[peterldowns]

Me! When I was in highschool I started emailing companies from the whoishiring thread, managed to find an apprenticeship in SF. My thinking was that before I went to college to study computer science I should check to see if I liked writing code.

Turns out I love writing code and don't care much for computer science. I've been a software engineer (NOT a computer scientist) ever since.

Thank you to Mek, Stephen, and Matt for taking a chance on me.

[gwbas1c]

> Turns out I love writing code and don't care much for computer science. I've been a software engineer (NOT a computer scientist) ever since.

That was a piece of advice I wish I had when I was in high school. It wasn't until halfway though college that I understood the difference. It was abundantly obvious that the vast majority of CS students should have been in a "Software Engineering" program, too.

[hirvi74]

Why do you think such students should have been in SE instead? Because it aligns more with their goals?

Perhaps you are right, but I am thankful for my CS background despite being a SWE myself.

Understand that I am also close to the intelligence level of crayon-eating compared to most on this site. I felt like my unspectacular public state university level CS degree wouldn't even hold a candle to some of the people's education in this very thread like the one commenter who studied at MIT.

However, I still believe what I learned was extremely valuable. In fact, I am sadden by my level of understanding and I wish I knew more CS. Just because I do not apply pure CS every single day does not mean that my decisions are not influenced by what I learned. At worst, my knowledge has never been a hindrance.I refuse to believe that knowledge can ever be useless. Not applicable != useless.

Genuine question though, what would a software engineering program provide that a computer science student would struggle to understand?

[pavel_lishin]

I think you can have an SE track with the appropriate amount of CS background. You'd have to, to be a functional engineer. (Then again, some I've worked with...)

One reason I also wish I'd gone along an SE track is that it would likely have given me a lot more experience actually doing what I do for work. Using version control, working with others in a group setting, actually making software.

[laurencerowe]

Having done a software engineering degree (albeit 25 years ago now) you should probably not expect it to be any more practical in that way. We had only a handful of extra mandatory modules over the CS requirements (I think on working on larger systems) but no extra practical programming.

[red-iron-pine]

> Using version control, working with others in a group setting, actually making software.

aye, this. in my experience hard part isn't doing the actual coding bits, it's ironing out the Requirements, stuffing them into JIRA, building the Interface document to cover what we're coding, writing documentation, and making sure the new guy doesn't break the version control.

Coding the specification isn't hard once we have them. A lot of that is outsourced in my org, esp. fluff related to a few areas like UX. But the hard part is getting there, and the engineering processes and mentality to do so.

[cchance]

I didn't go to college, I got out of high school, took care of my mom and almost immediately worked for an ISP as customer service, worked my way up over 3 buyouts, and 20 years to be a sysadmin for the company that everyone depended on.

Sadly something I only recently allowed myself to understand is that I really don't have passion for networking, I absolutely love coding and creating new integrations, interfaces and backend, I did a lot of it to patch holes in the company i worked for and streamline my own and others work.

I'm a remote contractor for that same company now still doing the networking and some dev work for them but really want to get out and find a company that I can focus more on the DevOps side.

[peterldowns]

Working and taking care of your mom right after graduating highschool sounds like a lot of responsibility. Massive respect. I hope your job transition goes well.

[devwastaken]

SE programs are scams in the U.S. unfortunately. Comp sci is the only universally recognized and mostly standard degree. SE isn't even an option for many hiring/job app platforms like IBM.

[peter_l_downs]

I ended up working for 2 years before I went to school, and it made a lot of things easier. When I graduated I was very certain that I wanted to go back to industry rather than go to academia. Definitely different jobs and skillsets.

[gwbas1c]

The irony is that, I think if I had studied software engineering in college, I probably would have continued to get a PhD!

[sircastor]

I completed a BS in Software Engineering a few years ago, and my schools program was almost identical to the CS program. The courses it lacked were (as I recall) Operating Systems and Networking (I’m a bit sad I didn’t get to take those, but I had to finish the work online, and the CS degree wasn’t available as an online program)

I’m not certain, but I think most SE programs are largely CS programs

[rvrs]

Your website says you went to MIT to study computer science anyways...?

[peterldowns]

Yes, and I learned a lot there, including that I much prefer software engineering to computer science.