http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29...-poker-905794/

I know it's been discussed a ton everywhere, but always interesting to hear ppl's stories so I thought I would cross post it over here and see some responses. Respond or not no biggy.

i did not...i graduated, and now have a piece of paper saying i went to classes and learned things


btw, i'm a geology major...so send all of your rock/earth related questions this way

 

Originally Posted by Cmoney3

not me. College grad here. dropping out of college to play poker is a horrible idea

well only like 2-3 % of people who play poker are good enough to be doing it for a living....and of those 2-3 % about 75 % of them just suck at the nonpoker aspect of it so yeah ur obviously right...

i dropped out of college like 3 years ago when i actually wasnt good enough to do it full time but now i am and kinda wanna go back but it would be fiscally irresponsible for me to go to college for the next prolly 2 years.....i talked to my parents about going back in the spring and the first thing that camme out of there mouth was "how will this affect ur poker playing hours/the money ur making" boy times sure have changed in my household

i'm doing both. School is a decent outlet for this game, especially when you suck like I do. I could fathom taking off a semester or two and playing poker full time but I couldn't fathom dropping out altogether when the swings in this game are brutal. You'd have to have some serious $ saved up in order to make this your career.

I graduated but really didn't want to go work for some corp so I played full time with pretty much no br. It worked out somehow.

 

Originally Posted by bef99hwk

Why did you choose this major? What do you plan on doing with this later in life? (That's asked as a serious question...not in any way saying it's a useless major, poking fun, etc).

Also, do ppl who graduate plan on ever using this, or just the usual, "get as rich as you can as fast as you can from poker, invest/run a business/get real estate?"

legit questions. i picked it cause i thought rocks were cool liked them when i was a kid and then took some intro classes and was interested in that stuff. science is cool, and geology is like not a science you always hear about, yet it applies to everyday life, and you can see it everywhere just by looking out the window...oh and the major/department seemed real chill and relaxed (also, i'm the only person i know that went on like 6 field trips/semester in college...how awesome is that). as far as what you can do with a geology major...work for oil companies. that's where all the money is, moving out to texas or somewhere west where they do all the drilling, gulf coast etc. if i wanted to stay on the east coast i could get a job working for the state or county doing different types of surveying type stuff...also a lot of construction companies and stuff like that usually hire a geologist or two to check out land before they build on it or blast into it, that kind of stuff...


tbh...i'll probably never use my degree for anything. if poker doesn't work out or if i get bored or w/e of it in a few years i'll probably go into some kind of business or sales field


edit: i don't really have a plan. i'm not trying to 'get rich quick' or anything like that. i'm saving to buy a house right now, and would really like to get one totally paid off in the next year or two. after that, i have no idea...i've always wanted to start a business or own a store or something like that...but idk if that's a reality or not, we'll have to just wait and see

poker made me fail/get suspended from college, does that count?

Now i play, make some $, don't need part-time job. But will be going back to school in the Spring. Gl me, 6 year plan

I am a 5th year accounting major at penn state's main campus and I am going through a time in my life where I really do not know what I want in life and have no real direction. I have always been intrigued by poker and started out my senior year of high school just being a huge degen. I have always screwed around online just going through the cycle of winning and losing money throughout college but it was a hobby I really enjoyed. Penn State actually has a ton of kids who have had success from online poker and some of them are looking to pursue poker professionally while others are looking to settle down and find real jobs. About a year and a half ago I got backed by a friend of mine who is a cash game player and started playing small and mid stakes mtts but was still focused on my academics and was heavily involved in school organizations so I never put in any serious volume (I am actually still a Resident Assistant which pays for my meal plan and my dorm room). This past summer I decided not to take an accounting/business internship and wanted to take my shot at grinding full-time and see if I actually could make any money playing online mtts. I was happy with my results and made way more money grinding mid-stakes mtts than I would have interning at a Big 4 accounting firm in New York City and being miserable waking up every morning at 6am and having to be owned by the man.
It has now been about 3 months since I have been thrown into the fire of high stakes mtts (320 fos and under, 50c and 30r and under) and I have not really had any massive scores but this has been over a tiny sample size since I only play about 3-4 times a week. Several of my friends have helped me improve my game tremendously and have allowed me to believe that I can actually make a run at making some noise in the high stakes mtts. However I cannot help but be realistic with myself and think that I am pushing very tiny edges and chasing EV that is unattainable. Along with the fact that I will have a resume gap, not have health insurance, not be taken seriously by my peers outside of poker, and be questioned by my family members, I am not sure if the opportunity cost is there for me to seriously pursue online poker for a living. I have stopped going to my classes, plan on quitting my Resident Assistant job (since the amount I am being compensated is nowhere near close to how much I am making from poker), and am contemplating taking next semester off from school to really focus on getting better at poker. I know that this will definitely not go well with my parents but I am 22 years old and feel I have the right to make my own life decisions. Anyways this rant has gotten pretty long so I just wanted to see what people had to say about my current situation. Thanks in advance for reading and responding all.

Poker made me want to hurry up and finish school. I graduated w a degree in Accounting but always hated it. I never pushed myself as hard as I should have and didn't get the best grades and finished w like a 2.8 gpa. 99% of my classmates were arrogant douchebags who thought their shit didn't stink but were all very bright people. It was pretty miserable spending years around these people when you know that deep down you cannot stand what you are doing. After trying to get an internship over 2 years contacting nearly 200 small business and accounting firms my soph and jr years, I realized that I wasn't going to get one because my grades/resume weren't up to par w the rest of my brainiac classmates. All the while I was grinding all day and night after classes bc I loved poker. I never, ever thought I'd play full time til the last year of school. After finally realizing that I had no job plans or anything lined up at all after school, I began to focus more on poker as a job. My entire college career my occupation field had been steadily growing with salary increases, but when I went to get a job, every firm was saturated with young recruits. I think I finally realized I was done w school and accounting when I failed my very last class to graduate. I had skipped probably 2/3 of classes and failed because of it. I pleaded w my professor to just let me have a D so I could graduate and just leave. Obviously, the professor had to make a point to me and make me retake it. So instead of finishing the semester and my college career, I was forced to stay back, take the same course over 2 weeks, and skip several of the first WSOP events of the summer (2009). I locked myself up for 2 weeks, studied hard, and binked a B in my last class of college. My last final was on a Tuesday at 3:00 PM. I was on a red eye that night to Vegas and stayed for 6 weeks during the series.

This def just turned into a life rant but that's a very short cliffs version of how I went through college and into poker. I never dropped out, but had I been at that point in my poker career 2 years earlier, there's a good chance I would have tried to drop out. I could probably write a pretty long story of how I turned from a pretty focused young guy wanting to go into business to being more focused on what made me happy and to go for that. While I would never recommend someone dropping out of school to play poker, I would strongly encourage someone to do everything in their power to do what it is that makes the the most happy.

POW!

They should just start offering poker degrees from all major colleges. Then I would go back.

I dropped out of high school

I didnt drop out of college to play poker but i dropped out of 11th grade to play poker

 

Originally Posted by FatsoFat6969

I graduated college and almost have finished my masters in business.. I honestly believe that its a huge mistake for poker players to drop out of college.. too much real life experience (social skills, independence) etc.. are lost when ppl don't finish college imo

Mentioned this before in another thread. I stopped playing full time as a 5-10 and 10-20 reg at a time when my results where at their highest point and the games were probably playing lower than 1-2 today.
I took a chunk of money out and completed an MBA, my friends flamed me at the time but it was probably a smart move because I know I couldnt beat the same games today at for the same return as my salary. It was tough in the first year post MBA working 80 hour weeks knowing that a good 1-2 grinder could grind out my salary in 6 months but 7 years later and in retrospect it was the right move to go back to school.

 

Originally Posted by HITTHEPANDA

i haven't started college yet after finishing high school, should I?

Yeah man go to college. It will be the time of your life. You have the rest of your life to play poker and college isn't as fun when your older. Not to mention you can learn something too.

 

Originally Posted by arsenal46

how is getting kicked out of school then stumbling upon poker in any way close to the same thing as consciously choosing poker over continuing a college education?

i dropped out to play poker cause i hated school and everytime i was in class i was thinking of the opportunity cost i was losing by sitting through classes that didnt interest me at all. not to mention i feel like college degrees are overrated by society to begin with especially nowadays when degress dont mean a whole lot in regards to getting a job. the lifestyle was perfect for me being a single 20 yr old and i was making enough money that my parents were totally cool with it. i wouldnt change anything in hindsight even after being on both sides of the coin in terms of big upswings and big downswings. school is always there in the future if i ever decide to go back

read my fkin post, wouldve gone back and be in school right now if I wasnt playing poker