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Interest in CS as a Major Drops
Dasein writes "The Computer Research Association says that the popularity of CS as a major among freshman has dropped in the last four years. Why is obvious to anybody working in the field. They conclude by saying 'With a fall in degree production looming, it is difficult to see how CS can match expected future demand for IT workers without raising women's participation at the undergraduate level.'"
There's still the entire population of India ready to take the jobs of western IT workers...
Those of us who work "in the field" know that an outdoor job is vastly superior to hovering over a computer all day.
Sorry. My sense of humor has taken the day off, and I'm compelled to post shit like this.
Speak for yourself, daylight whore.
You can't put a trademark on Clueless Masses ... prior art.
Throw in some Slashdot posts and it becomes an absolute metaphysical certitude.
Most people working in IT probably won't benefit from computer science degrees. Moreover, someone really interested in IT, should probably transfer to their university's school of business and, if possible, enroll in whatever their equivalent of an "Information Technology" degree is. Such programs usually have a number of IT classes, e.g. databases & networking (both with a much more applied slant then you would get in a typical CS class on the same topic), but also provide students with enough knowledge of business that they'll be able to more effectively interact with the high ups in the company when it comes to such things as policy making and infrastructure planning. Alternatively, there are also some two year programs that strictly focus on IT skills.
Why? Well any CS program worth its salt doesn't focus on teaching people how to admin Windows Server 2003, or Oracle administration. Rather, it focuses on teaching people about theories computation, algorithms, and, on the more applied side, best practices in software engineering. This kind of training will make some one a better programmer or software engineer, but it wouldn't necessarily be even that the relevant to the individual deciding which routers to buy or even the one installing set routers
<rant> Okay, so maybe I am little bit peeved when people ask me how to do such and such in Microsoft Word or Windows XP, and the looks they give me when I tell them I don't know. It's like they think it's so inexplicable that I don't know since some of the core classes for CS majors *must* be esoteric document formatting in Microsoft Word, and Windows XP - Why sometimes it can't connect to the network printer. </rant>
With all the new graphic engines you can see in games such as Doom 3 and Half Life 2, no wonder freshmen are losing interest in old school Counterstrike ...
Recently, when I was looking for an EE position, I did look at defense company openings. The need to pay the mortgage and eat makes you cast a wider net.
One position at White Sands NM had a substantial list of specific skills that looked like a good match for me until I got to the last requirement:
Experience flying fighter aircraft.
Holy crap! Not your everyday combination.
I don't remember that course being available:
EE453 Fighter Aircraft Piloting
That sort of threw my search back into private sector.
One simply needs to look to our own past to see how support was provided to the 'technical class' so to speak.
Even the most socially inept scientist could usually have counted on an arranged marriage of some sorts. The woman in the relationship would often be the fundamental social link of the family unit, since the man would tend to be of the personality type that interacts with others in primarily a professional manner.
Now however there is hardly any way for a typical geek to be successful at forming this kind of relationship while also maintaining the sort of mindset/personality which makes them so good at what they do.
Basically it looks like the current cultural setting in the west has turned harshly against the stereotypical technical oriented personality.
Ah well at least there's the temporary stopgap measure of the Russian Bride agencies etc...
You are an awful, awful man, indicative of the Patriarchy!
Your female-slave should divorce you, take your children away, slap you with some child and spousal support, and then return to college to get a degree in Women's Studies.
"in Germany laziness is a virtue and work is something negative"
Ooh, I am SO moving to Germany!
[what?]
>You mean like Google? They hire PhDs regardless of field.
:)
If you disregard the specific PhD, what exactly are you looking for that any non-PhD does not have?
Are you looking for a person who has the ability to do some research and then break it down into the greatest number of publishable papers possible? Maybe, since this trait would be good to patent something.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
You're right. The writing requirements would probably kill you, although I'll bet you'd be challenged.
Mod this guy up.. ..he's got it right.
Projects get headcount and too often headcount means warm bodies, with or without interest or ability. We seem to keep hiring these people that got into IT for the cash. They typically have decent marks in school and present well, but once it's time to actually work things suck.
My favourite new-hire quote: "I don't really like programming. I plan to be a manager."
The new guy had been given his first "welcome-to-the-corp-lets-see-what-you-can-do" assignment a few days earlier. Small potatoes, easy to do - more a test of how you go about things than anything else. Asked no questions and did ZERO work on it. The above was his answer when asked why he had nothing done.
Another gem from the same guy: "Programming is all about abstraction. I don't need to understand the details."
Nothing tanks a project faster than getting this calibre of employee handed to you. These are the guys who should drop out of IT. The ones who really should be there will stick with it even if the starting salaries drop 20%...
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