Ask HN: Suggestions for a highschool programmer? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Suggestions for a highschool programmer?

9 pointspeter_l_downs10 comments

tl;dr: Do you have any good suggestions for a highschool student and programmer in regards to what to do after graduation?

Hey there HN, I've only been a reader since about a month ago but Hacker News has got to be the site I visit most. I love not only the links and topics of discussion but also the community. I've been busy thinking with my parents about what I should do after graduation and, to be honest, we're overwhelmed. We don't have a lot of money, but I have good enough grades to go to at least a middle rate university. I'm extremely interested in math, computer science and engineering, and have been programming since elementary school.

So, I'm turning to you, HN. Should I try to go to college (my grades are good enough and I could, but I would probably have to take out student loans), or do you think that in these times trying to enter directly into the workforce is a better idea?

Also, do you have any suggestions for projects I should try to build? Any languages or areas of programming that you think I should look into? I program in C and Python and a little Java, is there anything else that I should really look into? Maybe Lisp?

p.s. to see some of my projects, check out http://www.peterdowns.com/projects/

A good university is the best place in the world to meet other programmers. Go to the best school you can - once you're there, you'll be shocked how fast you improve when you're surrounded by other young hackers. The classes are a bonus - you won't be able to tell in advance which they are, but there will be a couple that will blow your mind wide open.

The hacker crowd is not necessarily obvious at first glance; even the best schools are full of "thirteenth graders" and disaffected professors. But rest assured it's there. (The local ACM chapter is often a good place to start looking.)

Applying doesn't cost much; don't be afraid to apply to MIT and Caltech. You might get in! The usual strategy is to apply to a couple "stretch schools," three or four you think you'll probably get into, and a "safety school." (Write the applications for your safety schools first - the essays get easier fast.)

Community college is a backup. Work towards selective schools for now - they have early application deadlines. Community college, on the other hand, you can wait until practically the day before school starts. They're always there if you need them. That's what they're for.

Finally, don't worry about money. That's what financial aid officers are for. If you get accepted, they'll figure out a way you can afford to attend.

+1 for excellent advice. Thank you.

Keep going to school, but remember, school is a means to an end. Don't just go because you think it's expected. Go to learn that last 10% of what you don't know.

Even a genius isn't born with knowledge. It has to be acquired.

Trust me, and I really hope this does not come across as a dig, but however much of a badass coder you may be, you have no idea how much you don't know. If you dive in and work your butt off, you'll advance like crazy, opportunities will come, and you'll realize how much you don't know.

Lastly, I will offer some advice that you probably won't hear from a lot of Hacker News users. Corporate coders aren't all just drones who don't understand new tech. Most corporate coders write a lot of code in their spare time. There's no reason why you can't take a corporate coding job, and write iPhone apps at night. Obviously, it's easier to go to school full time, but take it from me, I worked two jobs, supported a wife and baby AND attended college at the same time.

Was it hard? Yeah. But I've been a coder for over 11 years now, launched several of my own products and am working on another right now. I've done massive work for several Fortune 500 companies and make well over six figures and climbing.

And I did it all on a community college degree.

Thanks for your advice. I hope my original post didn't give the impression that I thought I didn't need to keep learning - on the contrary, I need to learn a lot more than that last "10%". You've given me a lot to consider.

Community college can be a great way to save money and if you manage it correctly you don't have to lose any time. Going to community college for a year or two to burn through their math classes (high probability of transfer, and 4 year University math classes are often effectively taught by grad students anyway!) and you'll probably save in the neighborhood of 10-20k. Computer classes in those places tend to be more vocational and rarely transfer. Most states have a way to determine what would transfer ahead of time and guaranteed admission for Community college graduates above a certain grade point average.

So if you go that route you can do your last two years at the best state school in your state with most of your prerequisites done and well on the way to a math major. If they offer lectures to their CS classes online and you can test out of the classes, read through those and do so for the first year's worth (just introductory stuff anyway).

You can save a lot of money this way, and if you do well in community college, think college is your thing, you could always try to transfer to a more prestigious (expensive!) school.

The thing is, if your state has a good school and you go the community college route, you'll have as good a resume as anyone who did the whole four year haul there, but at almost half the cost.

If it turns out that you are one of nearly half who don't complete school, finding this out at community college costs doesn't sting very much at all.

I recommend community college for now. It's cheap, easy, you'll be ahead of everyone in the class, yes, but you'll learn that there are a lot of things you probably don't know about yet.

Notice I didn't say you'll learn them :-), that will be up to you, but for instance, you'll be exposed to ideas and concepts you haven't encountered in your hobby programming.

Once you're in school, apply Google Summer of Code. Working on an Open Source project in a team is invaluable.

I also learned to program from doing hobby projects, but writing real code that others use and look at is a whole different world. I regret I waited till I was done with my college years before I started getting into Open Source development.

Good code you can show people and contributions are invaluable both to learning, your resume, and getting scholarships to a four year Uni when you decide it's time to transfer (if).

Good luck, keep coding!

Definitely get a university degree in software engineering. The workforce will wait for you. Opportunities will wait. Fail to get the university degree in computer science and your career will likely be hampered for life.

Definitely continue with school. You can most likely test out of certain classes, but the main benefit of attending university is not necessarily the piece of paper you get at the end, it's the experience, the people and the ideas you get exposed to. Don't hurry to join the workforce - you can always freelance, do consulting work, and summer internships while you're in school - but at no other time in your life once you join the workforce will you be able to focus so completely on learning and discovering yourself and the world.

I highly recommend continuing with your education. It's going to be tough going into the job market without job experience and no college degree.

If you're interested in hardware as well as software, maybe you can look into the Arduino (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arduino).

Go to college. The college tuition will not be a problem if you can start taking on client work at your spare time. Simply go to less party and begin looking for clients.

Besides, you can gain some real-life work experience while you are in college. By the time you get out, you'll be more ready that everyone else.

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