To summarize some viewpoints: Tor - Advocates benefits of a broad education. Dick - Advocates importance of applied math. Also advocates individual choice of education. Ido Ran (Thread OP) - Advocates more emphasis on applied skills rather than broad academic skills.
Question for Java Posse: What academic subjects or classes were most valuable, interesting, and which do you wish you could take? @Tor, if you advocate broad education, why haven't you recently taken classes to broaden your education? @Dick, if math is great, why haven't you been taking math classes? With your deep interest in Scala and Haskell, I would hope you've taken university level classes in Algebraic Structures, Topology, Real Analysis, and Category Theory. If you haven't taken these classes, why not? @Ido Ran, sure the typical programmer job doesn't demand math or history or science. Most normal jobs are like that. However, I'd argue that it's common to find quality programmers who do perfectly well without formal knowledge of the skills you mention such as design patterns or database design. Also, UML is an antique. This issue is infinitely broad, but there are two policy strategies that I'd advocate with fairly high confidence in the general subject of education and workplace credentialism: - K-12 education should be governed more by parents and local communities rather than by the state or national governments. Giving families and communities meaningful say and involvement is beneficial over having things run by completely remote politicians. - Reduce legal licensing barriers to work in fields like cutting hair and cosmetology. Many of these have little value and just serve to protect the special interests of workers already in the field and block new workers and competition. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Java Posse" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/javaposse/-/NKCFco9z_ZUJ. To post to this group, send email to javaposse@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to javaposse+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
