I need to know whether your job and your education match up

[andrewducker]

Where "Education" means a degree or some other specific higher-level qualification. Having taken French A-levels and now working in France doesn't count. If your life doesn't fit into nice, neat categories then leave a comment :->

Poll

Comments

[andrewducker]

It's not so much that I chose my education to match the job I wanted, as that I wanted to do anything to do with computers. So I did GCSE computing, then A-level computing, then a degree in computing, because I like doing stuff with computers, not because I was deliberately getting the qualifications necessary, but because computers=AMAZEBALLS.

I blame my Dad, for bringing home a BBC B in 1981, when I was 9, and warping my tiny little mind.

[andrewducker]

OTOH, I didn't really decide on having a _career_ until I was 31, at which point I junked the pointless series of dead-end computing jobs, took a £2k paycut to join a graduate scheme, and started over.

[bohemiancoast]

there are graduate computing schemes?

Because computers are indeed AMAZEBALLS. Though not working and studying exactly what you like is also AMAZEBALLS to be honest. But perhaps not sustainable for the long term.

[andrewducker]

Yup, computing graduates come in on similar schemes to graduates in other parts of businesses.

http://www.standardlife.com/careers/graduates/grad_day_it.html - to give an example entirely at random :->

[joexnz]

I never thought about having a career, I thought it might nice to end something I enjoyed that scope to evolve, but never gave it much thought as to what that was. Frankly having career ambitions seemed far to much work and competition

[ciphergoth]

I knew I was going to be a computer programmer when I was at primary school. Not sure I know how I knew...

[andrewducker]

Because computers are AMAZING.

[meowpurrr]

my childhood ambitions all boiled down to wanting to press lots of buttons, and blinking lights. then i discovered computers...

[cartesiandaemon]

I think we love buttons because it demonstrates understanding/power over our environment. I like programming now for the same reason! :)

[rhythmaning]

I thought about a career a lot, but of course these things changed. When I saw Chris Hadfield talk this week, he said he wanted to be an astronaut from the age of 9, when he watched the Apollo 11 Moon landing. I was 9 when I watched it, too, and I also decided to be an astronaut. What I wanted to ask him is how did he stick so tightly to that decision? When I was a kid, EVERYONE wanted to be an astronaut.

As a teenager, I went through journalist, photographer, writer, scientist...

I took university courses I was really interested in, and that was followed by a PhD; but during my post-doc, I decided that frankly I didn't have the ambition to be an academic!

Having had a career (of sorts!), I now freelance - which I see as a series of jobs!

[andrewducker]

I think there's a big difference between "Being an astronaut would be amazing" and "I will go and look at all of the steps necessary to become an astronaut, and make a conscious decision that I will do all of them in turn until I achieve astronauthood".

People are good at the former, not so good at the latter, in pretty much all areas.

[alitheapipkin]

Yep. I decided I wanted to be an ice skater aged about 5, I cracked my skull falling over on the kitchen lino trying to skate with dusters tied to my feet and have never ice skated in my life!

[andrewducker]

It's fun!

Although possibly you should be well-wrapped first...

[miramon]

How about 'When I was at school I deliberately took specific classes so that I would be able to eventually get a specific job' ...but then I didn't get it (due to a combination of medical issues and economic downturn in geosciences/industries). So I ended up in IT along with everyone else.

[andrewducker]

Dammit, option 3 was supposed to be "I took the classes, and didn't get the job" (and then the current option 3 as option 4)!