To degree or not to degree...

Need a degree. This isn't 15 years ago. Most places require a degree now,so if you don't have a foot in the door already, it's over.

The other problem is if you ever choose to leave the profession, which most of us will, you won't get a look unless you have that degree.

That's just the way it is.

 

Some say they would rather have their 20 years or so of experience rather than a degree. That may have been fine in the 80s or earlier, or even before the internet boom, but not now.

I'm sure 25 years as a writer, columnist or whatever would make a person qualified for many positions, but someone with two years of experience and no degree? That's a different story.

I just know without my degree I would be screwed. Scout.com wouldn't even hire me.

 

most ads say a degree is required. send in great clips and show a solid background, and you'll get plenty of call-backs.

 

I can personally attest to Tom's statement, and can personally refute jfs's assertion. I made solid advancement in journalism and have had no trouble succeeding outside of it. If you can do the job, all other "requirements" are negotiable.

 

Once upon a midnight dreary, I labored with the assumption that hard work trumped all, that talent and drive and a shiny, overstuffed portfolio from a reputable paper would be more than enough to brush away the lack of a parchment with a gold seal in the corner. Hell, I was good. That was plenty good enough.

So much so, in fact, that when faced with the choice of quitting a part-time job at a good-sized paper that routinely gets feted on the board or staying in the college I had just transferred to, I dropped out of school. Way I figured, a 29-hour gig with regular bylines at a damn good publication would take me to a lot more places than a degree from a commuter school and a fistful of acceptable clips from a couple of college rags.

And I worked. I worked well above the 29 hours I got paid. I covered high school games immemorial. I flew the paper's flag at the occasional college game. I helped on auto racing coverage, including when NASCAR made their twice-yearly fly-by. I did features; some pedestrian, others that went in the centerpiece spot of the sports front, and one that was the cover of the entertainment section. I picked up assignments when people were sick or had emergencies to which they had to attend. I freelanced for when minor-league teams came our way and their papers were still interested enough to have someone on the ground there, even if it wasn't their guy. I learned agate. I LEARNED AGATE.

Then I applied to papers. Papers near and far, papers big and small, papers with stars on their bellies, papers with ... wait, what? Anyway, I dropped my resumes with nearly any paper that had an opening and a few that didn't.

The big papers in-state where I thought I'd be a natural fit because of my clips and my talent and my life spent in the region? No callbacks. The mid-sized papers that covered interesting things and propelled their good writers into the stratas of our industry? Nothing. Small papers that had fun beats, a reasonable chance for advancement or were just in a fun as hell place? The occasional form letter. The sum of three years spent as a professional part-timer and college ex-pat? A couple hundred bucks a week, my old bedroom at my mom's house, three job interviews and one offer of $15,000 a year for a one-man army job in the middle of frosted butt nowhere.

I didn't want to go back to college. I didn't learn much the first time I was there. I didn't understand why I had to scrape my way through biology and Spanish in order to be ordained as worthy to staff volleyball games for a living. I certainly didn't want to tack on a few more thou in debt for it, not if it wasn't absolutely necessary.

Unfortunately, it is. People just don't look at you the same way without a degree. It's not fair, and I'd love to change it, but if you want in on the next hand, you've got to abide by house rules. So if they want a degree ... sigh ... then I'll go get a degree.

Went back to school, quitting the part-time job shortly thereafter. Two years later (and 10 years after I started), I finally got a degree. Of course, I happen to walk into a freefalling job market and I waited six months before my first job, a place that oddly enough I probably COULD have gotten in without a degree.

But it's probably a good thing I graduated, because years later I finally made the other discovery -- I'm not really any good, and I damn sure wasn't as good as I thought I was when I was a 22-year-old self-described rising star. At some point your confidence is going to give way. And even if it doesn't, trying to get to a big paper without a degree in 2008 is like catching three bolts of lightning in a paper cup. It's just how it happens now. And you damn sure don't want to be testing these waters in ANY industry without a degree on which to fall back.

tl;dr summary: it sucks that you need a diploma, but you do, so do it already.