HN user
Agreed. Some is better than none, and fugly code is better than no code. As long as you have a clear mention that you're working to improve the code's quality, most (competent) people should respect that.
This is a shameless self-plug, but it's relevant to tab hoarding. A while back I created a Chrome extension called Tab Flow to deal with my own troubles with this. Grab it from the Chrome store and feel free to hit me up with feedback/suggestions if you can think of a case it doesn't cover.
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tab-flow/pfhnncnie...
I've been wondering along the same lines, though my situation's a little different. I'm employed full time at a software company, and I'm about 70-80% of the way through my bachelor degree. I've discussed it with a couple of people in the company who are in higher positions than I am, and they've both said that it's good to have it, just for the sake of having it. Managers (or HR) use it as a checkbox - a quick way of filtering out applicants. I was told the following by my manager yesterday: "If I'm looking at you and someone with the same skills, but he has a bachelor degree, I'm going to hire him. He's proven that he can stick with it, and he gets the checkbox ticked."
Dude, that's clean and elegant. Roughly how much work went into that? I'd love to snag a copy of it if you're willing to open source it.