Going Back to College

Shaissa

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So after all this time (7 years) I'm debating about going back to college. I know many of the younger people on here are going right now. I'm curious if you or anyone you know started or went back after a very long time (over 3 years). How did they handle it? Did they think it was worth it? Any suggestions?
 
Honestly I found returning to education (going to college) to be a mixed bag. I had dropped out of school when I was 16 and had no intention going back to formal education. I found the whole structured approach to education to be stifling and it pretty much killed all creativity and joy in learning. However, last year I returned to college to pursue a course in Graphic Design, with the idea that maybe college would have a different approach to education and since the course I was taking was centred around creativity perhaps it would be exactly what I needed.

All in all, I kind of enjoyed the experience. To tell you the truth though, I had the feeling I was taking two steps back since I was at that stage used to being beyond the whole school thing. It was like I had returned to being 16 which of course wasn't the best thing at the age of 20/21. I didn't feel like I was really advancing in my life which, had I gotten a job then instead I would probably felt a lot more fulfillment.

This is just my personal take and obviously if one has gone from school to college to employment this wouldn't be a thing at all. Returning to education at that stage is more of a diversifying of one's skill pool. I have known people though who, once they return to school, are inclined to be the perpetual student, especially now since education and a vast array of courses are so readily available.

Lastly, I found returning to college to be a far easier experience for me socially than what I had endured as a teen. This was mostly because I had time to grow up a bit and identify my own awkwardness and issues of confidence.

I would recommend being a bit retrospective before making the decision to return to education. It may not fit in with who you are anymore or be redundant in terms of where you really want to be. Also, if it is a means to and end, it might be a good idea to see if there are back doors that you could manipulate that could circumvent the school option because it is a truly disgusting feeling finding out, after all the money and time is spent, that there was a way easier and quicker way to get what you were looking for.

Put it to you this way, I didn't need a Graphic Design qualification to be employed in the sector. An apprenticeship and knowledge of the various programs would have sufficed to land me a job. One can also freelance and after a job or two where one can get references it is a lot more possible to get placement in a firm since the companies are more interested in your practical experience than any piece of paper with a grade.

My advice, think about it. Don't just go ahead with it because it's the thing to do or it seems fun.
 
Put it to you this way, I didn't need a Graphic Design qualification to be employed in the sector. An apprenticeship and knowledge of the various programs would have sufficed to land me a job. One can also freelance and after a job or two where one can get references it is a lot more possible to get placement in a firm since the companies are more interested in your practical experience than any piece of paper with a grade.
This. All of this.

It obviously varies greatly with the type of field you're educated in (e.g. an electrician's tools & methods have not changed vastly in the past 5 years, but a software developer's tools & methods have).
For all intents and purposes, my Bachelor's degree in Computer Science is not even worth wiping my arse with (the paper is too rigid and coarse). Not just figuratively, but literally nobody gives a ferret's anus whether I have a C in .NET and a B in Web Development from 2008 or whenever it was. Everything I learned there is about as useful as a cat flap in an elephant pen today.

I'm sure there's plenty of fields where you're literally required to have a paper saying that you've passed X set of standards, but that is not an universal constant of the universe.

Age also limits your employability. As a rule of thumb, a 21 year old is much more attractive to an employer than a 31 year old, as there's less chance the 21 year old is going to require maternity/paternity leave or request extra holiday to take their SO on vacation, or whatnot.
 
I just have two questions:

1) What sort of career do you want to have?

2) How hard are you willing to work to get it?

While I've found that attending individual college classes and maintaining a regular job is alright, I still despise the thought of entering any sort of educational system full-time again. Like Galadin I got out of structured education relatively early, and entering one again really does feel like a step back. Different jobs are different, but chances are these days a college degree isn't required to get in, even if the job description calls for one. If you are willing and able to put in the hard work and entrepreneurial effort necessary to get somewhere, chances are good that you can. A business that sees you are independently capable and work hard is going to be much more interested than in someone who just has a piece of paper and a few years of debt racked up. That being said, I am only at the early stages of this process myself, so I'm not exactly a success story to follow. I just look at college and think "there HAS to be a better way." And I intend to find it for myself. It's not a cookie-cutter solution, but that is kind of the point, isn't it? Don't go back to cookie-cutter college to find your own mold? Again, it depends on what your goals are and what you're willing to put in to get there. Personally I would lose my sanity if I went back into the system full-time.

EDIT: Don't want to give the wrong idea. I LOVE education. Education is awesome. It's the educational SYSTEMS that be that I take issue with. I cannot advocate learning enough, and in fact I personally hold a higher educational standard than any school or college in my area. I just believe in a more personal, more practical method.
 
As others have stated it largely depends on what you want to do. I want to learn to be more tech savey with computers like the IT department is down here at campus. Basically someone that works for the geeksquad or something at Best Buy, so i'm going back after 10 years of a good solid education. Grasping at my math is hard because my teacher is going through the formulas way to fast, but aside that the rest of my courses which are prep or bs courses are going easy. So it's not a major challenge going back to me, you just will need to relearn time management for the most part.
 
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