Ask HN: Starting a CS degree at 28?
Flip it around. Is getting a BSc going to hurt you in any way? Opportunity loss? Debt? Missed opportunities? I&#x27;d look at it from that angle.<p>Biggest advantage I can think of as being a Canadian + BSc would be that you can use the TN visa provision of NAFTA (USMCA), and make 2X+ what you would in Canada (living in the States). This opens you up to working at Google&#x2F;Amazon&#x2F;Facebook&#x2F;Apple&#x2F;etc. I&#x27;m not sure where you live, but in Victoria, BC, where I live most regular tech jobs are 60-90k CAD but in the US you can easily make 120k+ USD. So, that is 2X+ with the currency conversion. But, cost of living might be more too, plus the whole work life balance thing. Money isn&#x27;t everything! Sometimes it is nice to make less money, have less stress, and be able to do stuff on the weekends. I&#x27;d suggest working while going to school too (if you go that route).<p>Starting your own business and remotely contacting to companies in the USA could work too (without a degree). You are basically working for yourself, so a degree doesn&#x27;t matter, as you are just working off your skill level. You can also charge in USD and live in Canada. The best of both worlds. You can use the &quot;professional services&quot; provision of NAFTA to only pay taxes in Canada. You cannot do any work in the US though. Might be worth researching if you are into that. This is high risk though as you are totally self dependant and running your own company. But, high risk &#x2F; high reward.<p>Another option, without a degree, is you can just as easily spend 6-12 months, while working, and build an awesome on-line portfolio that would probably make you stand out more than a BSc would. This will get you jobs too. Then you will totally stand out. Obviously this is not a quick trick but can pay off huge. Plus, you&#x27;ll have people offering you jobs vs you hunting for them. But, this takes time too, a long time, and needs some planning, but is well worth it. This has worked well for me but took a few years of building.<p>Those are the three things I have seen people do. It highly depends on your appetite for risk and your goals. So, I cannot really say what might work. You don&#x27;t want to spend 4 years, plus tons of money, to be in the exact same place. So, I&#x27;d create some type of long term goal of where you want to be, and then shoot for that. If you search HN there are many threads on this topic too with good advice. Use <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;hn.algolia.com&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;hn.algolia.com&#x2F;</a> and search for things like Degree, Bachelor, etc. I have seen at least a half dozen over the years.