<story><title>How to Learn Advanced Mathematics Without Heading to University – Part 3</title><url>https://www.quantstart.com/articles/How-to-Learn-Advanced-Mathematics-Without-Heading-to-University-Part-3</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mungoid</author><text>I really hope this doesn&amp;#x27;t come across as brash. I don&amp;#x27;t mean it to, but I must disagree with your assertions (In my case at least). Learning advanced mathematics without university is completely possible. Because it is at your own learning pace. Not one of a University.&lt;p&gt;I graduated several years ago with a BS in Computer Science, with a Focus on Networking. And during that time, I held 3 part time jobs while also being a math tutor. Almost none of the math I use today as a physics developer was learned from schools. I also never had that piece of mind you mentioned, because I was constantly juggling several things at once while going to school. My knowledge of advanced mathematics at the time of my graduation was pretty non existent. I think the most advanced math I had was Algebra 2 or something like that, and the Professors just basically read verbatim from the book.&lt;p&gt;A few years after Uni, I started teaching myself Calc, Trig, Vector maths, Diff Eq and Physics strictly from what I have found on various sites, software and books. Because of that, I ended up getting a physics simulation developer position at a software company.  Because in my companies view, being able to teach yourself all that math is much more impressive than being taught from a University.&lt;p&gt;I hated math during High School and College, but since then, I have found that I absolutely love math, and I will never stop trying to learn or do new things. My degree was two small lines on my CV, while about 50% of what I had on my CV was all learned on my free time, by myself.&lt;p&gt;So learning math without a College or University is totally possible, and in my situation, worked way better. Sites like Khan Academy, Wolfram, Youtube, etc. all give you the resources and leave it up to you to progress at your own pace, for free.</text></item><item><author>yodsanklai</author><text>&amp;gt; How to Learn Advanced Mathematics Without Heading to University&lt;p&gt;I wonder if it&amp;#x27;s even possible. Learning maths requires much work, time and dedication. Doing so alone must be very difficult.&lt;p&gt;There are several things universities provide that are hard to replicate alone: a degree, which gives you access to a job,  motivation, learning environment, and &amp;quot;peace of mind&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;What I mean by peace of mind is that, when you&amp;#x27;re a student, your job is to study, that&amp;#x27;s what you&amp;#x27;re expected to do and normally your degree will give you access to a job (esp. if your university is reputable).&lt;p&gt;Now suppose someone learns advanced maths on their own. There&amp;#x27;s a huge opportunity cost. Not only it takes a lot of time, and the few lucrative jobs that make use of maths are in finance. I suspect financial institutions are very conservative and rarely recruit someone without a proper academic background.&lt;p&gt;An other thing when learning things alone, is that your job is twofold. You must be teacher and student at the same time. You need to find the material, impose yourself some pacing, decide when it&amp;#x27;s ok to move on etc... It may be ok when you want to learn a new technique in a field you already know, but something as broad as &amp;quot;learning advanced mathematics&amp;quot; seems impossible.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sixo</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t mean to be rude by saying this, but the truly-difficult advanced math - the stuff that&amp;#x27;s really hard to build an understanding of by yourself, because it&amp;#x27;s fairly distantly separated from any obvious applications or anything you&amp;#x27;d readily have experience with, and heavily obfuscated (to newcomers) by the notation and pedantic proof-focused thoroughness (appropriate for academic math, less so for applications) - starts a few courses &lt;i&gt;after&lt;/i&gt; Diff eq.</text></comment>
<story><title>How to Learn Advanced Mathematics Without Heading to University – Part 3</title><url>https://www.quantstart.com/articles/How-to-Learn-Advanced-Mathematics-Without-Heading-to-University-Part-3</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mungoid</author><text>I really hope this doesn&amp;#x27;t come across as brash. I don&amp;#x27;t mean it to, but I must disagree with your assertions (In my case at least). Learning advanced mathematics without university is completely possible. Because it is at your own learning pace. Not one of a University.&lt;p&gt;I graduated several years ago with a BS in Computer Science, with a Focus on Networking. And during that time, I held 3 part time jobs while also being a math tutor. Almost none of the math I use today as a physics developer was learned from schools. I also never had that piece of mind you mentioned, because I was constantly juggling several things at once while going to school. My knowledge of advanced mathematics at the time of my graduation was pretty non existent. I think the most advanced math I had was Algebra 2 or something like that, and the Professors just basically read verbatim from the book.&lt;p&gt;A few years after Uni, I started teaching myself Calc, Trig, Vector maths, Diff Eq and Physics strictly from what I have found on various sites, software and books. Because of that, I ended up getting a physics simulation developer position at a software company.  Because in my companies view, being able to teach yourself all that math is much more impressive than being taught from a University.&lt;p&gt;I hated math during High School and College, but since then, I have found that I absolutely love math, and I will never stop trying to learn or do new things. My degree was two small lines on my CV, while about 50% of what I had on my CV was all learned on my free time, by myself.&lt;p&gt;So learning math without a College or University is totally possible, and in my situation, worked way better. Sites like Khan Academy, Wolfram, Youtube, etc. all give you the resources and leave it up to you to progress at your own pace, for free.</text></item><item><author>yodsanklai</author><text>&amp;gt; How to Learn Advanced Mathematics Without Heading to University&lt;p&gt;I wonder if it&amp;#x27;s even possible. Learning maths requires much work, time and dedication. Doing so alone must be very difficult.&lt;p&gt;There are several things universities provide that are hard to replicate alone: a degree, which gives you access to a job,  motivation, learning environment, and &amp;quot;peace of mind&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;What I mean by peace of mind is that, when you&amp;#x27;re a student, your job is to study, that&amp;#x27;s what you&amp;#x27;re expected to do and normally your degree will give you access to a job (esp. if your university is reputable).&lt;p&gt;Now suppose someone learns advanced maths on their own. There&amp;#x27;s a huge opportunity cost. Not only it takes a lot of time, and the few lucrative jobs that make use of maths are in finance. I suspect financial institutions are very conservative and rarely recruit someone without a proper academic background.&lt;p&gt;An other thing when learning things alone, is that your job is twofold. You must be teacher and student at the same time. You need to find the material, impose yourself some pacing, decide when it&amp;#x27;s ok to move on etc... It may be ok when you want to learn a new technique in a field you already know, but something as broad as &amp;quot;learning advanced mathematics&amp;quot; seems impossible.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>aluhut</author><text>I wish I could make the jump again. When I was a kid, I loved Math. I even got one of this badges that were so popular in my east block country, for being the best kid in Math for my whole year group. Then we moved to Germany. Math level was far below mine, I got bored, started to do other stuff and lost it when they overtook me. Growing up and work did the rest. I lost it. When I had&amp;#x2F;have to do some math I&amp;#x27;m doing what is needed but this creative spark you need is gone. Now I find it very complicated to get even into the syntax...I fix most of my problem through the net. It&amp;#x27;s like losing a friend whose face you&amp;#x27;ve already forgotten.</text></comment>