

Looking Back At What I Learned At College - excid3
http://excid3.com/blog/2011/05/looking-back-at-what-i-learned-at-college/

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wccrawford
You know what I learned in college? That you can pass all the classes with
very little studying, provided that you -learn- the material instead of
thinking you can just memorize it. Some classes don't even require that.

I also learned that teaching yourself is WAY faster than having someone hold
your hand. And it sticks better, too.

I learned that the only good thing for me in college was being forcibly
introduced to new things that I didn't know I needed or liked, and sometimes
didn't need and disliked. (But at least now I know!)

I learned that the world sometimes grades on knowledge that isn't actually
relevant to the matter at hand. At the time, I thought it was just college,
but now I know it actually applies in business, too.

I learned that the right paperwork (homework/degree) means more than actually
knowing things and being able to use them. At least, for some people. There
are a rare few (bosses and teachers both) that know how to assess people
properly.

And I learned that the next time I want to learn something, it will cost me
10s of thousands of dollars less to buy the equipment/supplies and some books
and just start doing it myself. (Along with a healthy helping of internet, of
course.)

~~~
excid3
While I agree with most of that, there is a lot of value that you get out of
it that you may not directly perceive. Making contacts with all these fellow
classmates and professors is worth a lot. Sure you would have met a lot of
people skipping college but it's a different class of people.

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maratd
The most important thing you can learn while at college is the skill of
learning. The ability to quickly absorb disparate information and apply it to
the task at hand. The _information_ you learn in college is worthless. You
will never use it. However, the skill you pick up as a consequence of learning
that information is invaluable and will serve you well for the rest of your
life. I work on something new and foreign to me on a daily basis ... that
skill allows me to learn quickly and solve the problem at hand.

Granted, you can acquire the same skill by going to the library every day and
reading up on a myriad of various subjects, then applying what you learned in
self-created projects ... but ... that requires a will of steel and frankly,
college just seems more fun.

~~~
deyan
I could not agree more - but would also add that in addition to learning about
learning, learning about yourself, others, and society is also very important.

I can never understand all these kids who somehow mistakenly believe that the
purpose of college is to prepare you for a very specific job. That's what job
training is for. College is about fundamentals.

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veyron
What school did you go to? Honestly, it really depends on the type of school
you went to. I felt that most of my learning in college came from meeting
other really bright and motivated people, which are in higher concentrations
in some schools compared to others (note the phraseology -- I did not intend
to argue that some schools are better than others)

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neodude
From the author's about page, he says he went to Southern Illinois University.

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excid3
That's correct, and while I did have a lot of trouble finding people of
similar mindsets at school, attending a couple conferences and meeting people
online worked out just as well. Having friends who are just as motivated as
you makes all the difference.

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kek
I disagree that general education courses are "crap". I think people greatly
undervalue the skills those courses teach when they pass them off as useless.

I'm graduating in about a week myself, and reflecting back on my college
education, some of the liberal arts courses I was required to take helped me
to develop crucial communication skills - which technical/scientific people
stereotypically lack.

Also, taking some of those introductory science courses, like chemistry, help
to create a foundation of knowledge to intelligently speak about other
scientific ideas. Could you learn this on your own time? Sure, but if you
don't particularly like a topic, it's unlikely you're going to devote your
precious free time to it.

~~~
excid3
At the same time, my chemistry courses were nothing more than prolonged
versions of what I took in high school. I didn't really gain much from them
because they were 300+ students and skewed grading scales (85%+ was an A).

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JoeAltmaier
College is a culture, not just an institution. You think differently (as
evidenced by the large blog entry describing exactly how he thinks
differently). Others who shared a similar experience have a huge common ground
to speed up communication etc.

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reedF211
How do you find time to work on personal projects after all the school work
and possibly part time job? I have so many things that I want do but there
just isn't enough time after all the assignments and the job.

~~~
excid3
Luckily for me my job of 20 hours a week has been quite flexible working in my
free time. It's also not been terribly challenging Rails development which
makes things easier. Aside from that I have pretty much spent my last semester
working from 9am till 11pm all 7 days a week. Glad it's over now though! :)

