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U.S. Students Shun Computer Science, Engineering
n9fzx writes "The San Jose Mercury News reports on a study by the Computing Research Association which finds that 'Undergraduates in U.S. universities are starting to abandon their studies in computer technology and engineering amid widespread worries about the accelerating pace of offshoring by high-technology employers.' Enrollment in those fields has dropped by 19% in the past year alone." Update: 03/24 23:40 GMT by CN : jlechem wrote in with a related story: "Wired News has a story about how American companies are outsourcing not because of cheap labor but because of the American school system not being up to snuff. In a report by the AeA, they contend that American schools don't teach enough math and science anymore."
Why study boring stuff like computers and engineering when there's no job market for those skills?
Instead, take the time to study things that are interesting and really mind-expanding like literature, philosophy, and languages.
Leave the geeks to their machines, let the rest of us rule them from management.
I have been pwned because my
There are no Computer Science Graduates going into the Computer Software business because with Open Source there is no more money in the Computer Software Business. There is money in the Computer Service Business, though. So maybe Computer Science graduates should go into the Computer Service Business, right?
Well, it turns out that the Computer Service Business is more profitable in outsourcing countries, so there is no more money in the Computer Service Business, either. Now there isn't any money in either the Computer Software Business OR the Computer Service Business...ooops!
Maybe Computer Science Graduate graduate isn't such a good idea after all.
Thanks, Open Source!
Perhaps the 19% decline all went to the increase in business schools that have "information technology" as a major.
I was a CS major for a year and a half at Boston University. I took a bunch of classes, and I finally realized that a University's idea of CS is fifty different flavors of Discrete Math. Most of my classmates had never even written a program over 100 lines....and I took up through Junior level courses. Now, I certainly realize there's math involved in CS, but CS != math. All of my friends in the CS program spend weeks simulating queues and predicting average TOS etc, but as soon as I start talking about things like polymorphism or inheritance I just get blank stares.
If my professors actually taught me USEFUL skills, like PHP / MySQL, I would have stuck with it...but a program that chooses completely useless, academic languages like Scheme and Standard ML over practical skills just doesn't give me enough competitive skills to be worth the money.
There's always a market for people with useful skills....it's no surprise that when the industry gets tougher people are not as likely to waste their time and money to come out of school without marketable skills.
But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.
Thats right, if you want things to change, vote democratic, because we all know the way to create new jobs is higher taxes.
"Preaching interventionism" is a very deceptive way to descrive teaching the economic history of the wealthiest nation on earth.
You knew what kind of a view you were getting from the Soviets, too. A Soviet-Communist view. As if that kind of thinking makes Cato any less silly.
Laissez Faire is exactly about worker exploitation. Because it is the most ruthless pursuit of efficiency - and if you can, through deceit or violence, convince people to work for free, slaves are, after all, more efficient than paid labor. Laissez Faire is a clever code for saying that profit is more important to you than democracy or human rights.
There are many barriers to "progress" in this modern world. Laissez Faire advocates are reduced to conflating those that are necessary (like weekends off, for instance) with those that are pernicious (like the RIAA, for instance)...
But if you really want to see Cato's theories in action, you can visit anywhere in our planet's generous 3rd world, where Laissez Faire indeed reigns supreme, just as it did here, before we finally, inch by painful inch, evolved.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
Wow. How exceedingly arrogant. Does that mean doing anything for any reason other than being passionately interested makes someone unworthy?
Tell that to all of the CS people I know who now work in services or fast food now that their jobs are gone. They don't have passion for these professions, so they should just make way for those who do. I mean, who needs food on the table, right?
This of course also ignores the fact that some people who *are* interested in CS may avoid it in lieu of something else, knowing they can't get a job when they graduate. So now you have CS-minded people taking classes they're not really interested in. That's better, right? Seriously, if CS becomes the equivalent of Underwater Basket Weaving, who's going to bother?
Read: Rabbit Rue - Free serial nove
John Kerry promises to create millions of jobs for the unskilled, unwashed, unmotivate, uneducated masses in the new video game and junk food testing industries.
Hower Dean supports the decision with a resounding "GWAUAUAHEUE"
Show me where Cato has advocated using force or fraud to acquire workers.
You want me to repeat myself? They advocate Laissez Faire. In other words, if I can "find a way" for something to be cheaper, then it should win in the marketplace. By definition, they care less about how I "find a way" than is generally acceptable American in society.
Force and fraud are the bare minimum standard of entry in today's Free Trading global economy.
Let me be crystal clear on this, so I don't have to explain it a third time. You advocate for force or fraud when you spout nonsense made to sound like economics justifying how workers in the 3rd world should abused every day making our sneakers, our plastic lawn ornaments, our campaign T-shirts... all while you look the other way. Smirking as Americans try compete with 4 cents a day.
You have some audacity to ask that question, sir.
Oh, you wanted me to show you where they bluntly admit this? Hah. Good one. You're like someone asking for proof that they got in a fight... from their hospital bed.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
Mathematica is worthless, but where I work, probably 85% of our control algorithms are developed in MATLAB and then proved on a real-time system (usually a custom DSP board) in C.
Did I mention Mathematica is worthless? Did I mention MATLAB makes me smile?
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Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)