Or, if you don't want a degree or want to work WHILE you earn your degree, get the certifications first and then go for the degree later. Just beware that many corporate positions REQUIRE a degree in order to even apply (it's based on government position requirements and isn't something they can really control).

Find a program at a school that hires undergraduate Teaching Assistants. After acing a freshman level class and applying to TA that class my junior and senior years, I got a tuition waiver and monthly stipend those years. It's a great hourly wage compared to campus jobs and looks better on a résumé.

Hey! Listen! Find the college you want your degree to be from, then do the following:

Probably the worst advice I got in college was "don't try to work your freshman year so that you can focus on classes."

Stop this nonsense. Work your way thru college. You need to learn to like to work and learn to love the discipline to do things you don't want to do. Hard work will set you free, what's the point of college if you spend your live enslaved.

I'm about to go to college and could use some financial advice.

Programming and web dev? That's one of the few things you don't need official schooling for. Don't waste the time and money. If you want to pay for the *experience* of going to college, that's a different issue (and one that doesn't require all 4 years). Skills and portfolio are what matter in your field. Surely if…

Room and board is the killer. If you can go to school locally, like a state school or CC, do it. Like many have said, the name of your school is pretty irrelevant, its your degree that matters. And live at home as long as you can. If you do take out loans, after graduating, living at home will give you one less burden…

• Go to a strong technical oriented community college.

Jrod3737 is right on. The larger point is to study something that makes money. If you study "Women's Studies" or "Journalism" at Sarah Lawrence you will never ever make enough money to pay back the loan. Ever single entity in this world is a business. I am a graphic artist and I treat it like a business. My art skills…

I graduated this year with $0 in loan debt with a bachelors degree in engineering. I came from a modest family, and received no financial support from my parents. Your circumstances might be different then mine, but here's how I did it. Start by going to an in-state school, that will cut expenses in half in most…

Ha! I grew up in Atlanta, so I can perhaps hone it on specifics...

Double major with business or business administration as your second major. You'll be earning twice as much in 5-10 years because you'll be moved up the company ranks faster than your peers and be twice as marketable in your profession.

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Hello, I can relate to the burden of decision, I just started this semester and will be majoring in CIS with a focus on networking. here are some tips that may or may not be useful. 1. community college! The one I'm going to has tuition/fees around $300 a class/semester. compare that to university, and you'll save a…

TheFriar hit it right on the money. Community colleges are golden, especially for web development. It's an extremely cheap way to get basically the same education, (or better) than you'd get at a 4 year.

tl;dr - it's a trap, DO NOT take on loans for school, work part time & do school part time OR teach yourself. ex: Yahoo will hire people w/o CS BS degrees, as they'd just have to retrain them anyhow.

Run from Student Loans. At least you're looking into something that is marketable. There are a lot of people out there that are so up to their eyeballs in Student Loan debt that they can't pursue the career they want because have to take a job that will pay back the loan. Not many artists can find a job that pays…

Oh my gosh! Don't listen to them! Just go to one of the many CS crash courses in Silicon Valley! Like Hack Reactor. Only $18K and starting salary is +$100K.

I am a software developer but didn't start that way. I first got a bachelors in Chemistry then realized I didn't enjoy it. So I finished up another bachelors in CS. I'm not finishing my masters this Fall and have about 8K in loans for all my schooling.