Education Working Group
Draft Report Outline -- 6/21/96
CS&E education needs to evolve rapidly, alongside the rapid evolution of the
discipline itself. As new priorities for education emerge, many of the current
models and mechanisms are inadequate to meet their demands. The following list
identifies seven major areas of concern in CS&E education, as well as new
initiatives that can be taken to faciliate strategic reform.
- The importance of education as a strategic future direction in computing
research has been identified, in part by its participation as a distinct
"subject area" in the SDCR Workshop. The delicate balance between education
and research must be reexamined by college and university faculties, as well as
the entire profession. New interactions between research, education, and
industry are needed, so that students, faculty, and computing practititioners
can maximize the utility of education in the broad range of interests that it
serves.
- More faculty members should make an attitude shift so that teaching becomes
an exciting priority activity, alongside research and consulting.
- Curricula should stress computer science interactions with other
disciplines.
- Graduates should be prepared to address peoples needs and concerns about
computing; industry's needs may be addressed at the "back end" of the
curriculum, but should not drive the design of the first courses.
- The first courses should be designed to reach a wide audience; majors and
nonmajors. There are many effective models for the first course (CS1).
- The breadth of the discipline should be taught early, but not at the
expense of a solid programming experience.
- A senior level design course or capstone research experience should be
required for all undergraduate majors.
- Computer science and engineering changes more rapidly than most
disciplines, and so must CS&E curricula.
- A process is needed by which new principles and artifacts can be
effectively integrated into the core curriculum, and soon after they emerge.
- Similarly, an effective means for identifying and eliminating obsolescent ideas
from the core curriculum must also be implemented.
- Duplication of effort in the development and delivery of curricula is
unusually widespread and often nonproductive. Much of the result is of uneven
quality and/or quickly dated.
- A new mechanism is needed by which successful course materials can be more
widely shared. This would include both the Web and an effective reviewing
scheme, so that wide dissemination and high quality will be ensured.
- There are several computer science education communities, and they have
many common interests; yet they don't interact much at all. At the moment, the
membership of the ACM Education Board is appointed entirely by the discretion
of its chair.
- A visible and proactive ACM Education Board should intentionally represent
all constituencies and promote wider interactions among them.
- New communication channels should be created, so that curricula at all
levels are better understood and shared among different communities. For
example, the SIGCSE program committee should have representatives from the
secondary school community (including AP), the graduate school community, and
the professional education community, alongside the already-well-represented
undergraduate community.
- Specific core subject areas have evolved rapidly, and yet have not found a
niche in the core curricula in many programs. Examples include object-
orientedness as a way of thinking about problem solving, parallelism, networks,
human-computer interaction, software design, software safety and other social
issues, and the theory of computing.
- A revised set of knowledge units from Curricula 91 should be developed to
incorporate these and other contemporary core topics and themes in computing.
- Topics in the theory of computing need to be reintegrated into the core
curriculum in meaningful ways, beginning with the first course.
- Teaching methods, lab materials, and technology are strongly biased toward
a narrow student population and set of values. These elements, along with the
faculties themselves, must change so that they accommodate a wide range of
learning styles and student backgrounds.
- Lab exercises and examples should reflect a wider range of student concerns
and real life experiences.
- Fundamental traditional ideas in the discipline, including theory, should be
repackaged and presented in new and engaging ways.
- The management of large classes is a serious problem in many large
programs. Lectures alone, without student interaction in small groups and
laboratories, are an inadequate learning mechanism for CS&E education.
- Many issues apply specifically to the secondary and graduate levels of
computer science and engineering education, as well as the undergraduate level.
- A coherent secondary school curriculum should be implemented for the
general population that mirrors what is taught in the natural sciences and
mathematics. It should follow the ideas presented in the ACM Model High School
Curriculum, appropriately updated. The current AP curriculum serves a more
narrow purpose, and does not satisfy the need in this area.
- Massive amounts of teacher training at this level need to be developed, so
that computer science becomes understood by the general public as encompassing
a much broader range of subjects than just programming.
- An alternative PhD program model that intentionally prepares graduates for
research in industry rather than academia. This model would complement (not
replace) the current one that prepares graduates for careers in academia.
- Professional education should be widely accepted as a regular part of the
academy. Programs at all levels should provide courses for part-time and
evening students.