On Tue, 2010-10-05 at 08:35 -0700, Mark Fortner wrote: [ . . . ] > The curriculum hadn't really changed in the 20 years since I'd been in > school. They had added Java to the curriculum but just covered basic > syntax, didn't cover the libraries, and all of the assignments had to > be done with notepad and the command line. A friend of mine said that > the professors are more interested in their own research than keeping > current with the latest developments. And I suppose I agree with that > assessment.
This is both true and not the whole story. The issue is really quite complex but also straightforward! CS research that involves programming has that done by the PhD students and RAs. The staff rarely do much programming themselves. Moreover, governments are making harder and harder to do interesting CS research. Furthermore there is an element of the people who would make good programming course staff not staying in academia -- why teach when you can do. I for one am never going to mark another exam script, it is too boring and depressing. Thus I have no possible future in academia. I suspect there are similar reasons for anyone who can actually program from entering or re-entering academia. Thus you have a "self-selecting" set of academics who can't do, they can only teach. As they cannot do, they don't keep up to date. So the cycles form and pain begins. > > The upshot of all of this was that they were graduating kids that > weren't qualified for entry-level jobs. You need to know enough of > the basics to be able to create a web app, and know how to use a > version control system, in addition to the basics of problem analysis > and design and working on a team. > Also employers have unreasonable expectations of new graduates. University courses are not training courses they are education courses. In all professions other than software development, new graduates have to do two or three of further training before they are qualified. In computing brand new graduates are expected to be as good as 10 year veterans. > A few months after talking with my friend about the curriculum, I was > asked to help design a computational biology curriculum. I was one of > the few with industry experience, so I knew what would be required of > graduates. The only problem was that the creation of a new curriculum > requires years to go through the approval process, so it was likely to > be out of date by the time it was actually put into use. I guess that > explains the inertia when it comes to the curriculum. Validation is a lengthy process, but it is a poor set of staff who end up constraining themselves overly by the results. Curriculum should and should be expected to evolve appropriately within the framework of the validation. -- Russel. ============================================================================= Dr Russel Winder t: +44 20 7585 2200 voip: sip:[email protected] 41 Buckmaster Road m: +44 7770 465 077 xmpp: [email protected] London SW11 1EN, UK w: www.russel.org.uk skype: russel_winder
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