First of all, I want to say that I'm a freelance Frontend developer with an experience of 3 years in my 17th and things went that way that I have to go to college in another country (Canada, if it matters). Yes, I have.
My problem is that I can't decide which education program I should choose. I haven't found any programs that aim only on Frontend. I checked out some "Web design & development" programs and I can say for sure that I'm not going to learn XML, PHP and MySQL.
I was thinking about Computer Science but I'm a Frontend developer and I want to keep working as a Frontend developer in the future, I want to work with React, not some programming language and I'm afraid of math lessons! But I still have to go to college so I'm trying to find the most useful program that will help me to make some good contacts in this field and upgrade some other skills that will be useful in life in the future.
Any suggestions, thoughts and advice are more than welcome and appreciated, thanks :)
Top comments (21)
I feel that there's something off in your thinking and goals. ReactJs is a framework built on top of JavaScript so you're doing programming too with ReactJs. It really makes no sense saying you want to work with React. It may disappear in few years which will eventually make you jobless and out of track. What's sane is learning the fundamentals and how computers and programming languages work. Thus will give you an advantage and a boost in your career in term of problem solving and thinking.
In general, colleges and universities do not have really up to date curriculum or excessive technical materiel. The web is evolving so fast which means it's up to your perseverance to stay in track. But, the fundamentals and logical thinking you get from computer science and related field of studies are crucial to boost your career. It's not the degree but the material which means you can learn it by your own online if you like to.
However, if you really hate the idea of studying things related to logic and abstract thinking you can go the other way around and seek something related to intuition like human psychology or communication. It's beneficial for the front-end as it teach you how to better communicate and present your products ( It may be more of UX, but it's front-end ).
I wish you all the luck in your decision, and don't limit yourself 😊
Here is the thing you're missing: what are the fundamentals? Do universities REALLY teach the "fundementals"?
If you mean C Programming, data structures, and algorithms... Those can be learned outside the university context and all good.
Yeah, that's why I said at the end :
Note: I edit my original comment and rephrased it
However, the university, college or whatever academic will give these information in a digestible way within a community of learners as sometimes some of the concepts are frustrating to deal with alone. So a mentor or a colleague will be a great help. I'm not saying all universities are great but it's a considerable experience to have.
well, as I said, for me good contacts that will help me to find a better job in the future is more important than a degree
You are an idiot. Obviously JS is required for React. He is saying the end game and asking the best route there.
React is NOT going anywhere. It's the most used library and growing. It's HUGE.
He is planing a strategizing, he obviously has what it takes. Stop being a troll.
As obvious as it's, I know many people who jumped straight to ReactJS without having a solid knowledge about JS. It's exactly the same when years ago people jumped straight to jQuery. Many of them didn't had a clue about vanilla JS features like how AJAX calls are made or how to traverse and manipulate the DOM. Anyways, the Author stated that he want a degree to work with ReactJs. So my point was it's not sane to pursue a career or study to obtain a degree for the sake of working with a specific framework or library. As it's possible that it would be replaced or abandoned someday. I was pushing towards learning the basics of CS and programming languages to build a robust technical knowledge. I don't know which part of my personal opinion was troll?
Hey there,
Writing from Toronto, ON. I am about to graduate Computer Programming & Analysis program at Seneca College.
Insofar found it to be incisive into basic software development principles.
In this program I studied Fullstack in iterations - starting jQuery, Express, Handlebars, CSS, SQL; and finishing with React\Vue\Angular, bootstrap, NoSQL. Overall boring.
For many people who attend college, this program would be sufficing to instil "intern-ready" skillset for some huge corporation like "Canadian Tire". Hence this is the path people choose most often.
Hope you'll find Canada warm and cozy during winter! (In Ontario, it's utterly important to stay warm and dry).
Good luck, @silencerweb
Could you tell more about this college and Toronto in general? I'm still choosing the province, city and college so I wouldn't mind to hear feedback from somebody who lives there. I'm interested literally in anything that can come to your mind
There is one thing is to be said: Seneca College is about international students. You can learn the best aspects from each culture, and the worst, if not considerate...
Being a decent english speaker will render null while studying in there, everyone just utilizes simplest language possible (professors too!) So be aware of this, if your listening\narrating skills are valuable to you - better choose less open (smaller) college, like GeorgeBrown.
Toronto itself is a remarkable, loud, dirty, and nowadays foggy (pun intended), city, I get along with downtown quite easily, living uptown. Nevertheless commute during rush hours (which is essentially any time you go out, if you are not a night owl) takes more than an hour.
Rent prices are reasonable, a sturdy and clean basement CAN be found (renovation infrastructure for owners is bona fide).
Startups downtown appear and disappear on job boards daily, hence finding an internship is a pleasant Career Development experience with business communications and interviews is assured.
I am enjoying this place, people, education, life.
Wu Wei
Thanks for the information! ^
I'm a front end developer. A Computer Science degree is still very useful. In fact, I'll be starting my Master's in CS next year.
My undergrad was in design and, while it's definitely helped me over th years and I feel like I'm a step above many other front end engineers because of it, the reality is, the CS theory is probably more useful on the job to me. Once you get to the senior level, you are focused more on architecture and performance than designing things, as there's usually someone else doing that work. It's also super useful to be able to understand the back end systems you'll be connecting to. I still mock up applications and make certain design decisions, but for most front end guys, I don't think an entire degree on it is worthwhile over a CS degree. If you're interested in design, take a few courses on UX design in addition to CS.
Consider a degree in design or communications with a focus on digital media.
That's the path I took, and I stand out from other front end developers because of my ability to see eye to eye with designers, solve visual problems, and think aesthetically. Both visual and technical problem solving skills always come in handy as a front end developer.
Pretty much all computer science, communications, and design programs teach the basics of web development.
If professors knew modern web development at a professional level, they would not be professors.
Just keep in mind that your degree is going to be a somewhat useless piece of paper that gives you a little bit of status. 90% of the knowledge you will come to have will be self-taught from your personal projects, Stack Overflow, podcasts, and great tutorial platforms out there like LinkedIn learning.
Well, as I said, I've been working for 3 years already as a freelance frontend developer and I'm okay with self-education. I like the idea of taking a design program, thank you. I've always been interested in design and to be honest, 20% of my job is finishing something instead of the designer.
Writing live from Kingston, Ontario! Currently in my second year of Computer Programming at St. Lawrence College and, to be perfectly honest, I'm dropping out of my last year. My main focus is web dev as well, but the curriculum is jam packed with server programs, COBOL, and Java (which I'd like to learn, but wasn't taught well).
The fundamentals are there, teaches you C++ really well, but I feel you can definitely learn more on your own. As someone else mentioned, the curriculum will definitely be outdated. I made some great friends and learned some PHP and C++, but it doesn't go in depth with web development.
Hi, I graduated with Cognitive Science specializing in Human Computer Interaction. Try to see if there are any like that. Our curriculum was heavily focused on UX and that helps a ton on the front end as you can then provide your thoughts on that side of things.
What you're saying is a bit tricky though because you say you want to work with react and not a programming language. But react is a library of JavaScript which is a programming language. In this case I think computer science is a good idea. But if you want to stick more to the front end, look for more web development majors and yes maybe consider something in design as well.
If you want to avoid deep mathematics then find a degree that is on the outer perimeter of front end development. Something that compliments it so that when you look for a career you can show that you stand out from the rest. Every college has different majors so it really depends on the school. Just look for those that can compliment you within design, or web development if you want to avoid computer science.
With the rapid pace of change in the tech industry, it can be difficult to predict which skills will be in demand in the future ?
However, there are top 10 skills that are essential for any front-end developer.
You will want HTML5, CSS3, SASS of LESS, Valina JavaScript, then React. In that order. There is a path. I just gave you the heart of it but there are other programs that coincide. Good luck! You are going to be an awesome developer.
github.com/kamranahmedse/developer...
You can study toward an information systems degree if you're avoiding maths.
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