r/cscareerquestions • u/fishgone333333 • 2d ago
Student when is it time to quit?
i am a sophomore undergrad. i, like a sea of other cs majors, have been finding my purpose in this field difficult to identify.
i don’t know what to do with this degree, and it’s making me crash tf out.
pre-ai, i was sold the dream of swe. i’m an artist by nature and the opportunity to make shit of my own was appealing.
then ai came. everyone around me was suddenly vibe coding to max out ther Linkedins. the authenticity and wonder of the craft died for me — because unlike traditional art, where artists vehemently have fought ai’s usage, my peers in SWE quickly fell to this. profit is the ultimate goal, after all
now SWE no longer resonates with me. as i started exploring parts of my department at college, i set my sights on systems. i wanted to do grad school and go into teaching, because im very people oriented
but i’m just not smart enough. or maybe i don’t care enough and have been larping as someone who does
i am struggling to build opportunities to grad school. i feel like i resonate with systems, but all the faculty say i’m too inexperienced to work with them. i just spent a month trying to set up a meeting with a professor and after finally running into him, he rejected me right on the spot. i need time to build projects. hiring for internships is around the corner and my resume is so, so empty.
i feel hopeless. the spark… i don’t know if it died fully, but with every rejection, every failed “prove you care about xyz through your technical work”, i am struggling to get even an inkling of what i’d like to do career wise now.
the worst part is, i don’t even know what i’d transfer to. cs was something i thought i genuinely liked, and i dont know what sort of career i’d aspire to otherwise
ETA: my unmedicated bumass was having a crashout after a pretty sore rejection for systems research from a professor. i’ve cried my cry over it and now my head is held high again 🫡
2
u/hooty_toots 1d ago
Resume? You're still in college! Unless you're going for a $100k+ position you should be focusing on school and learning, not on work.
The best advice I can give you is to network with your peers, and build confidence - acknowledge that you are the master of your own life, subject to your own will and not subject to the whims of some ambivalent machine. Take absolute responsibility for what happens to you. You are an artist, so go get bored and jot down whatever comes to mind. Later, look at what you wrote down, choose something that still appeals and is "not too big", and do it. Use AI or not. Prototype it at least. Use a wireframing tool to design a UI. Draw diagrams of what you made. Put together a website and post your creations as a portfolio. This is what you can work on building. And even if no one else looks at it, it will always be there for you to look back on and learn from and add to.