I really was going to keep my mouth shut on this topic, but I just can't help myself; the topic is stuck in my brain and I have to get it out through my fingers.
This discussion has ranged from how CS is taught to the grand structure of society, touching on whether or not a college education is worthwhile, the place of the programmer in society and the company, choice of career, and the issues of globalization. Let me offer first a link that I think is an actual contribution to the discussion; the rest I'll let you judge for yourself :-). First the CS education, then the larger issue, including a few embryonic thoughts about apprenticeship.
On how to teach CS, let me point out that this issue has received attention at the highest levels. The ACM issues guidelines on curricula for:
- computer science
- computer engineering
- information systems
- software engineering
- associate degree programs
- K-12
and most have been revised since 2000. The CS undergrad curriculum recommends, for example, a core of only 18 lecture hours on operating systems, out of a total of 280 or so core hours. In a U.S. research university, that would roughly represent the sophomore-junior content of a CS degree, and would probably roughly be doubled in the senior year to a total of perhaps 560 hours of lecture and maybe three times that in homework, a couple of thousand hours on CS alone, ignoring math, other sciences and engineering, humanities and social sciences. In other types of advanced learning institution, the amount could be substantially less or quite a bit more.
Craig Partridge mentioned a workload for students that amounted to about 600 lines of code a week for the term. I would hope that master's students in CS would be able to work at that rate, but that's clearly too much to expect of first-year programming students. The ACM curriculum above includes a several-page discussion of the importance of teaching programming v. principles, which I won't go into here, but I highly recommend reading it.
(If you're keeping score on the anecdotal topics mentioned so far in this conversation, version control probably makes the core curriculum, automata and shared libraries are in the supplementary curriculum. A couple of lectures on privacy, intellectual property and other aspects of computers in society seems like a positive thing.)
I'm not involved in the curriculum effort, but I suspect they are under more or less constant revision. In recent years, some universities have been adding programs in game design, bioinformatics, business/technology dual majors. One can certainly argue that the overall CS curriculum is in flux and varies across the country (and around the world), but beyond that it's difficult to generalize.
The above I'm fairly confident is a positive contribution to the discussion. From here down, I'll let you form your own opinion. Much of what I would write Karl Auerbach has already written, and far more succinctly and eloquently than I seem to be capable of. But let me offer a twist or two, and go a step farther.
Zach and other writers made several major points:
I think all of these points except #3 are debatable. Certainly the discussion so far has not made a distinction between #1 & #2. I'm not really going to discuss most of these points directly, but they form the undercurrent in what follows.
For millenia, kids were apprenticed to a profession at an early age. We still have this, after a form. LeBron James, Michelle Wie, the Magnificent Seven (remember them?), and all pro go players and musicians took up their vocations essentially full time well before what we consider "working age". Many of us starting hacking at a similar age, but maybe we need formal extracurricular mentoring and a similar support system? A way for kids to "go pro" earlier and still get the coaching they need? Virtuosos almost all spend 20-40 hours a week at it from the age of fourteen or earlier, why should programming be any different?
I've heard people say, "Oh, who needs college?" But I'm a fan of the modern apprenticeship -- the Western liberal arts college degree. It's your chance to read Wilde, Plath, Joyce, Thoreau, the Federalist Papers; learn a foreign language (okay, I flunked German), play on the basketball team, take up scuba diving; study how the encroachment of the modern world is impacting the Mbuti pygmies and the Navajo; maybe do a year abroad (I wish I had). Personally -- call me a science chauvinist -- I think anyone who claims to have a well-rounded education should be able to talk intelligently about relativity (special, at least) and quantum theory, arguably the two most important (and misunderstood) discoveries of the twentieth century (fans of the nature of the chemical bond, the structure of DNA, the Big Bang and plate tectonics all have a case, though). (On a tangent, let me recommend Alan Lightman's The Discoveries and Richard Muller's course titled "Physics for Future Presidents".)
For most people, college will be the broadest point of your life. For many -- including a particular skinny sixteen-year-old from southern West Virginia -- it's your first extended contact with people from other parts of the country and the world, and with the breadth and wealth of the world of ideas. Take time to hang out with the music majors (okay, Caltech doesn't have any of those, but it does have English majors). Consider a career in astronomy or geology instead of hacking. Trust me, once you're in a company and writing code, the world gets a whole lot narrower, even if you're working shoulder to shoulder with people from China, India and Finland.
If you're of pragmatic bent and recoil in horror at the thought of whiling away your days trying to decipher Joyce and Eliot rather than starting that get-rich-quick Internet business, well, I have trouble imagining that anyone can be effective at building large-scale computer systems without some background in probability. Probability requires at least basic calculus, and if we can get you as far as queueing theory, it will change the way you think about systems problems. If you are interested in image or audio processing, you need linear algebra and Fourier transforms, and the basics of amplifiers and RC circuits won't hurt; if you're in communications, antenna design and wave guides help; if you write firmware, you gotta understand what the funny lines on a signal analyzer mean. And I have yet to meet the engineer (myself included) whose writing and presentation skills need no polishing. Note that none of that is included in the 560 lecture hours mentioned above, but I wouldn't trade any of it for another hour hacking code.
Is it possible to learn all of this without going to college? Of course! Two of the brightest people I know are extremely well-rounded, and neither finished college. Did it hurt their careers? Probably in a minor way. Are they successful anyway? Very. (And no, neither is named Gates or Jobs). If you're smart, disciplined, get a good break and a good mentor, you can do it. But for most people, the direction and semi-structure (compared to high school) of a university will bring them needed breadth, depth, and maturity -- and a higher probability of success in life. (No guarantees, though!)
It's also true that the university environment as currently constructed is not perfect for everyone. But for many people, bailing out with the excuse, "I wasn't learning anything anyway," is a true statement that says as much about them as it does about the system.
And lest you think I'm in favor of stuffing people's heads with facts but not teaching them to solve problems, let me reassure you: I tell my students that the only thing they *must* learn in college is how to think, everything else is optional. While I do believe there is a core curriculum I wish they would learn, four years is a short time and a focus on any given technology is extraordinarily short-sighted when planning for a forty- to sixty-year career.
By now I've no doubt convinced you that I'm an unrepentant ivory-tower academic. However, I've spent about half my career to date in industry. Was I well-prepared when I came out of school? Let's say I was still a work in progress, and I owe more to a mentor and friend named Wook than any professor. Certainly I have regrets, the largest of which is not taking Jim Blinn's graphics class, but most of them are due to my own shortcomings. But because I was taught how to learn and how to work hard, I have followed up with enormous amounts of learning, and at every step of the learning process I felt that my time at Caltech helped.
From here, I was going to springboard into the place of the programmer in society and globalization, but this is way too long already. Let me thank you for reading this far, and finish with four thoughts:
Craig Partridge mentioned a workload for students that amounted to about 600 lines of code a week for the term. I would hope that master's students in CS would be able to work at that rate, but that's clearly too much to expect of first-year programming students. The ACM curriculum above includes a several-page discussion of the importance of teaching programming v. principles, which I won't go into here, but I highly recommend reading it.
(If you're keeping score on the anecdotal topics mentioned so far in this conversation, version control probably makes the core curriculum, automata and shared libraries are in the supplementary curriculum. A couple of lectures on privacy, intellectual property and other aspects of computers in society seems like a positive thing.)
I'm not involved in the curriculum effort, but I suspect they are under more or less constant revision. In recent years, some universities have been adding programs in game design, bioinformatics, business/technology dual majors. One can certainly argue that the overall CS curriculum is in flux and varies across the country (and around the world), but beyond that it's difficult to generalize.
The above I'm fairly confident is a positive contribution to the discussion. From here down, I'll let you form your own opinion. Much of what I would write Karl Auerbach has already written, and far more succinctly and eloquently than I seem to be capable of. But let me offer a twist or two, and go a step farther.
Zach and other writers made several major points:
- The undergrad CS curriculum at many colleges/universities is inadequate.
- The undergrad CS curriculum at many colleges/universities is poorly taught.
- Students arrive with differing backgrounds and ability levels, and consequently come away with different learning experiences and knowledge.
- A. It's possible to pick up "on the street" what you need to know to do most jobs in a Silicon Valley startup.
- B. Promotion at major research universities forces a focus on research rather than teaching.
- C. CS as a major is not very attractive right now, for a variety of reasons, culminating in "programmers are treated like dirt in companies, and with all the jobs being exported to India, it's a bad career choice anyway".
I think all of these points except #3 are debatable. Certainly the discussion so far has not made a distinction between #1 & #2. I'm not really going to discuss most of these points directly, but they form the undercurrent in what follows.
For millenia, kids were apprenticed to a profession at an early age. We still have this, after a form. LeBron James, Michelle Wie, the Magnificent Seven (remember them?), and all pro go players and musicians took up their vocations essentially full time well before what we consider "working age". Many of us starting hacking at a similar age, but maybe we need formal extracurricular mentoring and a similar support system? A way for kids to "go pro" earlier and still get the coaching they need? Virtuosos almost all spend 20-40 hours a week at it from the age of fourteen or earlier, why should programming be any different?
I've heard people say, "Oh, who needs college?" But I'm a fan of the modern apprenticeship -- the Western liberal arts college degree. It's your chance to read Wilde, Plath, Joyce, Thoreau, the Federalist Papers; learn a foreign language (okay, I flunked German), play on the basketball team, take up scuba diving; study how the encroachment of the modern world is impacting the Mbuti pygmies and the Navajo; maybe do a year abroad (I wish I had). Personally -- call me a science chauvinist -- I think anyone who claims to have a well-rounded education should be able to talk intelligently about relativity (special, at least) and quantum theory, arguably the two most important (and misunderstood) discoveries of the twentieth century (fans of the nature of the chemical bond, the structure of DNA, the Big Bang and plate tectonics all have a case, though). (On a tangent, let me recommend Alan Lightman's The Discoveries and Richard Muller's course titled "Physics for Future Presidents".)
For most people, college will be the broadest point of your life. For many -- including a particular skinny sixteen-year-old from southern West Virginia -- it's your first extended contact with people from other parts of the country and the world, and with the breadth and wealth of the world of ideas. Take time to hang out with the music majors (okay, Caltech doesn't have any of those, but it does have English majors). Consider a career in astronomy or geology instead of hacking. Trust me, once you're in a company and writing code, the world gets a whole lot narrower, even if you're working shoulder to shoulder with people from China, India and Finland.
If you're of pragmatic bent and recoil in horror at the thought of whiling away your days trying to decipher Joyce and Eliot rather than starting that get-rich-quick Internet business, well, I have trouble imagining that anyone can be effective at building large-scale computer systems without some background in probability. Probability requires at least basic calculus, and if we can get you as far as queueing theory, it will change the way you think about systems problems. If you are interested in image or audio processing, you need linear algebra and Fourier transforms, and the basics of amplifiers and RC circuits won't hurt; if you're in communications, antenna design and wave guides help; if you write firmware, you gotta understand what the funny lines on a signal analyzer mean. And I have yet to meet the engineer (myself included) whose writing and presentation skills need no polishing. Note that none of that is included in the 560 lecture hours mentioned above, but I wouldn't trade any of it for another hour hacking code.
Is it possible to learn all of this without going to college? Of course! Two of the brightest people I know are extremely well-rounded, and neither finished college. Did it hurt their careers? Probably in a minor way. Are they successful anyway? Very. (And no, neither is named Gates or Jobs). If you're smart, disciplined, get a good break and a good mentor, you can do it. But for most people, the direction and semi-structure (compared to high school) of a university will bring them needed breadth, depth, and maturity -- and a higher probability of success in life. (No guarantees, though!)
It's also true that the university environment as currently constructed is not perfect for everyone. But for many people, bailing out with the excuse, "I wasn't learning anything anyway," is a true statement that says as much about them as it does about the system.
And lest you think I'm in favor of stuffing people's heads with facts but not teaching them to solve problems, let me reassure you: I tell my students that the only thing they *must* learn in college is how to think, everything else is optional. While I do believe there is a core curriculum I wish they would learn, four years is a short time and a focus on any given technology is extraordinarily short-sighted when planning for a forty- to sixty-year career.
By now I've no doubt convinced you that I'm an unrepentant ivory-tower academic. However, I've spent about half my career to date in industry. Was I well-prepared when I came out of school? Let's say I was still a work in progress, and I owe more to a mentor and friend named Wook than any professor. Certainly I have regrets, the largest of which is not taking Jim Blinn's graphics class, but most of them are due to my own shortcomings. But because I was taught how to learn and how to work hard, I have followed up with enormous amounts of learning, and at every step of the learning process I felt that my time at Caltech helped.
From here, I was going to springboard into the place of the programmer in society and globalization, but this is way too long already. Let me thank you for reading this far, and finish with four thoughts:
- The Western liberal arts CS degree, properly taught and learned, has long-lasting value. The key question is, is it worth a thousand bucks a week for four years?
- Engineers are paid to solve problems, not to write code. Demonstrate an ability to learn about the problem domain in which you are working, and your prospects improve; breadth and depth help.
- What is it that makes Code Monkey such a pathetic figure? The fact that he's not in control of his own destiny. If you want that control (and, IMO, if you want a date), being articulate and well-rounded is the path to leadership.
- Finally, keying on that last word, the job of a university is to provide productive members of society. You should graduate knowing not just a handful of technical facts, but how you can find the best role for yourself, where "best" makes you happy, earns you a buck or two, and allows you to contribute to the greater good.
Do we accomplish all of this in four years? Nah. Do we start students on the right path? Some of them. Should we figure out how to do our best for more of them? You betcha. Are professors perfect, giants striding the Earth before whom all should bow? No way. They're taught to swagger, but if they haven't humbled deep down by their own learning experience, they haven't been paying attention.
One thing's for sure, though: the development of the next generation of leaders, both in technology and society, is far too important to be left to what disaffected teenagers pick up surfing the blogs of disaffected, semi-literate, technical and political ideologues.
One thing's for sure, though: the development of the next generation of leaders, both in technology and society, is far too important to be left to what disaffected teenagers pick up surfing the blogs of disaffected, semi-literate, technical and political ideologues.
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