[JMTQp8lwXL]

Because most high school graduates don't have the soft skills (or the hard skills) to work in a corporate environment.

I've worked with people with previous job experience that have gone through 10-week coding programs. And it shows. They might've been taught a framework or a language, but their computer science skills aren't nearly as developed. Some things take years to click, and growth occurs from years of writing bad code.

[jdietrich]

>I've worked with people with previous job experience that have gone through 10-week coding programs. And it shows.

Were they useless? Were they worse than useless? Or were they just not as good as a more experienced developer?

I'm not arguing that college has no value, but that it's bad value for money. If someone can become a useful-but-flawed developer after a short bootcamp, surely it's better for them to learn on the job while earning a living rather than mortgage their future on four years of education.

If college were free to the student and cheap for society, sure, send everyone and don't worry about it. That's not the case though - an entire generation have been saddled with vast, unmanageable levels of student debt. We need to be asking serious questions about how much and what kind of education is really necessary to produce skilled workers.

[hopler]

College doesn't teach those soft skills. Jobs and skill training teach those skills

You don't need college to write years of bad code. Internships or hobby projects do fine.

[JMTQp8lwXL]

The credential signifies that you indeed spent years writing bad code, and got better. Maybe it does have value there. Many companies are weary of hiring someone who has a few years of self-taught experience.

[daveFNbuck]

Hobby projects don't do fine because there's no one to tell you what you're doing wrong. You need that to avoid reinforcing bad habits.