SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, has released the highly anticipated report "Retention in Computer Science Undergraduate Programs in the U.S.: Data Challenges and Promising Interventions"(pdf)
[...] The computing field is experiencing exponential growth, both in terms of current and projected job openings, as well as students majoring in computer science (CS). Recently, the U.S. Department of Labor projected that between 2008 and 2018, ¼ million computing jobs opened in the U.S. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, however, in 2015-2016 only 64,405 students received computer science degrees. the main source of preparation for these jobs. Additionally, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that employment in computer and information technology occupations is expected to grow by 13% in the next decade.
The interest in computing is also reflected in the numbers of incoming students pursuing Bachelor degrees in computing. A report by the Computing Research Association (CRA) highlights that US undergraduate enrollment in computer science is higher today than at any other time. Additionally, the CRA report outlines a 185% increase in CS undergraduates at large institutions since 2006, and a 216% increase of CS majors at smaller institutions during the same period.
Despite these trends, the challenge of retaining more women and people from underrepresented minorities (African-American, Hispanic, Native American) has been a persistent challenge in the field for decades. According to the National Science Foundation's Engineering and Science Indicators for 2016, despite the fact that women earned 50% of the Bachelor degrees in science and engineering, they accounted for only 17.9% of Bachelor degrees in the computing sciences. Additionally, data from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) shows that for CS Bachelor degrees granted at doctoral-granting institutions in 2015, only 8.4% of degree recipients were Latino and only 4.3% were African-American.
[...] it is an economic imperative for the United States to have a large and diverse tech workforce. Better solutions are developed by teams with a diversity of people and perspectives. Retention in college computing programs is foundational because if we are not attracting and retaining a diverse population of students in Computer Science programs during the students' academic careers, we will not see a diverse workforce in computing emerge.
The article enumerates several areas of interest:
- Data Collection and Analysis
- Promising Interventions
- Give Students a Better Understanding of CS
- Meet Students' Varied Backgrounds
- Increase Helpful Collaboration
- Increase Sense of Belonging and Build a Safe Learning Culture
The report concludes by emphasizing that there is no silver bullet than can transform an institution into an inclusive and equitable learning environment for all students, and that the work to create an inclusive environment is not a temporary effort. The ACM Education Board Retention Committee notes that because these constructs change very slowly, issues of equity will continue to be pressing in all fields -- including computing -- and therefore will require continued vigilance and determined effort.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 04 2018, @09:48PM (5 children)
Most of these so-called "CS" jobs are just basic business logic to automate someone's workflow.
Adolescent boys (and maybe a few girls) can pick up this skill almost naturally just by playing around with computers, and can do for society what society needs without ever really understanding anything that CS departments find valuable.
I know. I know. It's hard to hear, but that's the truth.
Plumbers earn a lot, and yet most of them don't even know why they do certain things. That's the way of the world; just get it working.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 04 2018, @10:28PM
I wish I was a plumber. I didn't want to get my hands dirty, and here I am with PHP... FML.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @12:48AM (3 children)
What kind of jobs do people with CS degrees get, and what is their work like?
I'm an EE and with one notable exception, every single person I've worked with knows how to program, in any language you put in front of them. Most know a lot about things like data structures and some even know about Big O notation, although the types of software that you usually write as an engineer is for simulation testing or a few dozen lines of code to control your piece of the widget.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @01:06AM (2 children)
Programming is the easy part. Most CS students where I'm from are expected to pick that up as a consequence of personal study while they deal with questions such as memory models and error handling philosophies.
A real CS guy should be an architect of cutting-edge systems, not a codemonkey punching the Perl button for his next caffeine shot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05 2018, @08:13AM (1 child)
Yeah, but is this what most CS graduates do? How many cutting edge systems are there? I've been involved in the design maybe a dozen or so systems, all of which is boilerplate, or at least data sheet implementation. If you want more than this, you're probably working for samsung or apple on chip design and even then on a small team of a dozen or so.
(Score: 2) by arslan on Wednesday December 05 2018, @11:05PM
The code cutting stuff is a means to an end. Its the start to get to that architect of cutting edge systems. Getting a CS degree doesn't just land you an architects job and rightfully so. One of implicit reason you want to start at the bottom is to also learn about the problem domain, be it banking, real-estate, food & beverage, etc. A good architect understand their domain - a CS degree doesn't teach you that. Even in a very technical/sciency domain like aeronautics or pharma you really need to learn the domain.
Unfortunately a lot of CS degree students coming out doesn't really understand that and they get stuck cutting code waiting on tech BAs to hand them requirement on a platter.