If you do college right (go above and beyond class work, absorb everything) you can come out with the equivalent of ten years experience in four but if you do it wrong (coast by) you can come out with negative return.
College also exposed me to a lot I wouldn't have been exposed to otherwise like operating system design, AI, physics, statistics, calculus, and compiler design.
I also got a high-profile internship through my school and THAT looked extremely good on my resume.
However, as a hiring manager I almost never consider the degree when hiring. The candidates get the same questions no matter what.
In fact, a doctorate is almost always a negative signal. I have never hired someone straight out of a doctorate. In my case they have always spectacularly fail the coding part of the interview.
In short: you get what you put in. If you can afford to spend four years with little to no pay it is an awesome experience (in my opinion). But it doesn't make or break you.
A doctorate is a research degree. Hiring a newly minted doctorate just to be a code monkey would indeed be a mistake. Frankly, both parties would probably be unhappy with the job requirements (I certainly would have been).
For me, the difference is fairly simple. My education is a credential and it helps me get my foot in the door. My experience helps me actually get shit done.
People can cheat in their formal education and still get the degree. It is a little harder to cheat their way through a job.
I have not found this to be true. Not that it is harder to cheat through a formal eduction, just that its about the same difficulty to cheat through a job. They are both trivially easy to do.
There are lots of people with long years on their resume that can't program their way out of a bag.
Experience is good for depth of technical skills and office collaboration skills. Education provides introduction and breadth of topics.
Employers generally want to minimize the amount of on the job learning a new hire has to do. That means depth in the skill sets they want. And that doesn't even include employers who run an website/app assembly line and don't want to hire cogs, not engineers.
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Allow me to make the case for breadth, because your personal goals should be broader than focusing on what employers want and being a really really really good fit for small percentage of jobs.
Sacrificing your education to "focus on gaining experience" is a con. You want to be hire-able long term. To the extent that experience proves you can build something, have a project to show for yourself. Not a senior project, something you care about, with utility to yourself, something that by the time you get to an undergrad project, you just want to work on your thing for credit.
I can't even count the number of times I've benefited professionally from a few kernels of knowledge something outside my main work focus but knew because of a "topics" course I once took. Having an idea what already exists out there in the world, even if the skills aren't strong is a huge boon to solving problems as the come up, or approaching a new design. Otherwise you're often re-inventing the wheel, or feeling around in the dark until you stumble upon a professional domain you didn't know existed and can start reading their literature. The upsides of depth are just much more visible than the downsides of lacking breadth.
Strictly speaking: no, a lack of a formal education will not disqualify you for _most_ tech jobs (although it will disqualify you from some, for example: consultancies staffing big government projects, where they have committed to consultants with minimum qualifications, anything in academia, etc). That said, it wont be regarded as an advantage either.
The real question is: if you haven't been studying- what _have_ you been doing? It may be that you have been working on a startup, or have fallen into something which has really made you grow technically. In this case you are probably doing OK, although you will have to study if you want to pass an interview at Google (which rather defeats the purpose of not studying).
On a side note: be wary of employers that make a great virtue out of hiring people with no education- this is often a sign that they want to press down pay and conditions or that fully qualified people not to want to work there.
Some advice: internships and engineering coops are really great ways to get experience in your field, while getting that magical degree.
My student assistantship started the summer after my senior year of high school and I attribute some of it to my prior experience since my high school didn't provide much in the way of CS classes so I lacked a formal education but it wasn't a full time job either.
You aren't just padding your resume, you're also getting a feel for the different paths in your career you could pursue.
I had 3 different Internships for 3 different companies, and although that added a decent amount of stress (an annual job hunt) to my college career, I 100% recommend it.
I worked for a medium sized team at Georgia Tech's Research Institute, was the first hire at a startup, and worked DoD contracts for BAE, a defense contractor.
Those are all extremely different, and I not only built a resume that served me well in a variety of interviews, but also learned things I absolutely did not want to do.
However, your principal point, that work/study is a good idea, I wholeheartedly agree with.
I'd try to finish your degree if you're in a position to do so, but if not, I would not sweat it too much either.
I was able to find a student startup that I was enthusiastic about and overwork myself until I had enough experience to become interesting to larger companies, ultimately tripling my income in a 3 year period. There are many paths, but they're not always obvious.
I am telling this as an entrepreneur who didn't get a graduate degree. I eventually started my own company with some of my other friends. But now when I need to hire I definitely look at educational qualification. It's an easy criterion to make sure that there are "less" chances of getting bad hires. I would love to give everybody a chance to qualify for a job at my company, but hiring has costs associated with it.
But if you are really passionate about programming (or any other technology) and can build something impressive which other people in your age group can not do easily, then you shouldn't find it difficult to find a job without a degree. Generally, this happens via references. I got my first job like that. But I used to earn 1/4th compared to my other friends, who had good academics, in their first jobs.
However, after a few years of experience, qualification doesn't matter much. Your ability to communicate and prove your skills matters much more.
In the end, all your actions have consequences. If you want to leave education for your passion, be prepared to live with that decision for your life. As there will be long-lasting consequences (not necessarily all bad) with the decision.
That said, getting inside the door might be a lot harder.
The most successful candidates I've seen often complete their degree while working actively on passion projects and going on internships/coops.
My initial experience as a programmer was a self-taught and that logic and experience has stuck with me with everything. It definitely is like a muscle and you just learn from your mistakes and only get stronger with every new program you write.
I rely more on my college degree for people to take me seriously, but I have spent the past 5-6 years building a professional portfolio and a base of clients, including acquiring recommendations on LinkedIn -- which is probably the most useful feature LinkedIn has. It really does help to have that as people can see those client websites and their testimonials. It definitely has paid off.
No regrets on the college degree.. and most companies do require it for them to even notice you nowadays.. my experience in college was awesome and made me who I am today. I fell in love.. got my heart broken... I learned a lot.. made friends who I still keep in touch with today, and its just a time in my life that was good. I would love to go back for my Master's degree, but at this time, I'm at a good place in my life, with a great job -- a career I want to call it that I love and could see myself doing for the next 30 years.
I will say as a job searcher, the degree is pretty important, especially in bad job markets. In good markets, hirers are willing to overlook education more readily than in bad markets when they can be more selective.
Finally, I understand everyones experience is different, but I absolutely loved some of the projects I was able to work on while getting my degree. They would be frequently inappropriate outside of academia so you are unlikely to get those opportunities in industry. For me, working on academic projects while I was there was nothing but fun and it largely prepared me as well for moving into industry as anything my peers were doing.
For example, I would be more likely to hire someone with no formal education (beyond, say, high school) and four years of relevant, "in the trenches" experience over someone with zero real-world experience and a degree whose ink is still wet (and I have done that just, FWIW).
That's not to say that a college education is a waste; it's absolutely not, of course. You'll learn things there that you typically won't learn on the job (algorithms, etc.) and the networking and connections you make there can be extremely beneficial later on as well.
After 4 years. What is better 4 years of experience vs 4 years of education?
After 8 years. What is better 8 years of experience vs 4 years of experience + 4 years of education ?
After 12 years. What is better 12 years of experience vs 8 years of experience + 4 years of education ?
Lots of people will have "bat boy" syndrome...a baseball team can make it to the World Series, and the bat boy gets to go with them, but doesn't provide any value on the field. These are engineers that were associated with projects, but didn't actually do any of the work. They just happened to be in the room when it was done, but put it on their resume anyway.
That said, if you're relying on experience to open doors, I'd make sure that you can actually show people what you've accomplished. I have 5+ years experience at a very reputable and challenging company, but all the work I've done is proprietary. So people have to take me at my word,and it's difficult to convey how much you're capable of in an hour long interview.
I think education will actually open more doors more easily. Another way to look at it: You're always getting experience(there aren't many gate keepers), but getting a degree can provide you access to lots of opportunities once you have it.
I have friends and family that seem to thrive on going to school and can't imagine why I don't. It isn't the same for everyone. In my case, I don't think it has hurt me. I've always had a job, always felt like I could quickly get another job and I make good money.
From the hiring side, despite my "lack" of education, I've had the chance to interview quite a few people. There have been some with masters degrees that I would only be comfortable hiring as a junior dev. They had books smarts but zero experience. Some of them could have had the job if their asking price wasn't insanely high or they had some experience.
I also interviewed a self taught programmer who I'd work with in a heartbeat. It didn't work out for other reasons, but he could have easily had the jr. job and likely grown out of it with more experience.
Formal education opens some doors that experience will not, but I think there are plenty of opportunities with and without a formal education.
As others have pointed out, education and experience help you develop different skills. And yes, education is not for everyone.
However, your claim that you ar struggling with education because you wanto to focus on gaining experience is an amber light in itself. What would you think of a bodybuilder that claims that he is struggling to develop his biceps because his hamstrings are getting in the way? Sounds a bit off, doesn't it? It tells you, among other things, that his trainning is a mess, and that probably he has not yet developed the ability to set and pursue goals in a systematic way.
So, get your act together. You sound like a fairly young fellow, just starting on this path. So, it does not matter if your future peers/employers value education more, or experience more... since you clearly lack both. Just concentrate on self improvement, and things will eventually play out in your advantage.
Also, about education specifically. It is OK to not pursue that path, but be sure to make that decision for the right reasons. Every thing worth doing in this world requires effort; being struggling with each of them is the normal state fo affairs. Either complete your degree... or don't, but don't just leave because it is hard. Getting experience will be harder, in its own ways.
Education matters to the extent that it makes you a better developer than the other candidates. For example, did you take a DSP course and learned it well? That enables you to pursue jobs that require DSP knowledge.
Experience matters to whatever extent that you can demonstrate that you accomplished something significant during your job and that you learned and grew from it.
Fast forward 3 years. I'm at a different job and interviewing again - same guy. I'm not sure he recognizes me, but I know where I last saw him. I tried very hard to forget the last interview and give him a fair shake, but it was a repeat! I was sure he hadn't learned a thing in 3 years. The same types of questions were still a mystery to him. If I left an interview not knowing something and feeling like that kept me from getting a job, I'd go home and learn it. In this case the main language for both jobs was the same. Oh, in the end, he did figure out this interview was a repeat.
That brand spanking new grad may need a lot more training on version control and the differences between academic projects and the real world. But I'd expect them to have an easier time picking up machine learning, designing a custom circuit board, or writing an algorithm to do groundbreaking new things.
I love hiring people who are self-taught because it demonstrates that they're motivated and know how to learn. Faced with a problem they don't yet know how to solve, they'll usually be able to find a solution. It's not that people with education can never do that. It's that being self-taught in itself demonstrates that you can.
Education, by contrast, sets you up with frameworks for understanding what makes certain hard problems hard, and a toolset for evaluating potential solutions to them.
I don't usually hire entry level anyway, and my teams are rarely solving hard computer science problems. For this kind of work, by the time you have 8 years or so of education-plus-experience under your belt (in any combination), the differences are often minimal. I've had great reports and awful reports with and without formal education. So I don't really care.
That said, you may have trouble getting your foot in the door early in your career without formal education simply due to the way many HR departments screen resumes. It may take a lot more effort to find a place that will hire you and train you up in formal engineering practices for those first few years of experience.
Gatekeepers, especially corporate HR flunkies are trained to screen for academic pedigree. A solid credential helps open the door.
Owners/Founders/Hiring Executives mostly look for experience and intelligence. Does this guy understand my world? Can he help solve our problems?
Find a way to pursue both goals. Get a part-time/flex-time job while completing your degree requirements.
https://www.oreilly.com/ideas/the-traits-of-a-proficient-pro...
Google, Facebook and Amazon do not require degrees and some of them rely almost exclusively on their interview process.
When I hire people I look for the right combination of theoretical knowledge and successful practical application of said knowledge. Personally I don't care if you got the theory part from watching videos of MIT lectures and reading books, or from a classroom.
Some formal education shows that you have at least the commitment and self-discipline to achieve a goal.
If not, you should be able to show off some professional work that you did (and you are able to demonstrate that YOU did it), which could be a problem if your expertise is something like, say, embedded software, and not frontend web developer.
After a couple of years of demonstrable experience, it should really not matter, although some of the more established/formal companies might still be looking for people with degrees (for reasons unknown to me).
It's not about "no degree, no job", it's about "can't get a degree, higher risk that we're going to regret hiring you".
stay in school unless you have (a) a very good rationale for quitting, and (b) a detailed (in writing!) plan for how to get good enough at your craft to the point that you'll land some interviews and score a job offer. be honest with yourself about the discipline this will require, particularly if you're already 'struggling' in the structured learning environment you're in now.
beyond that, remember that the value of a college degree for you as a human being goes far beyond just your career.
edit: you might also do some research on what a typical technical interview involves these days. e.g., it's not unheard of to spend six months prepping for a google interview.
A top level job at the A-list companies requires intense interview preparation.
On the other side of the spectrum, there are companies on unattractive cities that will hire any warm body that can open an IDE. (I don't recommend working on those companies, or at least not for long though)
Every employer simply favors competence. For competence, you need both knowledge and skill. That's it.
I was working with an old carpenter friend of my father's last weekend, and he was telling me a story about a guy he apprenticed with. The man didn't complete 8th grade, and could barely do arithmetic, but was a master mason and carpenter. He was once tasked with taking apart a good-sized sawmill and reassembling it on another site; he spent a day walking through the existing plant, looking things over, without taking any notes, and then when the equipment was packed up and moved, set the whole mill back up at the new site from memory, with a healthy dash of experience to supplement.
EDIT, forgot the conclusion: Clearly, education isn't everything. It's at best a proxy for talent.
So is that person the idiot, or were we the idiots for falling for the act?
We have all seen the educated idiot though. Big degree from fancy university we've all heard of, gets great positions without effort, produces nothing and screws up things and blames it on others. Very hard to spot from a resume, a little easier in interview phase.