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Apple CEO Tim Cook: 'I Don't Think a Four-Year Degree is Necessary to Be Proficient at Coding'
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True, you don’t need the college to become a coder.
But what a degree helps with is it provides a common frame of language so that a team of coders can all speak and understand what the other is saying.
You come up with your own terms for stuff and there’s the overhead of others staring at you and saying “WTF did he just say?”
But what a degree helps with is it provides a common frame of language so that a team of coders can all speak and understand what the other is saying.
You come up with your own terms for stuff and there’s the overhead of others staring at you and saying “WTF did he just say?”
they wouldn’t want future employees going to college and accidentally taking an ethics course
more seriously though,
a less educated workforce is a cheaper workforce
more seriously though,
a less educated workforce is a cheaper workforce
It's easier to weed out the kids serious about software engineering from the kids who just make calculator and flappy bird clone apps in their spare time.
A developer is a technician, while a software engineer is an engineer.
It’s in Apple’s best interest to oversaturate the “technician” job market to lower cost.
You hear “everyone can code” from Tim marketing talk, but you’d never hear he say everyone can learn Apple hardware design.
Similarly, Tim never encountered students to major in fields that will be hired by Apple or its competitors, Like Electrical Engineering.
It’s in Apple’s best interest to oversaturate the “technician” job market to lower cost.
You hear “everyone can code” from Tim marketing talk, but you’d never hear he say everyone can learn Apple hardware design.
Similarly, Tim never encountered students to major in fields that will be hired by Apple or its competitors, Like Electrical Engineering.
You don't need to go through a higher education program to be a coder, but remember employers use higher education credentials to weed out candidates. I've met plenty of great coders that have limited post-secondary education.
Higher education goes deep into theory and the abstract, which is good if you are going into research.
Also the purpose of higher education isn't solely to get a person a job. The experience of going through a higher education and learning program also valuable - it often shapes our maturity (for good or bad I guess).
Finally, higher education is a good foundation but doesn't provide you real life skills - eg experience of collaboration and communicating in real business or development shop.
IMO, having a combination of both is good.
Higher education goes deep into theory and the abstract, which is good if you are going into research.
Also the purpose of higher education isn't solely to get a person a job. The experience of going through a higher education and learning program also valuable - it often shapes our maturity (for good or bad I guess).
Finally, higher education is a good foundation but doesn't provide you real life skills - eg experience of collaboration and communicating in real business or development shop.
IMO, having a combination of both is good.
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Software developer or software engineering positions can be filled by analysts, engineers or scientists.
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Except in the real world it means less than nothing.
I can't tell you the number of people we've had work for us who have qualifications but cant code to save their lives.
A degree doesn't teach you how to debug and dive into someone elses code. Only experience does that. Being able to string a few loops, ifs and methods does not a coder make.
A developer with no degree (or any qualifications) who's been in the industry for 5 years is worth about 4 developers who are fresh out of getting a degree.
A lot of snide comments from people who seem to be miffed that 12 year olds will have the same knowledge base out of high school as they have after college and a big student loan.
Tim isn't saying college is a thing of the past. He is simply stating that in a few years the average high school grad will be proficient in code. However they will still attend university to gain skills that set them apart from the rest.
Tim isn't saying college is a thing of the past. He is simply stating that in a few years the average high school grad will be proficient in code. However they will still attend university to gain skills that set them apart from the rest.
You don't get better at (insert any word here) by going to school. You get better at (whatever) by (doing whatever).
You go to school to get a job doing (whatever).
Coding is not software engineering.
You don't need a degree to be a programmer, but a university course is a great way to accelerate learning from knowledgeable lecturers. As long as you choose the right educational establishment, and apply yourself.
Wha?
Honestly I think the App Store and the current plethora of coders that flocked to both App Store and Play Store created this themselves ... many duplicating, sharing code bases for specific tasks (common ones) and especially duplicating Apps - either by sheer laziness or lack of real creativity or time consumption limits, maybe just to jump on th bandwagon or sheer sleuth in finding corporate licensing for games did not exist or lacked.
I'm STILL looking for a Gauntlet port to iOS!
Uh yea, I'm not arguing against someone that is saying a 4 year degree is required.
I think there's too much pressure to get a 4 year college degree. What's so bad about trade schools/community colleges? I live in a fairly affluent community, and the high school principal & a vice principal listed the middle school to give a presentation to parents of 8th graders. The principal said that it was okay to not take all AP/honors course, and was okay to take study hall. The parents looked like he ad blasphemed. Just seems like there's too much focus on the degree itself rather than the knowledge/experience gained.
I agree with him that many programmers can be self taught or taught in secondary (or earlier) schools but I still see a very legitimate reason to pursue more advanced education in programming. Everyone learns differently and I'm sure there are completely self taught architects out there but I'd typically want my architects to be formally taught not just on an individual language or three but on underlying computing concepts and basic logical constructs. There's a difference between an acceptable and successful app and a well engineered programmatic solution. Someone needs to be able to define the architecture and someone needs to refactor for optimum performance and someone needs to be able to audit for security exploits like buffer overruns and such. I don't seen those people (typically) being the self taught high schooler who wrote a few of their own apps.
Not against that either, I think there's a role for both.
Not against that either, I think there's a role for both.
I know a lot of talented programmers and many of them don't have a Bachelor's degree or similar. I have one and it hasn't been very useful. I've learned more through work and personal projects than I did in school. I don't have a computer science degree and I'm a senior level developer.
That said, depending on the country having a degree can help. Your application might get thrown in the trash by HR just because you don't have a degree, regardless of what it is. In the end you still should have a portfolio of your work that you can show and be able to to describe your programming decisions - know your stuff if you will.
Knowing your fizzbuzz etc crap by heart is useless knowledge in real world programming and whoever is hiring should not use those to evaluate applicants. Not everyone is good at coming up with programming solutions on the spot. I google all kinds of algorithms often. Not because I can't do them if I put my mind to it, but I know someone has already come up with an optimized solution that I can adapt to my own work. Better interview questions have you explaining how you would implement something on a more abstract level. The code quality in your portfolio should be enough to tell about your coding style and capability.
That said, depending on the country having a degree can help. Your application might get thrown in the trash by HR just because you don't have a degree, regardless of what it is. In the end you still should have a portfolio of your work that you can show and be able to to describe your programming decisions - know your stuff if you will.
Knowing your fizzbuzz etc crap by heart is useless knowledge in real world programming and whoever is hiring should not use those to evaluate applicants. Not everyone is good at coming up with programming solutions on the spot. I google all kinds of algorithms often. Not because I can't do them if I put my mind to it, but I know someone has already come up with an optimized solution that I can adapt to my own work. Better interview questions have you explaining how you would implement something on a more abstract level. The code quality in your portfolio should be enough to tell about your coding style and capability.
Tim should maybe tell his HR department that, since Apple still requires at least a 4 year degree for programming jobs.
"BS / MS / Ph.D in EE or CS is required"
https://jobs.apple.com/en-us/details/200028677/software-engineer-embedded-and-low-level-programming
"BS / MS / Ph.D in EE or CS is required"
https://jobs.apple.com/en-us/details/200028677/software-engineer-embedded-and-low-level-programming
This is like much of IT. Networking, Sysadmins, engineers etc. I've been in the industry for 25+ years, have a better than average income, and have no degree. I have a technical diploma from a very early tech\trade school, and numerous industry certifications from over the years. Would I do it differently today? I guess so as you are seeing more and more degree required positions out there. With that said, at least in my field, virtualization\networking\cloud, 25 years experience matters a bit more.
My biggest issue is how many people come to our company with a bachelors or even masters in info tech, and don't even have the basic skill sets to setup a router, switch or a server system let alone troubleshoot real world issues with them. You would think with student loan debt the size of my mortgage they would be able to at least do the most basic things without having to be trained.
My biggest issue is how many people come to our company with a bachelors or even masters in info tech, and don't even have the basic skill sets to setup a router, switch or a server system let alone troubleshoot real world issues with them. You would think with student loan debt the size of my mortgage they would be able to at least do the most basic things without having to be trained.
Tim is right on. All society needs is people who can do a trade. It is stupid to teach people about history, or philosophy, or government, or art, or science. All this peripheral knowledge just confuses people and keeps them from focussing 100% on doing their job. After all, that is all there is in life, you know, doing your job.
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