I’m a senior in high school right now and definitely need to consider what I’m going to do in college and for work.
For a very long time I’ve been into computers, and am a developer with a few big projects under my belt (this is a burner account for privacy). So, my logical choice for a while was to become a software developer professionally.
Nowadays that plan doesn’t look too promising. AI has basically replaced junior developers (with dubious results) and the competition has gotten much fiercer. I’m not even in college yet so I have a good amount of time to potentially pivot to something else before choosing a major.
I’ve got quite a bit of experience with Linux and I manage a home server, but that probably doesn’t differentiate me much. I’m honestly interested in most things computer related, but don’t know of any specific fields to seek out. If it’s so hard for fresh CS graduates to get jobs, why would any other option be different?
Eh anyone can Google to get to the next step, and the next step, until their hodgepodge project is complete (eg, most of my projects), but not many would take the time to learn how to best optimize the code, keeping in mind the low level fundamentals of the operating system. Those courses actually do provide a nice minimal level of understanding of concepts to ensure the programmer understands what they are doing to a level that can build larger projects, and hopefully work well with others on a team.