For people nearing the end of high-school, please go to college.<p>I don't have a degree and have been extremely lucky; I managed to get into middle-management and have been successful.<p>The problem is that I'm not as "portable" as I would be with a degree - in other words, a layoff or termination could put my lifestyle in jeopardy. As such, I am going back to school at 29.<p>Get it over with :)
I went to school and dropped out twice — Caltech and Georgetown. I think I maybe have 20 credit hours under my belt? I don't even know.<p>I'm now 24. I've done quite okay for myself. On paper, I'm not that appealing — non-violent/non-drug related felonies, dropped out of two very highly-regarded schools ("there must be something wrong here"), and some baggage from when I was a child ("mommy/daddy issues") that still sneak up on me every now and then, which have just as occasionally impacted my professional life.<p>But I made it. I'm a rare breed and I'm thankful. If I would have added a college degree to my life's work, it would be one less strike against me. A strike that I wouldn't have to prove myself for or against.<p>My advice: Anyone who is at or nearing the end of their high school career, please go to college. Two years at a community college, and then two years wherever you want to go. ~$70k and you're done.<p>While you're on HN, you're in a social circle of where it's not abnormal for people to be successful without a college degree. In the real world, however, this number is much slimmer than it's made out to be here.<p>That said, don't think that all you need is education either. A diploma is a piece of paper that shows you followed a curriculum, bought someone a new Mercedes, and slaved away for countless hours on end. Your battle doesn't end there — experience in the real world goes a lot further than you think it does.
I really like this. It reminds me of Mr. Money Mustache's "50 Jobs over $50,000 - Without a Degree":<p>[Part 1] <a href="http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/07/25/50-jobs-over-50000-without-a-degree-part-1/" rel="nofollow">http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/07/25/50-jobs-over-50000...</a><p>[Part 2] <a href="http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/08/05/50-jobs-over-50000-without-a-degree-part-2/" rel="nofollow">http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/08/05/50-jobs-over-50000...</a><p>Quick question: How did you get pagination working? I haven't built anything big in Meteor, but I did go through the Discover Meteor book, and it said that Meteor doesn't lend itself well to pagination, so that you should use infinite scrolling. Does pagination break if the database is updated, or is it not reactive, or am I missing something?
My quick 2 minute clicking around critique:<p>1. No search? A plumber is one one the best paid impossible-to-outsource-overseas jobs you can get without a college degree. Coming to the site I immediately wanted to search for it and have that be my point of entry to discovering how the site works. A known reference point. I had no desire to fiddle with those sliders.<p>2. Union jobs, a.k.a. "the trades". Not college but they have a clear progression and pay is fairly well documented. (a filter for union?)<p>3. pay is regional. Union jobs for example pay different depending on location. (see #2)<p>4. on the career path view make the breadcrumb dots clickable. <a href="https://raiseyourflag.com/career-path/virtual-assistant/virtual-assistant" rel="nofollow">https://raiseyourflag.com/career-path/virtual-assistant/virt...</a> - text is clickable, so should be the dots on the line above.
Nice looking site.<p>What did doing this in Meteor get you? Why did you go with a framework that focuses primarily on real-time interactions/data streaming?<p>It seems to me this could easily be a Rails app with some simple Angular components for the Filter Career Paths bit. But, perhaps this betrays my ignorance of the versatility of Meteor...
Sidestepping the merits of the go/no-go college discussion-- there are a lot of nice touches.<p>Check out the translate button: English -> French: <a href="http://imgur.com/a/N4U9t" rel="nofollow">http://imgur.com/a/N4U9t</a><p>At first I wondered why there was French but then I saw Toronto =)
Very nice! Coincidently, I've been researching Meteor this past week for a new website as an alternative to my current Laravel stack. Meteor is very exciting and I'm drawn to the Isomorphic JS concept. However, I decided to hold off for now after learning more about the issues with search engine crawling, large initial downloads and difficulty in deployment. Most of these concerns are on the Meteor roadmap, so I am eagerly awaiting future updates.<p>Meteor is definitely enticing, with it's upcoming Galaxy deployment tool and React/Angular support. It's a very exciting, albeit, fast-faced time for webdev.
One of those ideas, which if not executed well, could be misleading and/or condescending. I was pleasantly surprised.<p>Also very happy to see that it was not filled with Software based jobs.
TL;DR: university gave to me (and to my friends who have degrees) wider interest field, with skills to absorb information about new topics. In my own experience usually drop-outs and people who've did not attend college, have shallower and narrower interest fields.<p>IMHO, college/university degree is worth it (coming from Europe where education is way cheaper than in US), in regards you will also broaden your skill-set while attending school. Though, if you seek academical career 'real life' skill-set is somewhat less important.<p>Maybe it's just me and my social circles, but usually I can find out if someone has attended college or not (or just skimmed through classes), just by talking with them.<p>For reference, I had few colleagues who did their job well, though where completely clueless out of their job requirements range. They have not attended college, or dropped out very early. They had narrower and way shallower interest fields than people I know with degrees.<p>I want to stress that it's experience from my own social circles and I am not talking about exceptional cases (there are geniuses drop outs and geniuses with PhDs)
It's not working right now but I think it's a fantastic idea. I don't think a college education will matter as much as it used to in the computing world. I know several successful people without a CS degree (myself included) or a degree period and they are doing fine.
My undergraduate degree was math. Looking back, I find it really hard to imagine how I could have learnt all that without going to college. I just don't think it's possible to recreate that combination of extrinsic motivation and interactive learning. <i>maybe</i> moocs can do this but I suspect they fall short on both accounts.<p>Now I'm able to learn more independently (e.g. type theory and HoTT) but it's still very difficult and I don't think I could do it without my undergraduate and higher degrees.<p>I see a lot of posts on hn asking the lines of "how can I learn X on my own". Without at least some formal education in college math or cs, I suspect the answer may be "it's not possible "
I'm working on my meteor app too. Where are you hosting it? Can you provide more details on the deployment and how much monthly this costs you to keep it running?
Aside from the usual flame of whether or not to go to college, this is HIGHLY impressive in design and function. It's also an amazing idea.<p>Good job OP!
From time to time I think about university apart from academics. I went to a state school and left w/ around $15k in student loan debt, but made some of the best memories of my life.<p>Those are the kinds of experiences money can never buy you again. No sports car later in life will ever bring you that kind of fulfillment.
One of the careers listed is Boat Captain. I used to have my captain's license. You can totally do it, and travel the world driving wealthy people around, without a degree.<p>Another way to get into that profession is to go to a university with a top ranked racing team, and be a professional skipper after you graduate.
IMO, just do whatever is right for you. Nobody should be held back from pursuing academic interests. Just like nobody should be held back from learning on the job.<p>The only thing that we should warn people away from is doing <i>nothing</i>. You've got one life, just live it!
Why limit it to careers for people not going to college? What is the benefit of that over, say, having all type of careers whether a degree is necessary or not? It seems like a really well organized product you have, but you are limiting its potential.
I like the filtering approach - quite unique criteria, compared to what "similar" job-catalogue websites are offering.<p>Well done, overall! :)
I'm seeing huge amounts of commentary about going to college or not. Here's my take and experience for what it's worth, as well as a general response to some of the comments I'm seeing.<p>1) There is no one size fits all answer to the question is college worth it. Depending on what career you intend to pursue it could be required (i.e. try being a medical doctor without a degree) or silly (music composition degree for a non-academic role).<p>2) Most HR recruiters and certain 'this-is-what-all-the-other-managers-do' hiring manager types do care about the degree. Without it you will not be likely to get in the door. However, consider if these are the kinds of people you want to work for/with. The other type of hiring professional where the degree matters is the manager that wants 'only people from Stanford (Columbia, Harvard, etc)' or 'only Ivy League'... then the degree only matters if it's from one of those (obviously).<p>3) Be honest with yourself. We are not equal all equal and facing reality will help you better make choices. If you are brighter, more intelligent, better skilled, more highly productive, and better with self-promotion than the majority of people you know/encounter the college degree (and expense thereof) will often times not be worth it. There are other more effective ways to prove your worth. If you are much more average compared to your competitors, or less interested in proving your worth in terms of career, then the degree will open options that aren't readily open to your more marketable peers; however you will also be competing with a greater number of people in the same boat. Being average or not career driven doesn't make you bad, it's just a consideration.<p>4) Any job you get you will be competing with others. That competition will be more important than the degree once you're inside. A degree can get you in some doors, but once you're in it will be all about performance. If it's not, you may want to question organizational effectiveness in the business. As your career progresses, the degree will matter less and less and experience/achievement more and more.<p>5) A good job is one that you enjoy doing and that pays for your desired lifestyle. It's not what your parents wanted you to do or society for that matter. And not all of them require degrees. Not all of them are behind a keyboard or a suitable for telecommuting. raiseyourflag.com looks young, but has some interesting ideas in regard to careers. But there are others touting (<a href="http://profoundlydisconnected.com/" rel="nofollow">http://profoundlydisconnected.com/</a>) that there are good jobs with good pay that society (stupidly) tends to look down on. Don't let the opinion of others determine your course of action.<p>As for me... I have no degree. Despite that, I've managed to be in fairly senior information technology management positions throughout much of my career. I've been a consultant in the professional services group of business systems company and for the past several years I've run my own tiny boutique consultancy with clients ranging from M&A/Finance to frozen meat distribution to mobile app start-ups. More recently I've been doing much more hands-on software development work and enjoying the change. I tend to make as much or more money than the majority of my fully credentialed peers. I'm mid-40s and, true, I do have some college (music composition focused), but the lack of a degree has not stopped me from achieving what I want in career. Anyway, my two bits.