all military targets right? Enemies will shoot at them and should be shooting at them no? They participate in war. 

Depends on the type of boat you are on. 

Cant shoot a sub if you cant find a sub.

battleships are no longer a thing.

WW2 and its naval battles are not much of a thing. 

but who knows ww3 may happen and you get drafted anyways. 

[wasab]

34 minutes ago, starsmine said:

Depends on the type of boat you are on. 

Cant shoot a sub if you cant find a sub.

battleships are no longer a thing.

WW2 and its naval battles are not much of a thing. 

but who know ww3 may happen and you get drafted anyways. 

No, I mean enemies will actively seek and destroy you just like a combatant. This is why I say they are all soldiers. You don't do this to regular civilian tech workers in silicon Valley office. Enemies won't care if you are a 5 star general or the enlisted private driving his car, wont care if you are the guy with a gun or a guy with a fire extinguisher. They will shoot at both. Men in uniforms are all soldiers, thus combatants, thus valid military targets.

 

No violations of Geneva convention. Only exception is combat medics and maybe Chaplin and even that is not always followed. 

[Agall]

13 hours ago, wasab said:

Okay, but in a war, these people are all military targets right? Enemies will shoot at them and should be shooting at them no? They participate in war. 

 

12 hours ago, starsmine said:

Depends on the type of boat you are on. 

Cant shoot a sub if you cant find a sub.

battleships are no longer a thing.

WW2 and its naval battles are not much of a thing. 

but who knows ww3 may happen and you get drafted anyways. 

^

 

It depends on what ship of the carrier strike group you're on, carriers being a huge target but extremely well protected at every layer. Overall, a single carrier strike group of the USN could probably take on a small country's military on its own, but I wasn't in Intel nor are a naval warfare expert, so keep that in mind.

 

In war, you're generally targeting resources, its easier to cripple a military by destroying resources than a war of attrition by destroying the personnel. Something we figured out in WW2, targeting infrastructure to cripple a military versus WW1's battle of attrition. Slow the war machine of your enemy down to the point where it can't be supplied.

 

I won't get drafted, I served my time . The field I was in has exclusion clauses and disqualification if you're out long enough, so I'd be one of the last people they'd throw into the meat grinder. If you're 18-22 though, then its a concern.

[NavyCobra1417]

On 11/9/2023 at 7:51 PM, Jonseyc said:

So I work full time so it will be have to be online. 

Some community colleges offer associates degrees completely online with reasonable pricing.

[wasab]

12 hours ago, Agall said:

Snip

What I mean is that you are still a soldier to an enemy. In fact, the only difference between a 5 star general and a regular soldier is that he doesn't go out to seek and destroy. The enemies will certainly seek and destroy him. It doesn't mean a general is not a soldier, he still much very is. It is just that he is in an high level administrator role. 

 

So the difference between like say a rifle man and a tech specialist is just one. You don't actively go seek out enemies, that's it but believe me. Enemies will still find you as a value target worthy of elimination. 

 

 

[Agall]

8 hours ago, wasab said:

What I mean is that you are still a soldier to an enemy. In fact, the only difference between a 5 star general and a regular soldier is that he doesn't go out to seek and destroy.

Simply not true, there's a markedly different value to the enemy for a flag officer, senior officer, officer, junior officer, top NCO, senior NCO, NCO, junior NCO, and what most people simply consider a grunt. Even within those categories, there's different values to the individuals due to their role, where capturing a grunt who works in some technical fields like Intel can be worth more than capturing an infantry officer. Same goes for OPSEC when discussing certain elements of your work and external influences, like being some E3/E4 who gets access to strategic information about a certain conflict and 'leaking' that on Discord for internet clout...

 

8 hours ago, wasab said:

So the difference between like say a rifle man and a tech specialist is just one. You don't actively go seek out enemies, that's it but believe me. Enemies will still find you as a value target worthy of elimination. 

Not sure how deep your understanding of combat strategy is, but you seem to be entirely ignoring the fact that capturing the enemy is usually more valuable than simply eliminating them, especially if that enemy has useful information. Their life is also valuable to the enemy, especially in today's world with how publicized things can be. A captured grunt could turn into a national story and allow an otherwise small force a substantial amount of influence and negotiating power.

[wasab]

7 hours ago, Agall said:

Their life is also valuable to the enemy, especially in today's world with how publicized things can be. A captured grunt could turn into a national story and allow an otherwise small force a substantial amount of influence and negotiating power.

not really, it is impossible to POW an entire enemy army. During WW2 on the eastern front, neither side took prisoners and no quarters were given. the only good enemy soldier was a dead soldier