What degree am I looking for?

[speck317]

Hi,

I'm having quite a bit of trouble decided what route I should take in college. I have looked through some of the other posts on this subject but have found nothing that would help my specific needs, so I decided to post a new thread.

I am a senior getting ready to graduate (May 27th). The career I have chosen, for the long run, is computer security. Instead of going to a two year college and having a focus specifically in security, I would rather get a bachelor's degree first, become a network administrator, and go back for a masters with a focus in computer security later. The problem I'm having is deciding what bachelor's degree would benefit me best for this field.

I know that people don't always hire the best person for the job, and I read in another thread that you should attain a good education and still keep your resume looking good to the non-technical types. Many people are suggesting a computer science degree, and while I want to have a strong background in programming, I don't want to base my bachlor's degree around that. I'd like to eventually learn at least a little bit about everything computer related so that I'm not lost when I go into the field.

I have a very small background in programming languages such as VB, JavaScript, C++, HTML, etc. I have also been working with computers for my entire life, so I have worked on each version of Windows. I have Red Hat Linux installed on a separate hard drive, Knoppix on a CD, and have done quite a bit of work on Unix machines, so I am farely fluent in the NIX operating systems. Unfortunatley, I've never had the chance to work on a Sun system or any other OSs. I am extremely curious about the way machines work, and love troubleshooting networks and home computers. By the time I graduate, I will have an A+ certification (just waiting for the next OS test to roll around). All in all, I have an excellent background in computers and would like to study them in depth.

Sorry I made this post so long just for one question. Any help from network administrators, computer security professionals, and everyone else about what degree would be best for me would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

[The Real Bingo]

Hah, I'm in the same predicament as you, but I'm much less sure about what I want to do. I've been trying to exhaust every resource I can - using www.collegeboard.com, checking out local colleges and universities, and using the Occupational Outlook Handbook (to decide what I may fancy in a career). I think - at this moment in time, anyway - that I want to get into computers in some form or another. Whether that's setting them up, fixing them, or managing, I don't know. As far as a college, I'm probably going to attend our county's community college for two years, and by then I'll hopefully have an idea of what to do.

Since we are in similar circumstances, I suggest you check out CollegeBoard, and do the college search. You can define the schools you are interested in by majors, location, size, etc. In fact, there are 83 schools with a Computer/Systems Security major.

You may also want to check out some local technical institutes and/or vocational schools. Sometimes a full-blown college education is superfluous. Though I do suggest a Bachelor's then possibly a Master's since that's what the employers like to see.

Good luck.

[Russian Wall]

One thing you could look into is computer engineering. Depending on which school you go to, you can specialize in hardware or software, and some schools don't have the course at all. The hardware specialization route is essentially an electrical engineering degree based around computers and the software route is pretty much programming with engineering concepts from what I have heard.

At my U a lot of the engineering is generalized, so I learn a lot of non-computer stuff too, espiecially in first-year. However, the benefit of this fact is that an engineering degree is highly recognized, regardless of your major. What I mean is that I have heard of people applying for jobs that *should* be a certain major and getting the job with a different eng. major. This obviously doesn't hold true with highly specialized jobs, but there is some flexibility.

Engineering is all about problem solving and troubleshooting, however is an intense field and can get quite difficult. Anyway, hope this helps.