Degree and diploma in IT? beneficial or no? - need advice

I'm kind of stuck in a bind, and I'm looking for advice from those who are already in the IT field (Seniors).

I'm currently going to a college in Canada, unfortunately in Canada, Colleges don't really offer degrees. So I'm taking a 3 year program in Network Administration with a heavy focus on wireless in the third year. This will get me only a diploma and a cisco academy certificate.

College seems quite easy for me, and sometimes I don't think an employer would take a person with a college diploma as serious as a person with a university degree. I mean, sometimes when searching through monster.ca for a network administration job, I notice how it says "requires a computer science degree" and I'm wondering if they even realize programming and networking are totally separate fields.

Anyways, now to get to the point, I do plan on getting a university degree through a distant education (online) program. At the current time, the thing I would most likely be interested in would be a degree in Computer and Information Systems. So pretty much a degree in information technology.

At this point, asking the advice of the senior goons, do you think I would benefit from getting this degree at all or should I get a degree in something else? Right now, I do have my eyes set on being a network administrator for a huge corporation/organization. I know I wouldn't be getting that job instantly out of school and I got a long way to go, but that's what I want.

The good bonus really would be my college credits would be transferable for university, so I would only have to do 3 years, hopefully 2 years to earn the degree. But at this point, I'm in the middle of my second year in college.

 

Based on your career interests you might want to consider taking a look at Fort Hays State University. Another board participant is enrolled in that particular degree and could give you some firsthand information.

"College seems quite easy for me, and sometimes I don't think an employer would take a person with a college diploma as serious as a person with a university degree."

My college diploma has served me very well in the information technology field during the last 15 years and allowed me to work in the US. College by and large in Canada is quite a bit easier than university assuming you graduated from high school in the academic preparatory programme.

 

Not to insult you or anything, but things has changed a lot since then. The time, is no longer the dot com boom time.

I actually graduated high school with applied courses, not academic, so I wasn't actually allowed to goto University. I never really cared much in high school. I got pretty crappy marks.

Is fort hays distant education completely?

 

Firstly, no offense taken to your first remark. I graduated in 1992 with the college diploma in the midst of an economic downturn in Canada; the dot-com boom did not appear on the scene until about three-quarters through the 1990s. I am completing my degree after all these years for the purpose of changing careers and becoming a teacher.

Fort Hays offers both on-campus and distance education degrees. 'BlueMason' is currently enrolled at Fort Hays and can probably give you insightful, firsthand knowledge.

 

hey hey! ..just came across this thread.

Yes, I am enrolled at FHSU's B.Sc. in Information Networking and Telecommunications with a major in Computer Networking and Telecommunications. My main area of concentration is Networking and I'm plugging along nicely

At the end of the spring semester, I'll have obtained a "Certificate of Internetworking" as well - for taking one extra course; I'm getting prepped for CCNA which I will be sitting for in the Summer... I'm pretty happy with the curriculum at FHSU.

The course work is demanding, but then again I'm taking five courses so it is more demanding than if you were to take one ot two. Five again in the Spring Semester.

Certs/Diplomas complement a degree, and if you transfer as many courses as you can to a University, you'll nearly have a completed a degree as it is...

If you have any specific questions about FHSU, don't hesitate to PM me.

Have a look at FHSU .
BM

 

Yes, 100% Online. No proctored exams, all done via Blackboard. You can take courses towards CCNA, CCNP,etc. Excellent setup - I can recommend it.

BM

 

Hmm.

Fort Hayes was a school I was considering. My only problems with them were being tied to their academic calendar and that they have no Summer session.

 

Re: Hmm.

They certainly do have Summer Sessions - I took four courses this past summer and I have already planned my courses for Summer 2006...

BM

 

BlueMason,

Hey I was checking out FHSU and was wondering what were the costs involved attending online? Does it go by semester or by units?

Thanks

 

Heya,

Goes by Credits - one course is generally 3 hours ( unless it involves a lab, in which case it'll be 4 hours )... each credit hour is $130, so $390 per course, + books - no hidden fees!

I buy 90% of my books from bn.com ( used ) and they're fairly cheap

 

Hey thanks for the info BlueMason!

I have a couple more questions if you don't mind answering?

First, I guess you like the school or you wouldn't keep going right?
Second, how are the online classes? I have taken only one online class before and it seemed like it was ten times more work than actually attending the class in person. This leads me into my third question.
I read in an earlier post that you are taking 5 classes and that's great. So how much time are you allocating to each class? I work full time and have kids so trying to figure out how long this would take me to complete.

Thanks again

 

Loaded Question

I do like the school and the courses, I'm not pleased with one instructor at this time but overall I am very happy.

The online classes are pretty good - plenty of assignments & homework, never a dull moment I spend about 2-4 hours per day on the courses, it's broken up so it doesn't seem that long though...

I work full-time shiftwork and have 2 kids and a -very- supportive wife, I could not take 5 courses if it was not for her. Make no mistake, you will be busy - and at times, very to extremely busy I have had some very long days, after coming home from work my wife goes to work, I'm with my kids, put them to bed at 7:30ish and then I'm on the computer til midnight or 1 am... but it's all worth it!

I can't say how much time I spend per course as it depends on your prior knowledge/familiarity of a subject. The three INT courses I'm taking take a good deal of time ( IP Telephony, Network Architecture (Data Com) and Internetworking (aka Cisco Sem1 and 2) while the other 2 I'm taking are not that time consuming.

I would suggest taking a couple of courses to see how you like the school and how you find the courseload - everyone is different and gauges things on a different level - what might not be a lot of work to me, may be a lot of work to someone else, and vice versa.

Part of my madness is that I want to finish this degree in a decent amount of time - 4 courses last summer, 5 in the fall, 5 in the spring semester - I'll have completed 42 credit hours in < 1 year and the degree is 124, so another summer, then I have to hit Toronto for some CLEP exams... I'd like to be done end of Summer of 2007 - so 2 years for the Bachelor Degree.

If you're not a mad dash to get it done, take less courses and safe your hair (I've added plenty of grey/white to mine ) ans sanity! *hehe*

Hope this helps a little

 

Hey BlueMason,

Wow, sounds like you do keep busy.
Thanks for taking the time to reply it was a lot of help.
I believe I have a fairly good background in the technology. I'm rusty with certain things now with regards to anything other than Cisco but I'm hoping most of the classes will be easy enough. I will give FHSU a call and see what they have to say.
Cheers to you and 2007.

Thanks again!