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From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: net.cse
Subject: Re: Value of CS Degree (round the next)
Message-ID: <602@kontron.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 12-Mar-86 19:52:39 EST
Article-I.D.: kontron.602
Posted: Wed Mar 12 19:52:39 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 14-Mar-86 08:18:08 EST
References: <767@harvard.UUCP> <196@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Organization: Kontron Electronics, Mt. View, CA
Lines: 33

> 
> Unfortunately, Feynman is presently employed.  When the choice is between my-
> friend_Teddy-with-a-BSCS and my-friend-Eddie-with-a-BSEE, I'm going to hire
> Teddy 90% of the time.  Most college graduates are not genuises, and
> personally, I'd rather have some testimonial that a person (a) is capable of
> learning at the the college level, abd (b) knows something about computer
> science.  THAT's what a CS degree means.
> 

Not in my experience.  I used to work with a guy with a BSCS from Florida
Institute of Technology (NOT a diploma mill, I'm told), and I had to 
explain what a linker what.  The concept was COMPLETELY foreign to him.
He had NEVER run into it in school, or in three years working for ITT
as a software engineer.  Note: this guy got his degree in the late 1970s.
Fortunately, I don't have a degree, so I was able to explain what linkers
were, why it's good to break up large programs into several (or more)
modules, externs, publics, and all these other really deep subjects.

A degree means only that you were there, didn't insult the professors
too much, and managed to pass most of the tests.  It doesn't mean you
know anything -- and this problem isn't just CS degrees.  I spent about
twenty minutes on an airliner once talking to a guy with a B.S. in
Chemistry from CSU Long Beach, and he was unaware that fluorine gas is
causes most common substances to burst into flames on contact.

> Of course, this isn't the whole story.  One would like a little spark of
> imagination and various other desirable qualities.  This is why we have
> interviews.
> 
> C. Wingate

I agree.  I promise not to hold a degree against someone -- they may have
had no choice but to stay in school.