Completing a computer science degree on Coursera

AFF87

Congrats on sticking with the impulsive decision and congrats with your first class!

DenisM

How do employers perceive such diploma? I would try to find out before spending time or money. Did you?

HoldOnAMinute

Pure computer science, you can teach it on a chalk board, without ever touching an electronic device.

angarg12

I got a Bachelor, Master, and PhD in Computer Science, with a total of 11 years of education. It's the biggest waste of time of my entire life. As I progress in my professional career I'm more convinced that pretty much everything in tech is on-the-job learning, and universities are little more than a social club. Nowadays you can learn everything you do at university and far more online and for free. Universities (elite ones particularly) still give you credentials that have some value getting a job. However I wonder for how long that will still be true. Learning by doing and building a portfolio sounds like a better way of getting in the industry today than getting a multi-year degree with nothing or little to show for it. Nowadays I wouldn't recommend anyone to get a tech degree in a university unless it's a world class one. And even then, I would focus on networking and finding like-minded people rather than necessarily getting good grades.

drnick1

> The exams themselves are done remotely using Inspera proctoring software. Then it's almost trivially easy to cheat with a VM, or, failing that, a KVM switch with real hardware.

lvl155

CS degree is not all that fun. You’re better off doing math and just learning to code on the side.

bfung

Congrats! > Group projects were also a common complaint. You were randomly assigned a group, but it was often unclear if the participants were even doing the course - many people were in completely ghost groups. I see that nothing has changed in 20 years. Even when attended the courses physically in person, group project usually had 1 or 2 people doing all the work and the rest nowhere to be found, or just hanging out. :p

weakened_malloc

I'm actually doing something similar, myself, and doing a MSc in CS right now. I'm somewhat jealous of how little group work you had to do! Almost every course I'm going through now has 1-3 group work assignments each. Often the reason is something like _"that's how it is in the workplace"_ which is a blatant cop out, imo. It's clear the reason that Universities force group work is because it's a cost cutting exercise. They need to pay the hours for people to mark assignments. Make groups of 2, and you've cut the number of hours that need to be paid by 50%. Make groups of 5, and you've cut the cost by 80%. Of course, this comes at the cost of some students unfairly carrying others.

Vaslo

I got the MSCS from U Illinois on there. It was more work than I expected even with one class a semester. I definitely learned a lot I could use in my current role. I was in the inaugural class and it was pretty smooth other than one professor there who was an asshole and felt that online classes were beneath him. It felt like we got scraps from the table (then Covid happened and online was everywhere). Also, one prof quit just before the semester on a required class that seniors had to take and a replacement couldn’t be found in time. They offered us alternatives which weren’t really good class replacements. Strongly recommend if your time and money is limited.

theflyingpigeon

I have a similar trajectory. I attended two very competitive military schools in Brazil but never finished and moved to America. Today I’m a senior software engineer at a FAANG company. The lack of diploma has never been a barrier and I progressed very quickly in the company from junior to senior (4 years). But this has always been a perceived pain point and limiter for me so I decided to get a CS degree during COVID online from a college from Brazil. Just finished last week :) I do look for a stronger school name on my resume and got accepted at Johns Hopkins Masters in AI (online). Anyone had any experience with that program? Thoughts?

rootsudo

“ I was ready to enter the workforce and become independent as early as possible. I got into tech through certifications like MCP, MCSA, and A+ (they were all the rage back then), which was enough to land a helpdesk job at 18.” Same sentiments, if you had an MCSE you were hirable everywhere. A+ put you ahead of the pack and was lifetime back then. The early 00s were def a time. This is how I started too and also just recently completed my bachelors and now doing a masters.

rrvsh

I did this too for my BSc! Prof. Yee King is a great teacher, and although I was mostly doing it for the qualification and knew most of the course materials going into the degree, his explanations of web app architecture still really helped solidify my understanding. It's a great course in general, especially if you like data science