OOP, RDBMS and BTEC

[vetran]

The main differences to me are that HND etc courses tend to be vocational i.e. they teach you how to program, they do not teach the theory behind it. On my CS degree, in the 3rd year we had a few HND students come across and they struggled a little, especially with the OOP stuff.

Not my experience but it was 30 years ago I was taught micro electronics by a number of well known technological authors. The compsci people that worked for me couldn't explain how a computer booted, the HNC ones could.

It may be the HNC/D ones found it interesting and the Compsci ones saw it as a career.

Have to disagree about no degree, its a filter used by many Agents I wish I had done one.

Dominic / Dodgy your comments could be valuable.

[doodab]

It may be the HNC/D ones found it interesting and the Compsci ones saw it as a career.

Historically Comp Sci has it's roots in maths, so comp sci syllabuses haven't covered many of the details involved in actually building a working computer because that's electrical engineering.

Personally I think a comp sci course ought, in addition to mathematics and topics such as programming, language design, DB design etc, cover enough electrical engineering that a graduate can at least understand the principles of operation of real machines as well as theoretical ones.

[bobspud]

Agree up to a point, we've talked about carrying on the Maths A2 level and including stats, I know how useful it is. However we'll see a Bob backlash before long. My stats is not brill however I can see that according to this very site 'Developer' is still the top contractor skill, twice as well paid, and in terms of the overall jobs, 6 percentage points above 'Analyst' and developers of some flavour or other occupy 4 of the top ten spots.... ;-)

But your son has already proved that he is not up to the rigors of an AS level how is he going to cope with a technical skill like IT...

Here is my take on things.

Junior roles across the board have been bob'd to death. The grades are going to matter.

If you make the guy follow a maths and business type course they can enter IT from the business end of the game rather than competing at the bottom of a tank flooded with techies and no business sense.

The value in IT is the top end roles EA, SA and the xFO xTO type positions. apart from a few clever guys on the trading floors developers have a hard life. Getting there is hard and there are plenty of better techies out there now.

If the grades don't cut it you need to be more inventive than putting him against the usual 1500 applicants that all have the standard seven A* A-levels. He won't make the cut.

[pjclarke]

But your son has already proved that he is not up to the rigors of an AS level how is he going to cope with a technical skill like IT...

You assume a lot. I said his grades were lower than predicted, and there were issues with the teaching of some subjects, meaning he would have to improve a lot over the second year to get into the Universities he aspires to. Whereas he was a finalist in last years’ ‘Young Rewired State’ event, he attended a ‘Head Start’ CompSci summer school type thing at Aston Uni and the organiser wrote him this reference:

He showed clear passion for computer science, and an aptitude that I would recommend is nurtured. His attendance on the course demonstrates his proactive approach to his future learning and a keenness to advance his education via a variety of resources. On the basis of my observation of pj junior’s work whilst on our course, I would recommend him for enrolment in an advanced Computer Science course.

And he went on a week’s work experience earlier this year in the IT dept of a media company and they were so impressed they offered him an internship over the summer.

Anyhow he’s now been accepted onto a BTEC course that includes OOP as a module and we think this option, where we hope/expect him to achieve Distinctions (360 UCAS points) because of his aptitude and interest, he’ll have my support and because it is continuously assessed is probably a better prospect than gambling on him doing well in a few exams after teaching of dubious quality…..

Thanx for the replies and opinions.

[vetran]

good news, still recommend trying the degree at the end.

[bobspud]

You assume a lot. I said his grades were lower than predicted, and there were issues with the teaching of some subjects, meaning he would have to improve a lot over the second year to get into the Universities he aspires to.

Its not an assumption. Its a fact you have already stated he would need to improve a lot, thats not a little slip its a catastrophic ****up regardless of the reason why. Meanwhile all over the country the girls and boys he will be competing with managed to get their grades first time. Thus he is not as clever as them in that measure... Neither was I when I was his age and I too ended up doing a BTEC under my own steam at night-school.

[pjclarke]

Yep, that's the plan, University entry a year later than expected, hopefully not Sheffield Hallam ...

[KentPhilip]

Forget that soon-to-be-bobbed SC/IT developer stuff.
If he's even slightly academic do a Maths and Stats degree with the OU.
Or get the RSS Diploma in Statistics (equivalent to a degree).
The latter can be done part-time while doing a job if he's motivated enough.
The world won't be able to get enough data analysts soon.

And what is to stop you getting "bobbed" having learned statistics? Are the indians incapable of learning maths?
In this and previous posts you have advised people to learn stats etc as a way of earning more money in IT. But surely if it is hard to do this (such that bobs are physically unable to compete) then it is likely that a person of an average intellect is going to find it also hard.
If someone goes into a "high end" skill like stats then they are going to be competing with people who are intellectually superior to them, and that is going to cause their careers in that field to suffer. So any pay increase resulting in the intrinsic higher worth of the job is going to be cancelled out by their relatively low position in it?

Of course this is not a problem you have yourself Sas as you are so brilliant lol

[vetran]

And what is to stop you getting "bobbed" having learned statistics? Are the indians incapable of learning maths?
In this and previous posts you have advised people to learn stats etc as a way of earning more money in IT.

no they don't have a clue :

Indian mathematics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

good job we have SAS!

[bobspud]

And what is to stop you getting "bobbed" having learned statistics? Are the indians incapable of learning maths?
In this and previous posts you have advised people to learn stats etc as a way of earning more money in IT. But surely if it is hard to do this (such that bobs are physically unable to compete) then it is likely that a person of an average intellect is going to find it also hard.
If someone goes into a "high end" skill like stats then they are going to be competing with people who are intellectually superior to them, and that is going to cause their careers in that field to suffer. So any pay increase resulting in the intrinsic higher worth of the job is going to be cancelled out by their relatively low position in it?

Of course this is not a problem you have yourself Sas as you are so brilliant lol

The reason that the bob's won't get that far in the stats side of the business is that they would need to start getting near the senior management teams and articulating the findings... I think its the main reason why so many indian firms are desperate to find good on shore architects and SME's to take the flak and handle those relationships. As a model its very clever.