XPost: soc.college.admissions, misc.education   
   From: boxhill@verizon.net   
      
   > Well, yes...  But for myself, when I start a project, I prefer to   
   > explore my way into it.  If I start with an outline I have problems,   
   > because before I've finished the introduction I've realised that my   
   > outline doesn't quite match what is actually happening in the essay.   
   > While I'm writing, I'm continually readjusting my mental model of the   
   > subject, my attitude towards it.   
      
   Well, yes, the process of writing a paper is part of the learning process.   
   That's one reason why they assign papers.  Some people apparently think   
   about it all in advance and decide precisely what points they want to make.   
   Others find that their ideas develop as they engage with the material more   
   deeply in the writing process. This can make it harder to get the papers   
   done, but as you point out later, it's not _wrong_.   
      
   > I know fiction writers who have to write an outline and follow it;   
   > writers who have to write an outline but can't follow it; and writers   
   > who can't write an outline or they'll never be able to write the   
   > story.  Fiction isn't the same as non-fiction, but that kind of   
   > variation in techniques is the same:  everyone does things   
   > differently.  Teachers at school teach the technique that's safest for   
   > most people, but that doesn't make it best for everyone.   
      
   Exactly.   
      
   I have the impression--which may be wrong--that you are planning to major in   
   CS because you have a mild interest in it and think it will provide you with   
   a straightforward career path. There are other subjects in which you have a   
   greater interest, but you are putting them aside because you don't see an   
   obvious job there when you graduate from college.   
      
   I'd suggest that you think about two things: a) no field is immune to   
   change, and there are plenty of experienced unemployed programmers in the US   
   right now whose former jobs are being done by someone in Calcutta, and b)   
   although one has to make a living, there are many, many ways to do it, and   
   you haven't been exposed to a hundredth of them.   
      
   I'd suggest that you follow your bliss intellectually, and see how things   
   shake out a few years down the road. If you don't, you will either fail in   
   your attempt to put yourself in a CS box, or--perhaps worse yet--not fail   
   and find yourself in a career that feels like indentured servitude twenty   
   years from now.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)