[Edu-sig] Computer science without all that "heavy math" stuff...?

[Alan Gauld]

>> What he is really lamenting is the lack of a computer 
>> engineering discipline.  
>I disagree that this is what the author is stating.  

Sorry, I dodn't mean thats what he was statiing I 
meant that was the underlying lack at which he was 
intimating. In other words he is asking CS to teach 
something that is inappropriate for a science. It 
would however be appropriate for an engineering 
degree.

> I know people who majored in Chemical Engineering 
> and they had to take differential equations, ...

Absolutely, and that's still approprioate for an 
IT/Computer engineering degree. I strongly believe 
that. I don't think the author undestood the 
inevitably mathematical nature of computer 
engineering (or of any form of engineering for 
that matter!) but leaving the math issue aside I 
do think he is write to highlight the fairly 
narrow view of computing that seems to be taken
by CS courses - namely programming! 

> He asserts that because 95% of "IT jobs" don't 
> require them that they should not be required 
> of a CS major.  

Yes, and that I don't agree with. I think he, like
many lay people, doesn't appreciate what any scientific 
or engineering degree is about in that respect. 

>If you want to learn how to do a job in the IT field, 
> you should go to a technical school.  

Sorry, that doesn't make sense. Most programmers come 
from a CS degree background(at least herabouts they do)
and programming is part of the IT field. The problem 
is that IT has moved on from a cottage industry where
everyone knew everything to a huge field with many 
specialisms. The difficulty is that the diversity is 
not mirrored in CS courses which are still largely 
focussed on software development as if that was all 
computing was about.

> java weenies and NT administrators 

I do find this a tad offensive to the many people 
involved in the IT industry who are not programmers.
Computing operations is a big and complex business
which requires a broad and deep knowledge of computers, networks and how they
operate and interact 
- something of which most graduate programmers 
are woefully ignorant and it shows up in the 
non-scaleable, unmaintainable code that they produce!

> whined about how they didn't have a class in 
> <insert popular language>, or they had to take 
> "useless" classes in <insert theory>.

That happens on any course but the concern that I 
have here is that many CS courses are caving in 
to that by focussing purely on the commercial 
demands without providing the theory. We need both!

> I think the problem is not the universities 
> themselves, but rather the light with which 
> universities and technical colleges are viewed.  

I think thers a bit of that, but I also believe 
that the CS departments are too slow to broaden 
the range of computing subjects they teach.

Alan G