this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2023
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Can you get well paying coding jobs with upward mobility without at least a BA in CS?
It's harder to break into but I make 150k and barely graduated high school. Software engineering is largely a field that doesn't care about degrees but about ability. It's harder these days to break into the field than it was 10 years ago when I did but it's absolutely still possible
When I was looking for coding jobs with a decent portfolio, but no computer science degree I got 1 interview out of 300 applications. They absolutely will not look at you if you don't have the CS degree, or already know someone at the company who can force you in.
This is also just the reality of the job market, especially in this industry. Dev positions get hundreds if not thousands of applications which all vary widely in quality.
I have 20 years of experience and a six figure salary, the last time I went looking for work and was putting out applications I sent out easily over 100 applications and only had 4 interviews. I've found it's best to form a relationship with a competent recruiter, and work with them anytime you're back on the market. They're incentivized to find you a decent position so that they can make their commission. Of course finding one that is decent is almost as hard as the process of sending out applications, but once you do it's a relationship worth maintaining.
I'm guessing this is US-centric?
Canada.
I can agree with this. Landed my first dev job after working as a tradesman for a decade, but I liked computers enough to learn on my own. My 'trade' offered a 'unique persepective,' I guess.
I have a fine arts degree and I'm a lead dev 🤷♂️
You must write beautiful code
It's all ASCII art, but it runs like shit ;P More seriously; what constitutes beautiful code is very open to interpretation. Someone would say that a single line of list comprehension expression is beautiful while another would say the same thing expressed over several lines making the logic abundantly clear is beautiful.
Maybe not what you're asking but people with a non-CS M.Sc or PhD commonly switch to coding, especially in the data fields.
Anecdotally, I have an associates degree in horticulture and am currently the engineering lead for a team of six
If you entered the field 10 years ago, sure. If you're trying to enter the field now, I have bad news...
I used to work at a small tech company (5-10 employees) and when we hired for entry level coders we’d receive hundreds of applications. Most of them would be grads from bootcamps, some with undergraduate degrees and some without. My boss would just throw out any that didn’t have a bs in something, but preferred a stem degree. He knew they didn’t need a degree, he knew you didn’t need actual coding experience, it was just a quick (maybe illegal) way to make that list of applications more manageable. Edit: as other people have said - after your first job you are basically “in” and are a very desirable candidate. Your education matters much less after your first job.
I've never been to college and my job title today is Software Architect, I've been doing this for nearly 20 years.
It was extremely hard at first to get a job because everyone wanted a BA, but that was also 20 years ago. Once I had some experience and could clearly demonstrate my capabilities they were more open to hiring me. The thing a degree shows is that you have some level of experience and commitment, but the reality is a BA in CompSci doesn't actually prepare you for the reality of 99% of software development.
I think most companies these days have come to realize this. Unless you're trying to apply to one of the FANG corps (or whatever the acronym is now) you'll be just fine if you have a decent portfolio and can demonstrate an understanding of the fundamentals.