should i go to university?

[eternalworm2008]

My current life plan is to do nothing until im 18 in a little over a year and move in with my e-husband and he'll maintain me. but once im 18 he'll still be in university himself for like another year. I could move in then and there but i'd probably have to get a job to maintain myself. so, until he graduates and gets a job, should i go to university myself? even if just for a year? if i were i'd major in computer science, seems fun.

[Dan Q]

I went to university here in the UK a couple of decades and change ago, and studied computer science. There were some clear highlights:

• I met lots of fantastic people; much of my current circle of friends are people I first met while a student, or through people who still were - this includes my partner (we'll have been together 19 years this year!), her husband, people I've subsequently tapped for work/networking opportunities, etc.
• I discovered a love of voluntary work which gave me a huge sense of purpose and pride ever since
• I met the person who introduced me to my first serious employer, and to my first serious employer, and as a result got my first proper programming job
• I founded a nonprofit that I'm still involved with 24 years later, which does a huge amount of good in the world
• I learned some things from the course itself: a theoretical grounding that I still occasionally lean on and that I would have been less-likely to pick up were I entirely a self-taught (as opposed to a mostly self-taught) programmer
• It taught me to study at a HE level, which ultimately led me to two further enjoyable degrees (in addition to my BEng Comp Sci I nowadays have a BA (Foundation) Counselling & Psychotherapy and a MSc Info Sec & Forensics - I have a habit of collecting a degree for each decade of my adult life so far!)
• It gave me a "stepping stone" to the real world, which I definitely wasn't mature enough to handle well at 18!

But... I don't routinely recommend university to people. It's increasingly - and insanely - expensive, and doesn't represent good value-for-money from a learning perspective (if you want to be a programmer, or devops, or similar, at least, I think that you can learn faster and better under your own steam nowadays... although going through formal education doesn't stop you also doing that, of course).

So even though my experience of my first undergraduate degree was worthwhile, I think I went through the experience under conditions that are different from those that you face, and my experience might not be applicable to you. It very much depends on what you want to achieve!

If your aim is solely, or almost-entirely, to get the skills you need for most careers in computer science... I can no longer recommend it: it's too expensive and provides too little value. If your reasons are more-diverse, then... maybe!