How's it going everyone?

andrew129260 · 09 Aug 2013

I def. understand where you guys are coming from. But yeah, here it's bad. I self taught myself since 8 years old, constantly reading and studying myself because I am so passionate about it. I went to the tech school because instead of $40,000 for the same education; it was only $800 for a whole year. Plus, I got some tools and it included the cost of the exam. Since I have gotten my A+ I have definitely gotten further. But I got this from self studying, not from the actual class. I learned very little in the class. I am a visual learner and also learn by doing. So I feel like I do better this way. I was never good at school. Which is another reason why I try to stay away from it. I am glad i did too. If I was in debt like my friends I would go crazy. I would not be able to handle that stress. Benefit too of self study is no one then knows that you thought you knew something but you were actually completely wrong. haha. You learn as you go. Which is another reason I join forums.

School is important, its just not always the best solution. I work in a helpdesk/support role now. Money is pretty good. But I am looking into someday expanding my education. But I would attend a tech school which is way cheaper and does not cause me to go into debt. College just is too much money and is to much a risk here.

Shadowjk · 09 Aug 2013

Debt is something that puts a lot of people off from getting a degree and I don't blame them. £9000 ($14000) for a decent masters degree is quite a lot... Although you don't have to pay it off until you earn a certain amount it doesn't help though that the starting jobs don't have the best income but that's the way the world works

The Howling Wolves · 09 Aug 2013

Congrats Andrew for your accomplishments. Tech Schools and Trade Schools are much cheaper and one can find their nche there versus a 4 year university.
Got my education in the military and without a degree, went into Pharmaceutical sales, Mortgage Banking, and then working as a Pharmacy Tech in one of California's finest Prisons where I made a decent wage without the burden/stress of a student loan lurking over my shoulder.

However that's my opinion and everyone dances to a different drummer.
THW

Fantail · 09 Aug 2013

Greetings andrew
1.) Some alcohol may have been involved.
2.) After I got married.
3.) Remington
4.) Windows 8

andrew129260 · 09 Aug 2013

Ya I am glad I went to tech school as well. That was definitely worth it. Unfortunately you have to renew your A+ constantly which I have not done. I probably should take the test again. Its $100 though which is mad expensive for a test. And if you fail, you have to pay another $100 to retake it. I'm confident I could pass but still..

Fantail said:

Greetings andrew
1.) Some alcohol may have been involved.
2.) After I got married.
3.) Remington
4.) Windows 8

That's hilarious!

Shadowjk · 09 Aug 2013

Tell me about it! When doing my CCENT it was about the same price per go. Though the good thing I found with cisco was that if you passed higher level exams then it automatically renewed your previous certifications. For example if I passed my CCNA then it will automatically renew my CCENT for an additional 3 years :) Not sure how it goes with CompTIA though but I would look into it

Josh :)

richnrockville · 09 Aug 2013

Andrew:

<rant> I taught myself programming by reading and plagiarism, looking at the printouts for Fortran, Cobal and other languages, I experimented with changing some of the code and found out that it worked, or it bombed. Which I probably learned more with the bombs than the successes. I ended up in a company almost in charge of a Information Center. I never went to college or schools, outside of electronics school in the USN.
I was the only non-degreed member of the IC and there were people with many advanced degrees who made less than me.
Not confining yourself to a single area of expertise makes you a better system analyst which normally are paid more than programmers..
I learned enough to be dangerous :) in several programming languages. I used to help people who were bogged down in Cobol or Fortran program code. Most had at least a BA or MA in computer science.

</rant>

Rich

andrew129260 · 09 Aug 2013

This is random but I cant seem to find help for this guy. Anyone have any ideas?

Lag/Laggy animations with multiple displays (Extend desktop)

x BlueRobot · 09 Aug 2013

Shadowjk said:

A degree does have some weight with it and will help you get into the interviewing room but when it comes down to it experience is key and new graduates won't have that therefore it is expected for them to start out at a help desk job and then progress there way up. After getting a job and earned your degree you should look into certifications to prove to your employer that you can do the more technical roles.

College in the UK is like High School for US

I understand that self teaching can be more valuable and I will agree to some extent. I learned more about computers myself than my IT lessons at school however some specialty's like networking or system support can only be fully taught in a class. That being said self study is just as important and the internet can be an extremely useful tool in helping however I personally wouldn't depend on it.

If you want to just complete self study then certifications are the only way of proving your hard work

Just my opinion,
Josh :)

I self taught myself everything about debugging and programming, I brought books and used the Internet :)

Programming you can get a qualification, if I haven't seen or heard of any debugging qualifications, unless it's part of a driver development course?

x BlueRobot · 09 Aug 2013

andrew129260 said:

This is random but I cant seem to find help for this guy. Anyone have any ideas?

Lag/Laggy animations with multiple displays (Extend desktop)

I posted in the More Help Requested thread on your behalf, it's in the VIP section, so you won't access to it until you've earned Power User badge :)

How's it going everyone?

Thanks everyone