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Gates On Future of CS Education

Posted by Zonk on from the we-need-more-women-too dept.

lilrowdy18 writes "In an interesting article from Eweek, Microsoft chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates talks about how the lack of spending in research and development is 'kind of a crime'. He also talks about future problems that are facing the computer industry including outsourcing and the speed of upcoming processors." From the article: "Microsoft taps both native-born talent and foreign talent, but Gates said he is frustrated that more U.S. students are not going into computer science. 'The fastest growing major is physical education,' he said. 'The Chinese are going to wake up and say we missed this opportunity,' he joked."

23 of 563 comments (clear)

  1. It doesn't help... by whitefael · · Score: 4, Insightful

    when every other news article talks about jobs being outsourced and the layoffs that are happening all over the place, most recently at HP.

    1. Re:It doesn't help... by JWW · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Thats what really gets me fired up about these kind of statements. Its simple supply and demand. The basic gist of all the outsourcing hoopla in the industry is "There is no demand for IT workers." Now Gates and others bitch about how few people are going into CS. Of course nobody is going into CS, everyone has been told and even better SHOWN that there is no future in it.

      Modern coporations are cutting off their nose to spite their face. Someday they will be crying in their beer about not being able to find any workers. Well they made their own bed now they've got to sleep in it.

      (Sorry once I got rolling on the cliches I couldn't stop myself)

    2. Re:It doesn't help... by whitefael · · Score: 5, Insightful

      When I first saw the story, I was upset (hence my previous post), but as I think about it a little more objectively, maybe this is a good thing. So getting a job in the IT and software industry is tough, people are being laid off, and jobs are being outsourced. Maybe at this point, the people that are majoring in computer science REALLY want to do it. The hi-tech industry needs people that really have the desire to work in that field, not a bunch of people going into a major because it's the next big money-maker (MCSE certification anyone?).

    3. Re:It doesn't help... by EastCoastSurfer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Maybe at this point, the people that are majoring in computer science REALLY want to do it.

      Exacly. When I was in college getting my CS degree (graduated in '99) many people were in the program because that's where they could make money. The ones I still know about are struggling for work, but I haven't had any issues staying employed. Work hard and with a passion and people will notice and things will work out okay.

  2. the answer lies with him... by advocate_one · · Score: 5, Insightful

    if he's complaining about the lack of CS students, then perhaps he should pay graduates more, stop outsourcing to India and relying on H1b visas... then people might just believe there's a future in CS... he and several others like him are the root cause of the problem...

    --
    Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
    1. Re:the answer lies with him... by John+Seminal · · Score: 4, Interesting
      if he's complaining about the lack of CS students, then perhaps he should pay graduates more, stop outsourcing to India and relying on H1b visas... then people might just believe there's a future in CS... he and several others like him are the root cause of the problem...

      You hit the nail on the head. When I was in college, my roomate who was a buisness major switched to computer science when he saw an article in US News and World Report which said that computer science majors would start at $40,000 a year. The only major that started higher was chemical engineering. Buisness was somewhere in the middle at $29,000 or so, with art at the bottom with $18,500.

      Now people are avoiding computer science because there is no growth seen. There is percieved shrinkage in the USA. HP lays off 11,000. Sun fired 4,000 a few years ago. Who wants to work in an industry where they have no job security?

      It is not like someone can get a degree in computer science, get a job at GE starting at $40,000, and work there the next 30 years and retire with a pension. Most comp sci people I know work on a contract basis. One year at a single company is considered a long time by some people. Then there is the pain in the ass of finding a new gig.

      How does someone plan buying a house under those conditions? What do you tell the bank? Umm... I have had 5 different contracts the past 3 years.

      Then there is the question of sanity. Who will live longer. They comp sci guy, who works 60 hour weeks, under stress, then even when he has no work, he is stressed looking for work. I see an early death due to heart attack. Or is it better to be a PE teacher, making $35,000 a year and spending time outdoors lobbing softballs and playing tennis?

      The problem the comp sci students are going to face is the same problem the auto workers are facing. Companies don't give a crap about americans, even though the companies started in the USA, the CEO and board of directors are American, and they sell their product to Americans. They will move their factories and tech support and anything they can to Mexico or India or anywhere they can find cheap labor. The CEO's are pretty much trators and they are crapping on the USA.

      --

      Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."

    2. Re:the answer lies with him... by Monkelectric · · Score: 4, Informative
      Very good. Now here's the *REASON* he complains about there being too many programmers when he uses h1b's etc etc:

      Bill Gates *WANTS* the market of programmers to be flooded. The glut of CS students during the dot com boom was fabulous for software companies who were hiring programmers for 35k a year *AFTER THE BUST*. The economy is starting to heat up again (until oil prices kill us, a story for another day) and wages are starting to pick up again, and companies don't want to pay them. Believe me, bill gates does nothing but serve himself, if he says we need more programmers, we most surely don't.

      --

      Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley

    3. Re:the answer lies with him... by John+Seminal · · Score: 4, Interesting
      If you know of an industry where there is any job security, please share it with us.

      In my family, I have people who retired from GM as a factory worker, who still has enough money to buy a new car every 4 years.

      Next door is a nurse who is retired. Same thing, she has new cars and has money.

      When I was 19 I worked in a bookstore one year during college. One of the women who worked there part time was 60 years old and was a retired teacher. I asked he if she needed the money, thinking how sad that a 60 year old woman needs to work. She said she did not need any money, had more than enough, but she was lonely and wanted to be around people. Since she was a teacher, she loved books.

      My friends dad was a truck driver, and he is retired, and living comfortably in a 4br 2.5bath house.

      What two things do all these people have in common? An automotive factory worker, a teacher, a nurse, and a truck driver? They all started working in the 1960's and each and every one of them has a pension in addition to social security.

      It is a shame when today, skilled workers are not gaurenteed a pension. There should be a law which says that anyone who puts in over 10 years sweat and work into a company will get some kind of pension from that company. Maybe a good rule would be for every year worked, the company must pay a pension of 2.5% of that years salary, adjusted for inflation. A 30 year career would yeild 75% of the that persons salary. Add in social security, and most can retire comfortably.

      I wonder what has changed from the 1960's-80's and today. Why is it today most companies don't want to offer health insurance or pensions, or make people pay into their own private funds. What has changed? Companies could afford it back then, but today they outsource work, they close factories, and they don't want to pay workers. But the CEO's get HUGE bonuses, it is nowhere in line with the bonuses they got 30 years ago.

      The only way to fix it is to pass new laws. No more outsourcing of jobs. All companies must have a pension package. No lay offs unless the union okay's it. And every company must have a union, or the workers must collectivly agree on pay and terms.

      --

      Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."

    4. Re:the answer lies with him... by Dolly_Llama · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The only way to fix it is to pass new laws. No more outsourcing of jobs. All companies must have a pension package. No lay offs unless the union okay's it. And every company must have a union, or the workers must collectivly agree on pay and terms.

      Most companies do have some sort of retirement package, but the shift has been away from defined benefits regimes like that of a traditional pension toward a defined contribution like a 401k or and IRA.

      The difference here is a question of risk and flexibility. The pension model was designed around the worker who would stay at the same company for thirty years, then die a short time later. The automotive companies are quickly discovering, like other formerly strong American industries like steel, that these open ended pension liabilities coupled with longer lifespans are like boat anchors when their margins slip away.

      The fixed contribution model tries to solve two problems at once. First, workers can more easily move from firm to firm when their retirement package is not owned by the first company. Second, since only contriubtions are fixed, difficult variables like lifespan are removed from the employer's pension equation, allowing them to be focused only on their current workforce.

      The shift in risk is a political issue. Does the worker gain by the potential windfall of compound interest and appreciation or does he lose by inheiriting the risk associated with direct exposure to the market?

      --

      Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -- Carl Sagan

  3. The Reason Why...Simple by varmittang · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Is because we believe/afraid that we wont have a job when we get out of college due to all the out sourcing going on in IT. People don't want to spend all their money on a great education, to not have chance at a job when they graduate. So they look into other majors, while possibly doing some code on the side. Simple as that.

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  4. if microsoft can't find staff... by geoff+lane · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ... perhaps it is because the modern CS students have just spent three years learning about operating systems by using open source operating systems?

    Once upon a time you could make real money by working for a startup Microsoft. Today, it's just another job and all the cool ideas are coming out of Google.

  5. The difference is by overshoot · · Score: 4, Informative
    Microsoft and others are hiring in China.

    In the USA, they're not only laying off IT and CS staff, they're even letting H1-B visas go unused, not that that's keeping Bill and others from lobbying to raise the H1-B cap anyway.

    --
    Lacking <sarcasm> tags, /. substitutes moderation as "Troll."
  6. Ironic... by blahplusplus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Gee, this is like the pot calling the kettle black, how many jobs as Mr. Gates company outsourced I wonder?

    The guy is just playing the governments of the world off one another to benefit his own company. Not really news.

  7. No Jokes Here by $criptah · · Score: 4, Interesting

    How many of your Comp. Sci. peers got jobs before graduating from college? I know that only two of my fellow students did. How many business, accounting, education, and other students get jobs? Again, I don't know about your experience, but all my friends who chose not to major in Comp. Sci. did quite well and landed nice jobs BEFORE they got their diplomas.

    Supply and demand. This is a no-fucking-brainer for students who go to college in order to get jobs and move on with their careers. Last time I checked, nobody wants to spend -- or waste -- for years of school in order to end up unemployed. There are tons of articles that describe newly minted CEOS who decide to hire and developm in India or China because it is cheaper. Kids read that and decide not to fall into the same hole as the previous generation.

    Sorry Bill, not every students gets to be one of the wealthiest people on the planet. Software was hot in 80s. Now it is a freaking commodity. Let's move on.

  8. Bill Gates wants to have his cake and eat it too by Teckla · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From TFA:

    Microsoft taps both native-born talent and foreign talent, but Gates said he is frustrated that more U.S. students are not going into computer science.

    This is the same Bill Gates that wants to completely eliminate H-1B quotas (that is, allow an unlimited number of foreign software developers in). This is the same Bill Gates that is constructing a huge, sprawling Microsoft Campus in India.

    You want more students going into Computer Science, Bill? Then quit telling American students, through your actions, that there won't be any software development jobs left for them in America by the time they graduate!

    He's just another F'ing "I want cheap labor at the expense of American workers" prick. Excuse my French.

  9. Re:Wrong tense, Mr. Gates. by jonathansen · · Score: 5, Funny

    Mmm, I think you both misunderstood. He was being sarcastic, implying that Chinese are going to wake up and say "we [as in the Chinese] missed this opportunity [to have more physical education majors]".

    --
    "A dessert without cheese is like a beautiful woman who has lost an eye." -- Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
  10. Re:A lack of spending on R&D? by Rei · · Score: 5, Funny

    The title should have been "Billionaire College Dropout Accountant Encourages Students To Go To College, Major In Computer Science"

    --
    Point of interest. Offering to shoot us might not work so well as an incentive as you might imagine.
  11. PE? Makes sense. by Geckoman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Who gets paid millions of dollars to play games?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets put on the covers of countless magazines?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets multimillion dollar contract buy-outs when they fail to perform?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets invited on Leno and Letterman?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets multimillion dollar endorsement deals?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets put on posters and tacked to the walls of thousands of teenagers?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets worshipped and forgiven for all sins for being successful?
    Athletes and coaches

    Who gets teased mercilessly throughout their school years?
    Science geeks and nerds

    Who gets fired to raise stock prices even after successful work?
    Science geeks and nerds

    Who gets taunted and degraded by society at large?
    Science geeks and nerds

    Who gets underpaid for long hours and little security?
    Science geeks and nerds

    Who gets to spend 4-8 years in school in a difficult, demanding major with perceived diminishing job opportunities?
    Science geeks and nerds

    The perception is that you have to be born with certain talents and abilities to become a great athlete, but you can be trained to be a coach (even a mediocre one) and at least be in that field, so something fun, and bask in the reflected glory of the truly talented. Plus, we're not outsourcing football yet.

    Yeah, I can't imagine why so many people are choosing PE over CS.

  12. Re:Donation by ucblockhead · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Free? Free? You think he donated it "for free"? Hardly. He donated something that "cost" $500 million or more, and thus saved him lots on Microsoft Corporate taxes.

    --
    The cake is a pie
  13. Nice FUD but... by RingDev · · Score: 5, Insightful

    1) Four years of one of the most time intensive majors in colleges

    I actually thought my CS classes were the easy ones. It was that damn Lit class that gave me hell.

    2) Going through Microsoft's dehumanizing interview process

    There are (e-gahds!) other companies to work for you know. You don't HAVE to be evil.

    3) Getting free soda in exchange for 80 hour work weeks at minimum wage I don't get free soda, and I only put in 5 hours of overtime a week to run nightly processes. I get paid a good deal more then minimum wage.

    4) Getting fired at age 28 for being too old

    I'm only 26, so I can't say for sure, but my Boss (a former mainframe coder) is in his 50s, my team lead is in his late 30s and another developer on the team is in his mid 40s.

    Just wanted to shed some light on the ACTUAL life.

    -Rick

    --
    "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
  14. Re:A lack of spending on R&D? by multiplexo · · Score: 4, Funny
    The title should have been "Billionaire College Dropout Accountant Encourages Students To Go To College, Major In Computer Science"

    No kidding, you could have a similar headline for Steve Jobs. I loved seeing this story in the Seattle Times this morning. The headline was "Gates Stresses Need for Qualified CS Grads", the headline underneath it was "Hewlett-Packard to cut 14,500 jobs in restructuring plan". Do they put these things together deliberately to fuck with us, or is it just an accident?

    --
    cheap labor conservatives - they want to keep you hungry enough to be thankful for minimum wage.
  15. not a new problem ... by constantnormal · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Computer Science has never been a "popular" major in the USofA, and has suffered right along with other technical majors, like engineering and the sciences, when the additional disincentives of age discrimination and pummeling the graduates with the horde of pointy-haired-managers for which American business has become a haven.

    Go check out a copy of The Peter Principle (copyright 1969 -- pick up a used copy from Amazon) to confirm that the current decrepit state of our managerial skilz is nothing new.

    When the nation's leaders stop rewarding managerial ineptitude and punishing technical workers, we might have a chance of turning this around. You can count on other nations (China, anyone?) not making this particular blunder.

    If it offers hope to anyone, in today's WSJ (subscription required) there is a piece advocating outsourcing of our outrageously overpaid top management to bring excessive top management compensation under control. It's the 7th most-emailed article today. But it will take a long time after such practices begin (assuming they ever begin) before they filter down through the corporate structure and clueless incompetence is no longer rewarded.

  16. Ok, I will troll a bit... by orzetto · · Score: 4, Informative
    the most technologically advanced nation in the world

    I thought too that the US were a long way ahead in technology. I came for a conference in Austin, TX last November, and on the way back I stayed for a week in NY. I was disappointed in some ways:

    • How comes that I can't bloody call Europe from a payphone in Chicago airport? And where are the credit-card phones? It's an international airport, not a café! It's not that I did not try, and I tried the week later too. Yes, I know you use 011 instead of 00. It finally worked on Broadway by the 50th street.
    • Why doesn't my damn GSM mobile work? What's the fuss with multiple standards over here? (Yes, my phone is a triple band and was supposed to work in NY and Chicago, though not Austin). Damn, these work in Thailand, why don't they work in the US?
    • The conference in Austin was AIChE 2004. Number of participants: about 5,000. Number of complimentary internet connections: 0. Luckily there was a nice café at 6th/Congress with free access to Macs.
    • My Diners stopped working for a couple of days, and the Visa was dead. It would work early in the morning.
    • (This one is getting flamed)The statue of Liberty is small!!! I can't believe it's taller than the one in my town.
    • Why are still stuck in the stone, pound and foot age?
    • Times square: it's not square to begin with, and it's ludicrously small. It looks so big in the images from new year's eve...

    Ok, ok, I have to compensate with some positive points...

    • Ok, there are people who speak other language than English. I expected worse, on the plane to New York I was sitting beside a girl who completely by chance spoke Italian (and not bad either!).
    • Ellis Island more than compensated for Liberty Island. The museum there was cool, even if I did not find my grandfather's brother in the archives.
    • Food is nowhere near terrible as in England, and because of Mexico food in Austin was actually quite good. Que vivan los migrantes!
    • I happened to hear the Veteran's Day speech at the Texas capitol. Sorry for the people governed by these beasts, but for me it was an experience to see the closest thing to a Nazi rally I will ever witness (I hope).
    • Prospect park in NY rules!
    • Now, when I see "Venner for livet" (Friends) or "Sex og singelliv" (Sex and the city) I actually recognize the places!

    Anyway, back to the point: the US are not as advanced as many, Americans and not, think they are. At least not in the level of technology the citizens are exposed to, I have definitely seen enough to deem it unlikely that I was victim of a long series of unlucky coincidences.

    --
    Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y