At 06:46 AM 3/28/01 -0600, Gene Dascher wrote:
>This is a
>warning to all of you high school students who are going off to college
>soon.  Fully investigate the school that you are wanting to go to.  Get
>opinions from current students as well as alumni.  I was starry eyed, new in
>town, and knew nothing about anything when I was reeled in by the DeVry
>recruiters.  I'm not even saying not to go to DeVry.  Some people swear by
>it.  It just was not for me.

I'll second this opinion.  I started in July of 1989 and took my sweet time
finishing, but the entire program was a joke.   (I graduated in March 1993,
but would have graduated in 1992 if memory serves me right.)   Gene is
absolutely right, the about of COBOL they rammed down your throat was just
unreal.  I had a C class, Pascal, and that's about all I can remember that
was anything remotesly applicable to what I do now.   I'm really thinking
that had I to do over again, I would have pursued my intentions of starting
a business, right after high school doing repair/consultation/programming
and by now I'd be way a head of where I am now.   DeVry got me a slip of
paper and my foot in the door to work at Xerox.   That was about it.
Everything else I've taught myself so far, and since my Xerox days I've
managed to triple my salary (in 5 years).   Life is good . . . DeVry is way
behind the times and I don't see that changing soon.   DeVry is oriented to
take someone off the street and "make" them a geek/programmer/etc.   I
still say you can't "make" someone into a technology person.   You have
book smarts (which the people at DeVry that brown-nosed and did everything
right did) and you have real knowledge.   Thankfully I've been with the
real knowledge and only got enough book smarts to pass the classes to get
my a** out of there.   

Let's put it this way -- as a few teachers there pointed out, with just a
few more classes in accounting, a CIS major could probably be a CPA.  Is
there any red flag in anyone else's mind about that ? ? ? ?  

-- Bradley Miller