&gt;What I learned in Automata, Discrete Math, Algorithms, and the other more theoretical classes has been worth it&#x27;s weight in gold.<p>That was my intention when I signed up for University too. However, I&#x27;ve only had two maths modules, and they haven&#x27;t been particularly challenging.<p>One of the things I was looking forward to learn at University was hardcore cryptography, since I believe that&#x27;s one of the few things for which getting formal, structured education is the best way to go. Sure, you can learn the fundamentals on your own fairly easily (even more so today - Stanford&#x27;s online course in cryptography is very good), but you need to learn about attacks or you&#x27;ll write code vulnerable to known problems like hash length extension attacks, ciphertext modification...<p>However, the only time cryptography was mentioned - at all - in my entire BSc was in first year, where we had a few lectures explaining the rudiments of RSA. Interesting, for sure, but pretty much useless without the remaining 80% of knowledge required to have a full picture of what&#x27;s going on.