What do Quentin Tarantino, Steven Soderbergh, Robert Rodriguez, Richard Linklater, Spike Jonze and Steven Spielberg have in common? Answer: they did not attend film school. El Mariachi, Rodríguez’s breakout film, was filmed so he could understand how, a story he describes in his book Unmanned Rebel.

Unlike many races, you don’t need a specific qualification to start. Cinema is not medicine: you don’t have to have a degree or a diploma in anything.

A number of location managers and assistant directors actually say they like production assistants who haven’t been to film school, mainly because they are the most interested in learning and because they understand that they don’t know anything. Many times film school graduates think they know almost everything, and that makes them not seek advice, and that makes them screw it up.

The short answer is that you don’t need to go to film school to get a job in the film industry.

For film production, and PAs in particular, the best meaningful skill is the ability to get things done and done well. You are continually judged on your ability to help move production forward and on whether you can solve problems. Your past experience has nothing to do with it, if someone trusts you they will choose you, end of story. Having worked on movies for college with a few other students doesn’t mean you can work on a big professional set with a lot of people.

That’s not to say that film school is a waste of time, far from it. Getting a career depends on who you know and while you’re in film school, you get to know a lot of people. Some production companies also have internship agreements with educational institutions. If you can get an internship, it’s a very beneficial way to start a full-time career. Also, you gain knowledge of what goes into making a movie, something you would otherwise have to learn on your own. That can be a daunting task, and the structure that comes with a course can help people who aren’t good at self-motivated learning.

So, in short, film school comes at a high price and you can skip it if you want a job in the film industry. It has great networking possibilities, but also spending those years meeting, greeting and working!