[ryanfx]

Originally Posted by WildBillyT

Perhaps I was unclear. In certain jobs you cannot learn the skills you need elsewhere. I think it's foolish and illogical to think that you are supposed to know EVERYTHING when you graduate college regardless of degree.

But in many (engineering, computer programming, and probably a bunch more) the new hire has to re-learn the basics of what they are supposed to know. Example: I have had Computer Science graduates fail the "entrance test" I decided to implement because they cannot execute a simple JOIN statement in SQL. A few of them had 3.25+ GPAs in their major. I've also had guys that don't know what recursion is. That to me is really really bad. And I'm not alone. I talk to guys I know in many other fields who feel the same way.

It's one thing if you don't know intermediate or advanced topics. Or they can't/don't teach you what you need to know (I guess that's your case?). It is something completely different when people are given a degree and a nice GPA without an understanding of some of the fundamental topics of their field of study. That pisses me off. Especially when hiring somebody is a gamble, and their college performance may be your only clue.

Not knowing SQL statements is one thing... computer science is more about logic and application than it is specifics like web design and database access. Recursion on the other hand.. there should be no excuse for not knowing it.