No, but they could be useful if you are going for the full time path.. or going to big ads agency etcetera,
if you decided to be a creativepreneur or start up your own design brand etc, roll in the clients and jobs on your own then you only need a very good portfolio to do that

I've been on my own since 2017 and rolled in couple big brands client they don't even ask about my 'degree' or which uni I'm from, not a single one
but I've a pretty strong portfolio



you definitely can, lots of free resources on youtube or deviantart, search them up

This post has been edited by Gmruleme: Dec 7 2020, 11:07 PM

by the way, im not discouraging you to be a designer but it could be pretty tough.
Software engineer seems like a pretty good course if you're the type of person who enjoy executing task logically, money's not bad too when u go into industry full time..

just to let you know that you can also keep design as a hobby or interest, while pursue software engineering full time, who knows one day you could combine both

This post has been edited by Gmruleme: Dec 7 2020, 11:09 PM