starting a career/degree track, questions for programmers

[xm110]

Hi all,

I was just recently honorably discharged from the military, and am getting ready to go back to school. I know a decent amount about computers, but I was never really afforded a good opportunity to learn very detailed material. The interest, however, has always been there. My question is, how much experience/knowledge of computers do you feel is necessary to start a college degree track for computer programming? I am at a pretty basic level, so i'm hoping most degree tracks start off at a very basic level. I would love to hear your guy's stories/ experiences, especially if it has been within the last few years that you graduated. thanks a bunch!

[ShaneC]

Well first thing's first: Thank you for your service!

You're really not in a bad position to start brand new in school. Believe it or not, I think it's 10-times more important to be enthusiastic about the material than to come in with programming knowledge. The people who have a great interest are the ones who learn the material and then go off to do great things in the industry.

Most Computer Science degrees will start you off easy. At my University, for example, we have an Intro to Programming course that all CS majors are required to take. It starts you off assuming that you have zero programming knowledge. From there, subsequent classes build off that first class.

I know of many students who have come into the University, majored in CS with zero pre-programming knowledge, and then graduated going on to work at very notable companies.

So the short story is: If you have the passion, go for it. When you love the material the rest is easy.