A couple of notes on my situation:
- I'll be a minor (< 18 y/o) for this whole time period
- I have saved up a good amount of money from working this past year, so I'm okay on that front as long as I don't go crazy
- I've been accepted into a top-10 Computer Science program for admission this fall that doesn't let students defer for a whole year. I feel like I have a good shot at a top-5 or top-3 school if I apply again this fall (for admission next year). I don't necessarily want to go to college yet, but I also don't take being accepted there for granted.
- I'm located in the SF Bay Area
Cheers :)
If you have any doubt about what you want to do in life take some time to think about it.
Applying again next year, I'll be able to include all of my grades and test scores from this academic year, which will be an improvement. As long as I show that I'm not just wasting a year of my life, I don't think a gap year will hurt my chances of getting into school.
You also said that I'll have a lot of free time in college to explore my own interests, but isn't that a valid reason to take a gap year too? If I can go into college already knowing what's important to me and what I want to do, won't it make the experience that much better?
WDYT?
The gap year would be far better suited for this than multitasking passions and school time.
- Blog several times a week about your new experiences.
- Volunteer for stuff to meet people, concerts, events, conferences, sporting events.
- Start a side project so that you will be ready to kick butt when you do start CS.
- Definitely.
- Sweet - would you recommend any organizations that organize this kind of stuff, or am I better off just googling around for things in my area?
- No question.
Thanks!
I took about half a year off before grad school, and I loved it. For me that was much more valuable than if I had done something similar before undergrad. If you are interested, I spent my time off on a road trip across the US. My wife and I camped the entire time except for a few days with friends and 3 nights in hotels when we need some recovery time. It included a lot of hiking including up to 15 days straight on the trail.
I have traveled before and it was great to see the world from a different perspective. I feel I need that again. Maybe call it an expensive empathy-building exercise.
Certainly I just assumed that since I did really well in high school, enjoyed physics and got into a good school then studying Physics at University must be the right thing do. Since this matched up with all social expectations and since everybody around me told me that this was a really good idea, I never really questioned it. To cut a long story short, it probably wasn't the right thing to do then, and I ended up miserable and crashing out.
So whatever you do end up doing with your time, take the luxury to throw out any pre-conceived notions of what you should do and really reflect over what you want to do.
If I had your year, I would find some art form and try to perfect it. Then go back to CS in the fall.
Another option: go to Asia. And scuba dive. You can live in India for awhile for little no money. I spent 4 months traveling, diving and shooting photos and absolutely loved it. I don't think I learned a whole lot. But it was heaven.
Maybe do that and have some goal in mind. And if you do travel, you're going to take photos (how can you not?). So get good at making photographs before you go if you do (take a street photography class).
As a minor, traveling is a bit more trouble (not impossible), but getting away for a few months would be amazing. Thanks dude(tte)!
If I was you, I'd do some cheap traveling in South America or Southeast Asia.
I work full time now at a fantastic job but I often wish to venture to places that technology haven't penetrated very deep and learn more about social structures and how oppressive they can be in the eastern world. A young person with passion can do a world of good things if they can find the right problem to solve, the right solution, and the right partners.
Best of luck!
Any suggestions for specific places to go?
There are so many ways... As extreme as: lock yourself in your basement and code for a year, all the way to travel the world. How many countries have you visited so far? If less than 3? Definitely try to double that number.
You want to do crazy experiments (like Justin.tv)? Remember these recent posts about a github project that will accept any pull request? Let people suggest stuff, and do them (and report) [within reason].
* Visit an elderly center, tell them you're traveling, and let them request certain attractions in the city you're in. You GoPro the whole thing and upload it for them when you're done.
* Come up with an interesting question and ask people as you travel e.g. "what do you think of americans?" , "what do you think of america?". Share the responses on a blog.
* Go to Cuba and capture the density of wi-fi signals you get. Document it in such a way that someone besides you could rerun it in the future.
Count me as jealous. Have fun and good luck!
If you don't mind me asking, do you think you could go into more detail about what made the first six months great and the next six not so much?
What made the year off sort of a zero sum was that I had roughly enough cash to last roughly a year, but at about the halfway point I started looking for areas that I wanted to relocate to and worked on securing employment there. The stress of re-entering the workforce undid some of the decompression from leaving the corporate world in the first place.
It was a great period for figuring out just what I wanted to do and what really mattered in life. If I had to do it again, I'd have more FU money, or at least have a more solid income stream that wasn't wholly dependent on me being at an office for ~8 hours a day.
Lessons were learned, some easy, some hard. Plans are in action so that history won't repeat itself so closely next time I decide I need some time off.
For reference, I took some time off and wrote a book on a technical subject, created two big meetups and got hooked in with the local startup community. Now I go to local events and people are starting to actively seek me out.
Re: networking - do you think age is a factor? In your experience, have these meetups been inviting, or did it take a lot of effort on your part to start making connections?
So not sure why you would take a gap year without knowing what to do. Makes it seem like you don't want to study computer science?
So maybe you can question why you are wanting to study? Is it your favourite subject? Do you code for fun? Is there another subject you'd rather be studying, but maybe isn't as 'acceptable' with the various pressures to conform?
Hope this doesn't sound to harsh, but it is worth thinking about what you really want. Maybe THAT is why you need the year out.
If so then I would suggest some kind of travel. Get away from the peer / teacher / parental pressures and enjoy yourself. You might get a feeling about what you really want to do.
If you go crazy from not being able to fire up your IDE and crank out code, you may find that CS is right for you after all :-)
