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I graduated from a major US university, and was going to reply to the 2-year idea anyway. I think, while many students do take jobs, most of them are happy (for now) just to amass loans and bank on (increasingly difficult to secure) future employment. For some the vicious cycle you propose might be an actual improvement.

What I'd like to see is major Universities taking some of the ideas used in technical colleges: goal (job/career) oriented degrees, focus on actual experience, and for the love of all things sacred don't require (for example) CS majors to take dance appreciation and psychology. Students could shave a year or two off the time it takes them to graduate, and in doing so save themselves a lot of money. All without harming the "integrity" of the degree.

Well, you don't have to take dance appreciation or basket-weaving, but there is some value to liberal arts education in addition to vocational training.

At NYU (where I used to work), a CS major requires 12 courses in CS and 32 courses total. The degree costs just short of $93,000.

Do you really believe that a liberal arts education is worth $62,000 tuition + 2 years of lost wages (roughly another $140,000)? Particularly when, to borrow a phrase from Good Will Hunting, that liberal arts education is available to anyone for about $4.25 in late fees at the public library?

http://cs.nyu.edu/webapps/content/academic/undergrad/majors

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:CS5fT5z...

http://www.nyu.edu/bursar/tuition.fees/rates10/ugcas.html

Well, the CS education is available without the late fees, computer science is probably the easiest subject to learn from the internet.

For one thing, NYU trades on their name as well as their education, that's a big chunk of the money you're talking about.

But the more poignant question to me is whether you're getting less out of the liberal arts classes than you are out of the CS classes. I'm not sure that's clear, you can learn engineering anywhere, but 80% of the people I've ever worked with can't write for crap.

For one thing, NYU trades on their name as well as their education,...

If college is just an exercise in signalling, why bother with classes at all?

Why not just replace classes with final exams, give out the paper, host a few networking events and save billions of dollars?

Hey, you're the one who worked there :)

Personally, I value large chunks of the education I got in college, and think the majority of it had some value. I dunno how that value compares to the cost, and I've never seriously considered graduate school of any kind because the (tuition + lost earning) changes a bunch once you have a job.

I was mostly commenting that I thought a lot of the liberal arts education was just as valuable as the technology education, provided that I actually learned the tech so I could get a job. I learned a lot about music, literature and history that I'll have for my whole life, and that I really wouldn't have gotten off my duff to learn on my own.

Hey, you're the one who worked there :)

What do you think made me so anti-college?

> computer science is probably the easiest subject to learn from the internet.

Only for some values of "computer science". There is a lot of very tough math involved and having a teacher will save you ages.

This is a meme "I learn this, and you should learn it too!"

There are alway value to an education, in anything. The question is if it is really worth learning about?

Beside, people can learn to appreciate basket-weaving and dance appreciation in their own time. All they need to do is get rid of their TV and get a hobby. People don't need an overly expensive course to do that.

This was exactly my point. I think there really is value in learning the arts, and in learning other unrelated fields. I'm a big music enthusiast, and sociology was one of the best classes I took. But that doesn't change the fact that they are totally unnecessary to a programming career. If you're interested in them, you'll find your way to them, and you'll probably do it a lot cheaper.

I actually just created an account (pretty grueling process, I deserve some credit) to add my 2c: while focusing on professional skills and experience is a great thing for any curriculum, there is a value in "broadened horizons" that cannot be ignored.

Specifically, I found that the networking (meeting those outside your potential field) and ability to see things from other perspectives was invaluable in my college experience. This breaks down the "siloing" effect that I see a lot of talented CS majors have problems with, an effect that is consequently ruining the business world. Taking off the blinders once in awhile is a good thing, regardless how seemingly useless that Drama 101 class is. It's all what you make of it...

> in my generation, most UK students got their PhDs around 24-25 years of age; for the US students it was more like 27-28

The programs were not quite equivalent. US Ph.D. programs have traditionally included more courses and include a comprehensive examination in addition to a dissertation. A US Ph.D. candidate must demonstrate a broader understanding of the field and cannot just jump into thesis work upon starting their Ph.D. program.

The programs were not quite equivalent.

Sure, they may not be identical but they were teleologically equivalent. Newly minted PhDs from both countries proceeded to compete for the same jobs on a seemingly equal footing.

I am currently going into my second year university in Canada, but we have a similar situation. 60%-75% of first year course material was largely useless and/or so basic I was surprised people didn't already know what was being taught. My four year degree could easily be a 3 year degree. I personally believe the best thing to pursue at university is a double major, because it cuts down on the "broadening your horizon" courses.

Isn't there an equivalent of "Advanced Placement" in Canada? I.e. if you know the material of that freshman course, you can demonstrate it via an exam and be credited for the course.

I'd say it's a combination of your #1 - I 'relearned' a LOT of stuff in my first year- and the same phenomenon inside the university, between classes.

It's terrible, and eats a lot of time. Essentially, your professors can't completely count on what professors of pre-req classes have taught you, and often have to review some things. This problem is compounded when the school admits community college students, whose classes inevitably never match up well to the University courses, so they wind up trailing.

I've also been in classes where a class that was NOT a pre-req SHOULD have been a pre-req; for example, I took a class in sensors, and learned a lot about filters in the process. A huge component of using electronic sensors is filter design, so it was a very appropriate class to learn about filters in. After that, I took quite a few classes that used filters, but didn't require any pre-existing filter courses, so the professor would have to (briefly) teach filters again every time.

It's a shame that there aren't more half-courses. Running both a course on filters and "a tiny course on the stuff about filters you need to you for other courses" (that could maybe be as little as a few optional classes + a test) shouldn't be beyond our organizational skills.

Maybe what I want is more tests as pre-requisites rather than only full fledged courses (my alma mater had an English test that could be taken in lieu of one mandatory course)

Tests as pre-reqs are pretty useless IMHO. I 'tested into' the second level of calculus before I had taken pre-calc, but I would not have been able to pass the class, not a chance.

That only proves that the test was poor, not the theory.