I have my own business so it never really became an issue for me, but I was asked by my nephew recently if you can make it in IT security world without a college degree. That got me wondering, if someone had a CEH,CISSP,MCSE,and perhaps a few other great certs, how far could he get?
 

In my opinion, it's important to have it, but it has not done anything for me at all. I do not even list it in my signature. I attained my Associate's in "Computer Studies, with a concentration in MicroApplications" from my local Community College.
While I was working full-time at a warehouse, I was taking 1 class per quarter. Algebra class was 1 hour a day, 4 days a week, in the morning. I worked in the warehouse 2nd shift. Algebra class was toughest, but the teacher was fantastic. I can't rave about her enough. She actually would let you call her at home if you had a problem with a math question. But the College offered free math tutoring on the side, that was a big help. Took me from Sept 87-Dec 1997 to achieve. Graduated in June 1998.

Did my Bachelor's from an online college in Thousand Oaks, CA, outside of LA. Found airfare for $200.00 to San Diego. There was a Microsoft Technet convention there. They offered Microsoft cert exams there for half-price (at that time, they were $100.00). So on the spur of the moment, I cracked down to study for the Microsoft AD exam. Allowed myslef about 2.5 hrs to cram for it. Of course I bombed, but I kept working on it and passed it finally.

Took a day off from SD to visit family in LA. Stayed the night in LA, visited the school the following morning. (You really have to experience LA freeways. No WONDER everything in CA is so expensive). I found out at the school I enrolled in the wrong major; I enrolled in "Computer Science", which means programming. I am the world's worst programmer. Changed my major to "Management Information Systems". So they gave me credit for my certifications, and I had to do 5 online classes, plus write a 75-pg min. "Final Report." Took me 8 months for the classes and report. Did report on "Steganography as used by terrorists to institute attacks on America".
Had to pay $250.00 for diploma. As stated on diploma, "graduated June 10, 2003" little over 3 years, it's done nothing for me except give me a good feeling. BTW, it cost me approx. $2500.00

I have a friend that has a PhD in Astropyhsics. He says it's done nothing for him; all he's been able to get out of it is a part-time teaching job at Kent State. He tells me, "the only degree that matters is 98.6".

Don't want to sound negative or depress you or anything, but this is a real-world story. Don't believe all the hype from the schools.
Local school in my area advertises very heavily on TV. (Will not give the name here). Mostly they offer Associates degrees. I looked into them one time; they wanted about $27,000.00 for an Associates degree. I got mine from Community College for half of that. They tried to justify it as "it's their name on the diploma" that makes the difference to employers.
An Associates degree is an Assocaites degree, no matter where you get it from. AN Associates degree is only a starting stepping stone, by itself, it will not get you a job.

Take it for what you will. It's tough out here.

   

Having a degree helped me move to the USA from the UK and get an H1-B visa.  It has probably helped secure job interviews as well.  Having said that, I have now been out of work for over a year and cannot get an IT position for move nor money even after working for consulting companies in the USA and as an independant contractor in the UK for the last 7 years.  Before that I have been involved in every area of IT from a PC Support Technician and mid range admin to a Lotus Notes architecture guy.  This is partly why I am now getting into the security side of things and taking the CEH exam.

Degrees used to be an indication of a certain level of intelligence but they are as common as MCSE's these days so my advice is to get up to speed with the latest technology, learn all you can about it and you will be picked up eventually.......I hope.....

On the other hand, you could always try this here.

But I would never do this myself. It's up to you.

Yer right about most of that. Sadly, "It's not who you know, it's who you blow".

 Don't mean to sound negative, or piss anybody off, but that is essentially how it works. You have to know somebody with the influence, and I don't. I know a lot of people, but none of them have the clout to get me in someplace fulltime perm.

That's one of the reasons I've been looking for a full time perm job for the last 5 yrs. I haven't done any ass-kissing, I've tried to get a job on my own merits and qualifications. If I'm not too expensive, then I'm  a threat to them; if they piss me off, I can take them down. Heck, their loss.

I often thought about getting into new car sales, cause it's fun hanging around new cars. But there's the ass-kissing thing again, magnified a couple million times over.

I had this girl in my Networking Essentials class, first class I had when working on my MCSE. She said she was IT director of her company, and they were sending her to class to get certified. She admitted not knowing anything about computers. She was in her early 20's. I asked her during break time how she got to be IT Director of her company. She told me, flat out, "I was in the right place at the right time" Argh, I could have strangled her right there. I'll bet I know what position she was in: on her knees.

Well, someday I'll die, and all my problems will be over.

Sorry for negative attitude. Bad story is over noe, back to "normal". Ancient history class is over.