From: markonlinux@...
Date: 2007-12-12T10:00:00+09:00
Subject: Re: ruby certification

Hi Ryan,

On Dec 12, 7:03 am, Ryan Davis <ryand-r...@zenspider.com> wrote:

> I've been trying to avoid this thread but this one pissed me off...

  That obviously wasn't the intention.

> Education at any and all levels is what you make of it.

  If you reread my post I pretty much said the same thing:

  "One thing I will say about the whole Cert/Uni thing though is it
   depends on the person. Like somebody else said, you could sleep
   through a course, barely pass the exam, and forget it the next day.
   Or you could use it as a springboard to go further."

> The trend I saw across all of your examples is that you wasted your
> time and didn't learn very much.

  I'm looking (hopefully) at a distinction average, so I must have
learnt
  something.
  The trend I saw in my examples is that I learnt a little about many
  different topics, but wouldn't say I'm 'proficient' in any of them.
  Now maybe I learnt more, and I'm more 'proficient' than I give
myself
  credit for. Hence the:

    "I do though find myself thinking "oh, that's what the lecturer
     was trying to get across" at times."

> I worked my butt off and left proficient in
> imperative programming (pascal, modula-2 C), object oriented
> programming (esp smalltalk but also C++), formal language theory so I
> could build my own languages, build tools like make, and a lot more.
> That was what I was interested in and that is what I pushed myself on.

> If you leave college with a CS degree and you aren't hire-able, it is
> nobody's fault but your own.

  Probably! I was hire-able *before* I left Uni based on academic
record.
  Again, my intention wasn't to dismiss the degree as irrelevent. It
  certainly *was* relevent.

  If I had to sum up what I was trying to say above, it would be that
Uni
  provided a broad base, but now I need/want to target specific areas
of
  interest to a level where *I'd* consider myself proficient!


cheers,


--
Mark