12
daCoda
5y

Hey peeps,
I got a question that is bothering me for a while now. I am from Germany and I quit my CS studies a few months ago in favor of a "Berufsausbildung". I don't know if other countries have a comparable equal to our Berufsausbildung, so I gonna give you a quick overview:

In the Berufsausbildung you stay 30% of your time in school where you have to learn the basics and theory parts of your chosen profession. 70% of your time you are in the company ("Ausbildungsbetrieb") that is training you to learn the practical parts your profession and gain work experience. At the end of the Berufsausbildung, you have to work on a project and present it in front of a committee and write some exams.

So the Berufsausbildung is more about learning by doing instead of learning all the little things in the field of your profession.

Now to my actual question. One of my biggest dreams is to work in Japan as a freelance for a few years or more. Working on projects for companies in my home country while traveling through Japan. I know that it is hard to be allowed into the country for a longer time and even working there without a good education. I always have the feeling that I am inferior to people who have a college degree and I am afraid that my "inferior education" might be a huge disadvantage in the future for me. I already gained 3 years of work experience as a dev and in February 2020 I will have finished my Berufsausbildung. What is your experience with working as a dev without any college degree? Are you treated differently than other people that got a degree? And has anyone experience with working abroad with or without a degree?

Thank you very much!

Comments
  • 6
    I've got a MBO level BOL degree (about the same as what you're going but here we've got MBO which is the level (the lowest possible in my country, more learning by doing) and then you've got type BOL which is a full-time study and also BBL which is nearly exactly what you're describing only then it's 4 days work and one day of studying) and my current boss only wanted my skillset, he didn't give a fuck about my education/education level.
  • 3
    I don't think that having professional experience is less rewarding than just a degree, on the contrary. I did something similar that was around 60% work /40% school and I quite liked it! Less theory and more practical experiences. Around the time I had my exams, you could easily tell the differences between people that were in a regular cursus and the others.

    I can't answer to all of your questions and keep in mind that this is from my perspective (and a different country), but I don't think you'll have more trouble than someone else because of that ;)

    Good luck!
  • 3
    I cant say not having a degree has ever limited me, most company’s (in Australia at least) demand a degree on the job descriptions but I’ve never been formally requested to prove it.

    But who knows Japan could be different, but here, it’s more of a scare tactic then a requirement, from my experience anyway.
  • 2
    Currently doing the same just in switzerland. And i don‘t think someone who did a Berufsausbildung is less educated and has a disadvantage in any kind. Personally i think we have much more experience as we work part-time in a company, we know how it works on a practical site too and did not only try to understand the theorietical part of it. For me i.e i got a good understanding of how business works and how i have to establish myself in it. I finish my Ausbildung also in february 2020, and i have basically the same goal, just in the US and not japan but also to freelance as soon as i‘m done with my Ausbildung.
  • 1
    Almost same situation here.
    Dunno if the Ausbildung is really worth it in my case. I am doing my a levels and a government-proven Ausbildung "Informationstechnischer Assistent". Next year I will maybe attend a University, but besides of that I have applied for Ausbildung offering jobs.
    I am not sure, if companies (even companies outside of Germany) would allow someone like me being part of their dev Team.
    Ik it depends on my skills, but what about the educational part?
    Plus, do I need to do an Ausbildung after having my bachelor degree in cs?
  • 3
    Japanese clients usually are hard to find as they don't really use the usual networks to post jobs or find somebody, they much more prefer their local market/websites of native japanese developers.

    It isn't impossible, but it is much harder from my experience, especially if you are purely english speaking - they will always choose somebody that's japanese over somebody that's not.

    You'd be much easier off with china as they have a very strong hate against their own quality of products.
  • 2
    All i know is that on the path of learning the majority of devs have said practicing is the best.

    Also comijg from France, there is a similar mentality thinking that theory is better than practice. Hence practical studies are viewed lesser in quality.

    Imo, i‘d say it is because learning theory shows the ability to understand layers of abstraction and directly reflects a certain level of intelligence. Thus someone who succeeds in theory can apply that to many fields while practicality is more specific.

    But one dont imply the other. So usually someone good at something would way or another reach both perks.

    So if you practiced a lot you would start seeing patterns and go towardsand understanding the abstractions. While with theory you transform the abstraction through applied cases.
  • 1
    Im doing this since about 6 years now. No degree, but the equivalent of a Berufsausbildung. Im working for customers back home while traveling in Asia.
    once you got experience in your field, a degree doesn't mean that much.
    check out '#nomads'.
    It's a community just about this.
  • 1
    In order to work in japan you have to have a bachelors degree diploma. That means after you finish your apprenticeship you have to do a form of higher education. I don't know if Meister counts. But as you've may heard japans population is rapidly aging and shrinking. That means they will sooner or later make it easier for gaijins to work in japan. So you might be lucky. But if you want to make sure, you might ask the japanese embassy in berlin? www.de.emb-japan.go.jp
  • 2
    Thank you all for your answers! Good to hear that I am not the only one with this fear/situation.
    @heyheni yeah I will go the the Embassy in the near future. I hope they have some good news for me ^^
  • 2
    ppl here dont get that you don't want to work for Japanese clients. Freelancing for clients back home is easy (once you got them). make sure to pay taxes.
  • 1
    @-ANGRY-CLIENT- good luck explaining your degrees

    I am a Mathematisch Technischer Softwareentwickler

    And had to explain it in every interview
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