How Many Members of Congress Does It Take To Pass a $400MM CS Bill?

theodp writes: Over at Code.org, they're celebrating because more than 100 members of Congress are now co-sponsoring the Computer Science Education Act (HR 2536), making the bill designed to"strengthen elementary and secondary computer science education" the most broadly cosponsored education bill in the House. By adding fewer than 50 words to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, HR 2536 would elevate Computer Science to a "core academic subject" (current core academic subjects are English, reading or language arts, mathematics, science, foreign languages, civics and government, economics, arts, history, and geography), a status that opens the doors not only to a number of funding opportunities, but also to a number of government regulations. So, now that we know it takes 112 U.S. Representatives to make a CS education bill, the next question is, "How many taxpayer dollars will it take to pay for the consequences?" While Code.org says "the bill is cost-neutral and doesn't introduce new programs or mandates," the organization in April pegged the cost of putting CS in every school at $300-$400 million. In Congressional testimony last January, Code.org proposed that "comprehensive immigration reform efforts that tie H-1B visa fees to a new STEM education fund" could be used "to support the teaching and learning of more computer science in K-12 schools," echoing Microsoft's National Talent Strategy.

Comments

400 Millimeter Dollars

[pjh3000]

What are 400 Millimeter Dollars?

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Anonymous Coward]

Capital M is for Mega.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Anonymous Coward]

Ergo, MM should be "mega mega" and therefore be 10^6*10^6 = 10^12 (aka, "trillion").

Stupid accountants apparently can't be bothered using K to mean thousand (as practically everyone else does) and want to overload M to mean that instead. It's stupid and they should be ashamed.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[K. S. Kyosuke]

M is also a nautical mile, so it's 400 million nautical mile dollars.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Prof.Phreak]

It's MegaMillions.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[davester666]

so it's a lottery? http://www.megamillions.com/

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[jd]

Very small.

But, actually, it's not mm, it's MM. Since inverting the case usually means inverting the sense, that would be 400 million meters. Which would make it the largest unit of currency ever circulated in the US, and smaller only than the Ningi and Pu.

Since CS can only be taught in America on the removal of Microsoft, a 400 million meter long piece of paper makes sense. It should be plenty to completely wrap the key buildings. It will not be sufficient to wrap the ego of Bill Gates, who still "advises" the company.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[jd]

Schools will be paid in casino chips and their first task will be to find the correct casino.

Re: 400 Millimeter Dollars

[Redmancometh]

Sometimes there are overload parameters /shrug

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[FatLittleMonkey]

It's Roman numerals. MM=2000. Legislators like Roman numerals, makes them look clever. But they obviously forgot how to write the 400 (CD) in $2400.

That's a pretty big bill, I guess, but with a hundred sponsors it works out at $24 each. I assume they all got hats.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Anonymous Coward]

400 x 2000 = 800,000 dollars

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Anonymous Coward]

K is Kelvin. k is kilo. M is 1000 in roman numerals. so that would be $800000, using some kind of strange combination of roman numerals and non-roman numerals.
MM doesn't mean anything in SI. Trillion would be T.

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Anonymous Coward]

Accountants use M to mean thousand, which needlessly confuses the issue when "everyone else" expects it to mean million. Accountants then decided to use MM to mean million, which is technically less ambiguous but most of the rest of humanity does a wtf-does-million-million-mean? double-take.

I would have more fucking sympathy with them if they actually did their arithmetic using Roman numerals. But, you know, they don't. They are just being different to be different.

Re: 400 Millimeter Dollars

[astar]

The SI pros do not approve of this Roman numeral chaining. Really. Of course they are not really happy to have km but at least that is official.

But if i am to be pedantic i should also troll: The largest official SI prefix is Y for 10**24. A YB appears in a couple important public policy issues I follow. Now this is obviously meaning we need a way to talk about kY whatever and so we need to extend the official prefixes.

Alternatively a distance of a Ym is about the size of the visible universe and kYm
Is bigger. Even the idea of distance at a cosmological scale is uncertain. It is difficult to believe Congress has a feel for that sort of magnitude.

So guys, what shall we fix?

Re:400 Millimeter Dollars

[Anonymous Coward]

It MM is a million. 400 MM is read as 400 x 1000 x 1000 or 400000000

Sorry, but... why?

[Seumas]

Sorry, I don't buy into all this "we need to get kids using computers and programming in grade school!" crap. Or this "we need everyone to be in STEM!" crap.

Why do we need this, exactly? To keep the pool of employees huge and the pay low? Where is the push for teaching kids automotive skills in grade school? Cooking? Surgery?

Let's just focus on the basics. Teach kids to be inquisitive, critical thinking, human beings with a strong grasp of reading and writing and math and history and geography skills and knowledge. Those with an interest in other things will pursue them and doing so will be much easier with a solid primary foundation in these universal fundamentals.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, I don't buy into all this "we need to get kids using computers and programming in grade school!" crap. Or this "we need everyone to be in STEM!" crap.
 
According to Google and Facebook only women and minorities need that. The white males can fend for themselves.
 
Oh, that's right, the white males have been doing it by themselves thousands of years. Damn, I forgot.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jader3rd]

Sorry, I don't buy into all this "we need to get kids using computers and programming in grade school!" crap.

Why is it crap? For years many children have really struggled with why they are learning math (at least above arithmetic). Part of the problem is that they never see how it could possibly be applied to anything, ever. By teaching programming, math can begin to be applied to something; in a way that's not doing math for the sake of doing math. It's doing something, and it just so happens to use a lot of math theory. Learning CS will really strengthen many children's ability to do math, because they'll be doing something with the math, instead of math for the sake of math.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

To keep the pool of employees huge and the pay low?

Well, almost. It is true that higher education gives one more opportunities for higher paying jobs. But, back when a relatively small proportion of the population could afford a higher education, the opportunities and pay differences were huge.

Now that we live in a country where most people have a higher education, it is no longer nearly as much a differentiating factor as it used to be. This results in lots of jobs that would not otherwise require a higher education now requiring it, and the people who must accept these jobs wind up with lifelong debt and depression.

And yes, the higher availability of qualified candidates does pull salaries down for the jobs that actually need such degrees.

But......

If you go the other direction, and stop funding education with taxpayer dollars, then you reinstate a severe class disparity in which poor people have no means at all of moving up the social ladder, and only rich people can get the higher education and the higher-paying jobs.

So, which evil would you rather have?

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Beck_Neard]

Instead of getting more people interested in math, I predict it will wind up getting less people interested in CS. Count on school to turn highly interesting, mentally-stimulating subjects (like math) into boring rote memorization exercises.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[roman_mir]

Agreed, there is no need to push for any particular subject beyond ability to read, write and do basic arithmetic. Once those are covered, the kids should no longer be required to be in school. Should be able to go into trades (probably for most), trade schools, should let those, who are truly interested to continue education by removing huge artificial demand created with all the government subsidised debt (student loans) and should get rid of the minimum wage laws and laws that prevent 15 year olds from being hired.

In Germany there is a separation into different type of schooling, where most kids end up in Hauptschule and may actually start working from around age 15 (vocational training, training at work).

The next level of schooling is called Realschule, this one allows you to move to the next level if you can (Gymnasium) or to do vocational training. Gymnasium is your preparation for further education in a university.

What would make much more sense in USA would be to get rid of minimum wage laws, allow people to work for small compensation and train at work. If my company was based in USA I would hire 15 year olds in a heartbeat. I would train them for a couple of months if I wasn't forced to pay anybody anything more than they are worth if there were no laws that would make this arrangement prohibitively expensive. A 15 year old, who is interested in learning a profession and is willing to be an apprentice is not in any way worse than a 21 year old, who finished university with a worthless degree in women studies and is now unemployable, because the debt prevents him or her from taking a low paying job, while at the same time they have 0 skills (no more than a 15 year old without such 'education' would).

Of-course USA job numbers came out for July 2014

* 205,000 jobs added to the economy
* U3 unemployment rate rose from 6.1% to 6.2%
* Not in Labor Force, but Want a Job Now: up 144,000 to 6.259 million
* Employment/population ratio ages 25-54: down from 76.7% to 76.6%

* the overall employment to population ratio for all ages 16 and above rose 0.1% from 58.9 to 59.0%, and has risen by +0.3% YoY. The labor force participation rate rose from 62.8% to 62.9, and has fallen by -0.5% YoY (but remember, this includes droves of retiring Boomers).

25-54 year olds lost net 142,000 jobs.

16-19 year olds gained 44,000 jobs.
20-24 year olds gained 43,000 jobs.
55-69 year olds gained159,000 jobs.

So teenagers are finding part time jobs in the economy (summer), the so called 'retired' are coming out of retirement, because they can't afford to be retired in this economy anymore and the people in the main working age bracket have fewer permanent jobs and out of the 205,000 jobs created, that's just the delta, it doesn't show how many good, well paying permanent jobs were actually lost and how many part time jobs were created.

While the net jobs created are 205,000, most of the jobs created are part time, lower paying jobs, while jobs that are lost are full time, better paying jobs.

So what is going on with the job market exactly? Well, the same thing that is going on with the economy. The numbers can be demonstrated to be 'good' if you do not pay attention to the details. The reality is the opposite, the numbers are not good.

I would say that the USA economy needs fewer people in the universities and more people in trade, more people picking up skills as apprentices, skills that would make them employable without getting into gigantic debt with all the student loans.

It is expensive to hire people in USA, while the wages are not very high, the actual labour cost to the employees is high due to various laws, regulations, taxes, litigati

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

My guess is as the others. This is just greed based from big corporations.

I'd rather leave education up to the state level with some basics dictating federal funding. By basics I mean reading, writing, math, and science. Coding shouldn't be one of them. While coding would be a nice elective, I don't think it should necessarily be a requirement.

I'll make this brief. Just a week-long lesson on coding/scripting in mathematics classes should suffice. This could be Mathematica, Matlab, R, etc. Or things not related to math. Even programming on a TI-89 calculator could be fun. The goal should be a weak introduction to coding/scripting and the logic behind what one is writing. I feel coding/scripting is less important than say proofs and axioms.

Now, what we may want to do is to ensure students have the option to get into the T. and E. in S.T.E.M. by ensuring that they can elect to have those classes if they so choose. This might mean going to another school nearby specifically for that class, or maybe taking it at a community college. Maybe providing financial assistance to help poor school districts offer said electives would be a good idea. I'm thinking on a trial basis for 3 years, and if significant students take the classes, funding would be provided. Otherwise, the funding is cut off. But this is about providing money for electives in poor school districts who may not have the property tax revenue to justify adding those classes over the basics. And no, this isn't an justification for putting it into the common core.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jonwil]

I did programming at school and I didn't find it boring in the least.

To be fair I was already super-interested in computers and programming by the time I started those classes and was easily writing programs above the level of the classwork even before I started. And the teachers knew what they were doing and how to teach things.

Heck, I still remember getting in trouble for trying to pirate VB4 off the machines in the computer labs or spending every lunch break in the labs using Netscape 3/4 to access the Internet over the schools ISDN line.

Or hosting my first website on the school servers (and getting to know the people in the school labs quite well). Or not knowing the ways of the world and putting my photograph (taken with an Apple QuickTake digital camera no less) on said website and seeing other students mess with that photograph in Photoshop.

Then again, this was a nice private school and these weren't government employees with some central bureaucracy telling them how things were going to be done, what they should teach and how they should teach it.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anubis IV]

No one is suggesting everyone needs to be in STEM. At the same time though, it's widely accepted that the population could use a significantly broader awareness of the topics involved in STEM fields. We read Shakespeare, study history, and learn about government, not because we're necessarily going to become playwrights, historians, and politicians, but rather so that we have a broader understand of our culture, our world, and the ways in which it functions. The same is needed with STEM.

You point out that we need to be teaching critical thinking skills, and rightly so! But what better way to do so than explicitly teaching people how to think in the logical manner that a computer does? I have fond memories of learning Logo back in 4th grade. It wasn't until sometime in college that I even realized my first computer science education hadn't been in high school—where I learned Java, C++, and a handful of other languages—but rather way back when I used loops and other commands to move a turtle around on a screen in the early '90s.

I have no idea if my having learned that back in 4th grade affected my later choices to pursue this field. But what I do know was that it was an age-appropriate set of lessons that were fun and forced me to develop thinking skills I didn't have at that point. I didn't suddenly become a computer scientist or get forced into this field because I did some programming back then, but it did shape my thinking for the better. That's something I should hope everyone has the opportunity to enjoy.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

That really only applies to a subset of high school level math, whereas this is apparently going to push it into elementary and middle school. What's more, computers are more likely to just add another layer of complexity as well as more distraction from math. It's like when someone can't maintain a healthy relationship and decides that somehow polyamory will fix things -- usually the answer is to look deeper into the situation (e.g., home life) rather than to just shove more on to the pile and hope that does the trick.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[guruevi]

Math has been in the boring rote memorization exercise for decades in schools. The reason is that most people simply do not grasp the 'mechanics' behind mathematics and teachers have neither the will nor the skill to teach a subject like math. I didn't like math in school simply because they went so slow and required rote memorization of multiplication tables, axioms and rules. I even remember doing tests that were simply asking to write down axioms in text form.

Some people do grasp math and those will be the nerds that eventually become STEM students. However 75% of the population will never enter this field because they're simply not wired to understand it.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[sumdumass]

Count on school to turn highly interesting, mentally-stimulating subjects (like math) into boring rote memorization exercises

A lot of schools already do this. They (some schools) were doing it since the 80's that I know of. If your school is/was different, count yourself lucky because you had a couple of good teachers who are/were allowed to teach. And from what I understand, that will end when common core kicks completely in and they have to follow a lesson plan dictated to them while teaching to the test.

The GP was correct when he said "Part of the problem is that they never see how it could possibly be applied to anything, ever." I had that same problem. Things like Pi was explained to me as "it is just because" not that "it is the ration between a circle's circumference and diameter". "Just because it is" was good enough reason when asking why do we need Pi and any explanation of why I needed all that math boiled down to somehow saving money at the supermarket or something inane. Of course my teachers probably weren't qualified as math teachers and taught from a book rather than their knowledge but that was what our small town passed off as an education. I was lucky too, the other math teacher in high school was the football coach and I'm pretty sure he was teaching only because the school didn't want to justify the expense of a dedicated coach.

Of course now that I have been out of high school for almost 30 years, I have had plenty of opportunities to use what was or should have been leaned in math and for the most part, had to use the internet in order to look up the formulas, how to do some of them, and in some cases the answers. But that goes to the age old saying, if I knew then what I know now, things would be different.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do we need this, exactly?

To create a job for your useless brother-in-law so your wife will let you pet the cat...

Teach kids to be inquisitive, critical thinking, human beings...

Are you serious? The entire system is designed to rip that kind of treachery out of the little rug rats... Conformity is what is required. You don't want kids asking questions...

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Dutch Gun]

Honestly, forcing computer programming on kids will have the same effect as forcing math on them. It's no different - it's a way of solving problems, except by using logic and algorithms rather than equations. It's still a general solution in search of a problem. I think a lot of tech people tend to view technology as being interesting or important for it's own sake, but that's not how the world at large sees technology (nor should it). It's only real-world value is in what it can do for us that we couldn't do before without it, as heretical as that may sound here on slashdot.

My advice to educators is to let kids make their own computer games. You'll sucker them into doing some of the hardest sort of programming there is, and they'll likely enjoy it. More importantly, for those that are more artistically or creatively inclined rather than technically inclined, they can help out with artwork, story, music, and sound effects. Videogame programming is a fantastic cross-discipline project that can involve all sorts of different skills and abilities. So, not everyone has to write code, but everyone can contribute in some way.

I've found that computer games are great at driving home the need to learn higher math as well. Geometry, linear algebra, and matrix math are all used extensively in many types of games. Kids will naturally run into these problems, and probably work in vain to come up with a home-grown solution. At that point they're primed to learn a more elegant solution using higher math. The big advantage is that this lesson concretely demonstrates the value and usefulness of that math, making it much easier to learn and appreciate since it has a useful context.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[knightghost]

75% of STEM workers leave their field. There isn't a recruiting or training shortage, there's a retention issue.

Why?

2 simple reasons:
1. STEM workers are paid less than other disciplines that require similar intelligence, skills, and experience.
2. STEM workers are pushed to lower social levels. In some places I've seen them regarded lower than the janitorial staff.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[MrBigInThePants]

"To keep the pool of employees huge and the pay low? "

Well you have the answer right there, but seemed to miss it somehow.

This is not a feel-good story of congress doing something positive for the USA's fail-sauce edumication system that leaves no child behind by slowing down all the children and teachers.

It is simply morally corrupt politicians ensuring more meat for the IT grinder run by their campaign donors to help lower IT wages.

Very plain, very simple.

Don't believe me? Where is the 100 cosponsor bill to fix the rest of the education sector?

Oh, that's right...nowhere.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

This. Don't tell kids why they need to memorize this facts and formulas, teach them how to figure them out for themselves. Teach them the basics of how things interact and let them decide which things and interactions interest them; they will then seek out the facts and formulas that are relevant to those interests. Then, you have taught them how to learn. On their own.

Which is the best kind.

That's not to say you can't, or shouldn't learn from others. Quite the opposite, in fact. One of the most important things you can possibly learn is how to tell when your source is wrong, (optionally) call them out on it, and find another source. If you can't do that, you'll forever rely on others to tell you what should be important to you and spoon-feed you "facts" about those things. On the other hand, learning "on your own" is a matter of figuring out what's actually important to you, or at least how to discern a reliable source for "what's important" for a particular subject or goal, and seek out that information yourself. That shouldn't stop you from relying on the work and knowledge of others; it just doesn't require you to do so.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

This post succinctly describes why I'm not a Java developer, no matter how many times I've set out to learn the language. I'm primarily a web developer, full-stack LAMP and JavaScript (with strong sysadmin roots), so everything I've ever set out to develop in Java had followed the same process: start development, determine I could implement it better as a web app, begin implementing as a web app, get annoyed at reimplementing logic I've already done, causing me to eventually abandon the project. It wasn't until recently, when I started a project that can't really work as a web app, that the light came on and the value of Java (likely as a stepping stone to a number of other languages) became concrete for me; as you said, making it much easier to learn and appreciate since it has a useful context.

This is how people learn. Give them a problem, give them the tools. Hell, show them what the solution should look like. Leave it to them to figure out how to get from the problem to the solution; don't tell them anything they don't ask for. Let them fuck up. When they get stumped, they'll ask for help; show them what they did wrong, don't tell them what they should have done, unless they ask. People are inherently smart, unless you teach them to be dumb.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not that people can't *do* math that is the problem; it's that they don't have an intuitive understanding of why it works that is the problem. You can write all the programs you want that use the Pythagorean theorem, but you're not necessarily ever going to come to an understanding of why it works by doing so. It's like doing 50 "Find the missing side of the triangle!"-type problems; those are utterly worthless.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about poor states? Same issue as "reinstate a severe class disparity in which poor people have no means at all of moving up the social ladder". This is not a state level issue, this is a national issue. Heck, education is a world wide issue. It is a requirement for a functional society.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

So basically, none of this applies to you. Too smart to even understand this topic.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[perpenso]

Math has been in the boring rote memorization exercise for decades in schools.

The best math teacher I ever had, including college and grad school, was from 7th grade. He went off curriculum on nearly every topic, always showing us real world practical applications of a topic/technique when the book and formal state-approved lesson plan failed to do so. It really made a difference.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

I would have loved to start a vocational type school when I was 13, yet a lone 15, but most people don't know what they want to do in the first place. There are people in their 20s that are confused about what direction to go in life.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jeIIomizer]

it's widely accepted that the population could use a significantly broader awareness of the topics involved in STEM fields.

I don't even think most people are capable of truly understanding all but the most simple concepts. You see this in math, where people think that being able to *use* math is essentially the same as having an intuitive understanding of why and how it works. And it isn't just because of our awful education system that things are like this, though that certainly helps.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[roman_mir]

Sure, ppl are confused at 20 because they haven't tried anything yet, they already have all that school debt by 20 and no idea what to do. Starting with some job at 14 would give people direction and would provide them with valuable experience.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

determine I could implement it better as a web app

Web apps are fuckin' garbage. Why would you even do that?

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

To answer your question...

I'm primarily a web developer, full-stack LAMP and JavaScript (with strong sysadmin roots)

Slashdot is a web app. You're using it. Must not be that bad.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[fche]

... plus why on earth would it need to be a *federal* matter? Education is local, at best state level jurisdiction.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[angel'o'sphere]

For ordinary programming you don't need math.
And certainly nothing beyond arithmetic.

Math is needed in programming when you start doing something more hardcore, e.g 3D engines need some (limited) knowledge about geometry. Or if you want to simulate something like a satelite orbit.

It is roughly once a year that I have to calculate something on paper that is relevant for a software project. The software projects themselve usually don't use any math except +/- I don't even remember when I used the last time * or / ...

I guess I only use it regulary in the spread sheet for my bill, sad actually.

My actual project is just a self made NOSQL DB with insane high data input and sophisticated access algorithms. There must be somewhere a * and / hidden in the code calculating the hashes to access the disk blocks ... but thst is abstracted away for me :)

So bottom line: math is overrated, you only realy need it in corner cases of software development.

That does not mean it is useless.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[sensationull]

Have you tried Slashdot beta, that squeezes more web app stuff in, the older/better version uses far less and the better version before that used even less web app JS nightmare fuel. The thing is the more heavy and 'modern' you make a web app the worse it gets.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

I won't disagree with you on that front; however, that doesn't mean all web apps are crap -- just most, as decent web devs who aren't acting under direction of the marketing and accounting departments more-so than their managers in engineering are few and far between.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's an incredibly dangerous approach to take when teaching. The state approved lesson plan and topics are what a teacher is supposed to be covering. It doesn't matter how well the teacher might cover other things, if he isn't covering those points well enough, he's probably going to be fired before too long.

I don't like it, that's why I'm happier not being in the system, but it sucks to have a system where outcome isn't important unless it shows up on a poorly designed standardized test.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not really how education works. There's a limited amount of time to cover all the material that one needs to complete highschool If students had to derive all the formulas and recreate the proofs, graduation would have to come sometime after 30th grade.

The facts aren't anywhere near as important as you seem to think. The purpose of education is to get students to be able to think critically and synthesize facts. As well as to have a basic understanding of the facts necessary to get along in society.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jeIIomizer]

The purpose of education is to get students to be able to think critically

Which is exactly what the education system is failing at. Everything is about rote memorization and passing poorly-designed standardized tests that require that you do little beyond regurgitating the facts you were supposed to memorize. What remains barely requires any critical thinking whatsoever.

It does a decent job of turning most people into rote memorization monkeys that can't think for themselves, though.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jeIIomizer]

Also, no one is saying that they have to derive all the formulas and proofs from scratch. You don't have to do that in order to come to an intuitive understanding of why things work.

All that's happening now is mindless memorization, and then most people forget a grand majority of the facts they memorized, making the whole thing almost completely worthless. That's not 'education.'

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

I must not have updated my buzzword dictionary to the latest version; I didn't know that "web app" included everything you could possibly access or interact with over the Internet.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[uncqual]

I think there is some truth to this, but there is a problem in our highly mobile society if one city teaches things in one order and another city two states away teaches things in a different order. When a student's parent's move between these two cities, their kids are screwed (for example, they may never have learned what their peers at their new school learned last year and may be bored stiff "relearning" what their peers are studying this year but they learned last year).

As well, it seems very useful for employers to be able to count on a "high school degree" from any public high school to mean that the candidate has gained some minimum level of education. Of course, we are not even close to this now but it seems like a good idea. True, employers could work with ETS or someone to develop a national testing program that employers could rely on without having to run their own tests on each candidate, but that's a lot of overhead for everyone (although, it might be a good idea given how little a high school degree means today).

The later actually might be a good business opportunity for ETS -- employers would pay $2 for each certified query of test scores (which would be fairly detailed and include the dates and number of attempts etc) and people could take the test for a small fee (the real money for ETS would be in the continuing stream of paid queries by employers). A nice uniform standard for all that employers could count on for some subset of skills assessment.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Livius]

The purpose of education is to get students to be able to think critically and synthesize facts.

It used to be, but now the education system is dedicated to a daycare/prison system to warehouse children because wages are so depressed that no family can have an able-bodied adult not bringing in a money income.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[drinkypoo]

Sorry, I don't buy into all this "we need to get kids using computers and programming in grade school!" crap. Or this "we need everyone to be in STEM!" crap.

Why do we need this, exactly? To keep the pool of employees huge and the pay low?

Training kids to go into STEM jobs won't automatically get them jobs. But training kids to go into jobs which can be automated away will automatically get them automated away.

If we don't create a future where that training will serve them, we're probably all fucked anyway.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[drinkypoo]

Some people do grasp math and those will be the nerds that eventually become STEM students. However 75% of the population will never enter this field because they're simply not wired to understand it.

What about the school system's utter failure to actually attempt to teach mathematics until one is in college? They only teach memorization and computation, and no theory whatsoever. But our forebears worked this shit out with lines and curves, with sticks and strings. Why aren't we still teaching people how mathematics actually works, so that they might understand it?

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jeIIomizer]

It used to be

While there might be a bit more rote memorization and standardized testing now, our education system was always a horrible one-size-fits-all mess.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Tablizer]

Uh, you are not helping your case

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

A beta user, I see?

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[perpenso]

Let me be clear. He did not omit the state approved curriculum. He added to it, especially so with respect to showing us how the topic being studied was used in the real world. I think the result was improving our interest and appreciation of the topic, and we performed a little better at it than we would have otherwise.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is how people learn. Give them a problem, give them the tools. Hell, show them what the solution should look like.

True, but it has a few problems: It is time-consuming. It requires a highly motivated student. It requires the student to quickly identify cause and effect. There are serious limits on the "re-invent the wheel" method of education. One doesn't want learner-drivers to discover braking technique by trial and error. Especially when good experimentation involves the learner-driver repeating the error to prove it is a error. So lessons quickly devolve into "by the number" activities. Now repeating the lesson several times will allow a student to practice on her own, but once again, that is extremely time-consuming.

People are inherently smart, unless you teach them to be dumb.

No people are inherently selfish, lazy, greedy and horny. When people really want something they might be smart. How many children really want to go to school? They might be more interested when there is more play but school is based on drilling a set of rules into their head then moving to the next set of rules. Learning through play-time also requires each child be given their own set of toys: 4 of anything for 25 students does not work in a 2 hour lesson. More toys means more money to buy them, more storage space, more teachers to explain the student's mistakes and possibly, a dedicated classroom. Lastly, motivation is a short-lived behaviour: Keeping a class of students on-topic is difficult and will be rarely achieved.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Tablizer]

What the industry really wants is desktop-like GUI's over Web/Internet protocols. The existing stack is ill-suited for that, creating spaghetti apps with 5 different languages mixed in: CSS, HTML, SQL, JavaScript, and a server-side application language, let alone multi-version/vendor headaches.

If we told somebody about this mess in the 80's, they'd laugh at us and take away our beer.

After almost 2 decades of trying, it's time to call it a failure and revamp browser language/protocol design.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, what we may want to do is to ensure students have the option to get into the T. and E. in S.T.E.M. by ensuring that they can elect to have those classes if they so choose. This might mean going to another school nearby specifically for that class, or maybe taking it at a community college. Maybe providing financial assistance to help poor school districts offer said electives would be a good idea. I'm thinking on a trial basis for 3 years, and if significant students take the classes, funding would be provided. Otherwise, the funding is cut off. But this is about providing money for electives in poor school districts who may not have the property tax revenue to justify adding those classes over the basics. And no, this isn't an justification for putting it into the common core.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

Not gonna disagree with that assessment, either. It's not like industry has never been wrong before. I mean, really, the web design community is heading toward vertical-parallax, perpetual-scrolling monstrosities that give 10% of users headaches (literally) and can't be properly bookmarked or navigated. The industry is following them down that path!

There's a reason I'm not following suit: I prefer to make things that are actually usable! Yes, it's cool to add this or that new feature and make it look nice. Everyone wants to feel like what they're building or using is cutting edge, and that's just fine, right up to the point where you start breaking usability in the name of design.

Go ahead, re-implement the select box so you can ensure that it looks the same in all browsers, across all platforms. Add type-to-search and autocomplete to it. I'm all for that, you're improving the UX... unless you don't also handle switching between selections with the up and down arrows, entering and exiting the field via the tab key (trivial if you use a *real* select box and follow progressive-enhancement, replacing the select *for display* with your new control, this is not only possible, but trivial), and confirming the highlighted selection via the enter key. If you don't implement the functionality people are expecting *before* extending, then you're actually *breaking* things. And if you can't implement the native behavior it in a handful of lines of code, you probably shouldn't implement the control at all; most likely, any extensions you make will be inefficient and clunky, as well. But, I digress...

Creating GUI apps on the desktop isn't much better, in reality. You still have a multitude of languages; the application language and GUI framework, which is typically a language of its own (WYSIWYG form builders only carry you so far), if your application interfaces with a database you still have some form of SQL, and that API you need to interface with to access that bit of data from that 3rd party service? If you care about performance, you're proxying API calls through a local server that caches the results; if you need to intelligently clear or refresh bits of that cache based on some bit of application logic, you may need something more sophisticated than a simple HTTP cache, so there's your server-side application language. Don't get me started on version headaches with libraries...

I may have been born in the 80's, but I agree... they'd have laughed and taken away your beer if you had told somebody that programming the web was going to be so much worse than writing native applications. Hell, that's a good way to lose your beer today!

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

My point was that's how you teach people to learn. This is early-childhood stuff, if it's not done by kindergarten or 1st grade, it's probably too late. Once they've learned how to learn, they'll quickly pick up how to apply new things they learn, and the rote memorization of facts our students are expected to do for the entirety of their education suddenly becomes easier, because they've been shown how to find uses for the things they're being taught.

If we can't afford enough kindergarten teachers to keep the classes down to manageable sizes for this, we're already fucked.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[fche]

"When a student's parent's move between these two cities, their kids are screwed ..."

If all it requires is some such easily-surmountable personal inconvenience to get a major federal government effort started, no wonder the feds thing *everything* is in their jurisdiction.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

To keep the pool of employees huge and the pay low?

Typical slashdot. Over the hill 40 something. Doesn't want to keep his skills current. Feels threatened by everything.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

To keep the pool of employees huge and the pay low

Sub 1% unemployment, right through the recession. I wouldn't say the pool is "huge". We're constantly trying to hire more software engineers and architects, and we have virtually no turn over.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

LAMP?! Ewww. Use a real stack like FNPP(FreeBSD, nginx, PostgreSQL, Python)

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

How can reading, writing and math be basic skills, but not using a computer? Math skills alone are useless nowadays wirhout a computer. A 19c wunderkind that solves differential equations at lightning speed would be helpless in our age.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm primarily a web developer, full-stack LAMP and JavaScript (with strong sysadmin roots), so everything I've ever set out to develop in Java had followed the same process: start development, determine I could implement it better as a web app, begin implementing as a web app, get annoyed at reimplementing logic I've already done, causing me to eventually abandon the project.

You are doing it wrong, period.

If you cannot reuse the logic you have already developed (except UI logic, obviously), that means you failed to follow the most basic separation of business logic with presentation logic. Fail.

Your project is big enough to cause you to give up when having to re-implement it, that means it is big enough to be done properly.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's just focus on the basics. Teach kids to be inquisitive, critical thinking, human beings with a strong grasp of reading and writing and math and history and geography skills and knowledge. Those with an interest in other things will pursue them and doing so will be much easier with a solid primary foundation in these universal fundamentals.

Employers do not want inquisitive, critical thinking employees. The public school system since its inception has been primarily a training facility for the corporations. Corporations want drones not human beings but in the interim they accept human beings if and only if those future employees are docile, non-thinking, and submissive to to the demands of their managers.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it crap? For years many children have really struggled with why they are learning math (at least above arithmetic). Part of the problem is that they never see how it could possibly be applied to anything, ever. By teaching programming, math can begin to be applied to something.

For 99% of programmers their mathematical skills suffice at the basic arithmetic level so your argument would result in fewer students becoming interested in computer programming, at least according to those claiming mathematics is uninteresting to students. I never studied biology in high school yet I could easily read a textbook on the subject if necessary for my work.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BorisSkratchunkov]

One of the most important things you can possibly learn is how to tell when your source is wrong, (optionally) call them out on it, and find another source. If you can't do that, you'll forever rely on others to tell you what should be important to you and spoon-feed you "facts" about those things.

So what you're saying is that if I don't like the bullshit this idiot is spoonfeeding me, I should start listening to the bullshit some other idiot wants to spoonfeed me. Your position is logically inconsistent from my perspective- you're always going to rely on others to tell you what's important and give you information (unless you're a solipsist). I find it interesting too that you think that information sources are either categorically wrong or right- it's really way more fuzzy than that, and ultimately one's ability to determine the signal-to-noise ratio of a source is what allows one to glean the juicy bits.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[RR]

I think there is some truth to this, but there is a problem in our highly mobile society if one city teaches things in one order and another city two states away teaches things in a different order. When a student's parent's move between these two cities, their kids are screwed (for example, they may never have learned what their peers at their new school learned last year and may be bored stiff "relearning" what their peers are studying this year but they learned last year).

This is not an argument for federal education standards. This is an argument for fundamental education reforms. "Oh, I'm sorry, we can't talk about arithmetic on mixed fractions this year, because that's a 4th grade subject. This is 5th grade. We're doing geometric figures." Or whatever. What about the 5th graders who didn't really get mixed fractions last year? Many of the best mathematicians were made to feel stupid in school because they would rather think slowly than rush through all the subjects in the scheduled time.

Jo Boaler has been arguing that math education should be centered around Low Floor High Ceiling Tasks. Then it matters much less when your student enters the class, because they can learn from the activity at whatever level they've mastered. Somewhere else she argues that students should work on projects over an extended period of time.

The annoying part is that educational approaches take a very long time to see if they're really effective, so it's annoying to work out what is BS and what is useful out of the things that educational reformers say.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jader3rd]

For ordinary programming you don't need math. And certainly nothing beyond arithmetic.

Right, which is why it should be taught around the same time algebra is taught. Lots of children struggle with the transition to math that isn't all numbers. Having X's and Y's, and other variables takes a surprisingly long time to mentally figure out. But if they had a year of programming (which only involved arithmetic), when algebra would be taught, a lot of the hurdles would already be overcome because they relate the math they're being taught to their programming experiences.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jader3rd]

Instead of getting more people interested in math, I predict it will wind up getting less people interested in CS.

I don't know if it would get more people interested in math, but it would help make math less foreign/absured to them.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[jader3rd]

Honestly, forcing computer programming on kids will have the same effect as forcing math on them.

You mean introducing it to them? Without school "forcing" topics on kids, many wouldn't know that those topics even existed.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

You must've been replying to a different post...

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

Or it means I said re-implement instead of port. for something I'm doing because "that might be fun", that not-so-fun (for me, at least; if you like porting between languages, more power to you) task is a good enough reason to walk away.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[BronsCon]

You don't always need to rely on what others tell you; it's called the power of observation. For things you can't learn through pure observation, yes, you rely on others, but you don't do so blindly, you use those very same powers of observation to tell when what you're being told isn't working or isn't going to work. Will you, yourself, sometimes be wrong? If course, because that, too, is part of learning. I'm sorry I didn't go into enough detail for you, but I'm writing a Slashdot comment, not a Ph.D dissertation; this is something I'm doing for leisure so I might not always maintain your perfect standards of detail. It's funny we should be in disagreement on this point when we're clearly actually not. A source needn't be broadly reliable or unreliable, but for a certain piece of information, yes, a source is either reliable or unreliable; people need to be taught, at the very least, to discern whether a piece of information they are looking at is more potentially accurate or potentially inaccurate and seek out additional sources as necessary, rather than simply relying on a source because "well, I don't know, this guy sounds smart, so he's probably right, I can't check the information for myself because reasons".

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Dutch Gun]

Honestly, forcing computer programming on kids will have the same effect as forcing math on them.

You mean introducing it to them? Without school "forcing" topics on kids, many wouldn't know that those topics even existed.

By "forcing it on them", I simply meant that it shouldn't be mandatory. A computer science course should be an optional track, same as high-level math. There's no need to push it on students who don't have an interest or inclination for it.

Don't misunderstand, I absolutely support the notion of giving kids the option of taking CS courses as early as possible. I started programming around the sixth or seventh grade myself, if I remember correctly, and it was great to have that early head start when I took my first real CS courses in college.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[angel'o'sphere]

I was not against teaching programming, I only challenged the idea that being good in math makes you a good programmer.

Actually most people with a math degree who moved into programming, are good at problem solving but bad at coding. Physicists OTOH are often medium good in both things, means they are a bit slower than mathematicians but produce better code. But they are not lazy enough as 'good coders' are who hate to repeat themselves.

The best non 'comp sci' programmer I met was a Chemist. However he had the habit to try to make every method just a one liner, well obviously that does not work, but a if or a for was always extracted into its own method. As well as the body of the then branch and the else branch and the body of the for loop. So imagine a method with 9 lines, a for loop containing an if/else. He would split it into something like 8 or 9 methods. Most programmer hated it to open one of 'his classes'. "Oh, my gosh ... 300 methods, what is going on here?" However if you got used to that style it was not to bad.

The worst ... well not the worst coder, but likely one of those who produced the worst code was also a Chemist, a Phd actually. Funnily he was one ... she actually, was one of the fastest coders I ever met. She looked at a problem (specified in german) programmed it impossibly fast, in the worst C code I have ever seen. But it always worked, it was usually on spec and she actually never spoke german with us, but only english and she was a Chinese. She never understood why we did mot like her code ... haha.

Yeah, your point about variables makes perfectly sense imho.

Re:Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

It will be just another thing that the school system will fuck up

Great...

[Anonymous Coward]

Most programmers already have absolutely no idea what they're doing. Hopefully this doesn't just encourage people who have no aptitude to try to be programmers, because we sure as hell don't need any more bad or mediocre idiots thinking they can program well.

And these "Computer Science" classes always turn out to be programming classes in disguise, rendering the name completely inappropriate.

Re:Great...

[just_a_monkey]

Won't these classes rather be on how to use word processors, spreadsheets, and other Microsoft applications, and name-the-parts-of-the-computer, and such? Maybe write some Visual BASIC on the last week of the semester.

Re:Great...

[Proudrooster]

Don't forget about about the mandatory training in Ethics and Legal Issues, Digital Citizenship, Workplace Safety, Copyright education and why the ripping of CDs is evil. :)
Here is a link to the Michigan High School CTE Computer Programming standards.
http://www.ctenavigator.org/re...

Re:Great...

[uncqual]

How appropriately ironic that this document is an Excel spreadsheet.

Amusing, but potentially a waste of time

[zkiwi34]

Saying that CS will be considered core doesn't change the simple fact that it won't make the universities care.

If you want to do CS (or EE) at uni then the requirement is top end math (Calculus) and Physics, with it being a bonus if you've also done Chemistry. Until that changes it doesn't matter what else happens, CS is going to continue to be a lame duck option for high school students.

Re:Amusing, but potentially a waste of time

[ATMAvatar]

While Physics and Chemistry are not particularly useful, it's difficult to dispute that Calculus (and, by extension, Lambda Calculus) is useful for Computer Science.

Re: Amusing, but potentially a waste of time

[Anonymous Coward]

Lambda calculus isn't really similar to integral and differential calculus (your normal everyday AP Calc). It's more like symbolic logic (since it is a system of mathematical logic).

Easy enough

[Anonymous Coward]

Make the H1B fees $50,000/head per year. That'll stop H1Bs from being abused, and we can see just how much of a lack of U.S. software engineers there really is as opposed to how much of it is just trying to lower wages -- to the benefit, as it happens, of many of the companies sponsoring code.org.

Re:Easy enough

[sumdumass]

Why would they even bother with H1Bs if it is that expensive. Import them illegally and pay them as illegals. It's what is happening with the low education jobs and the government- outside of a few angry republicans do not really care. Some of them actually encourage it. Hell, look at the kids crossing entire third party countries to come into the US because it's known that no one will make them leave.

Re:Easy enough

[uncqual]

I've thought this as well -- although I think $50K per head corporate H-1B tax is too high for many cases. It just needs to be high enough to make absolutely sure that it swamps the "fudging" on pay rates that companies do for H-1Bs. I think something like 20-25% of salary is enough.

There's plenty of times I would have happily paid that tax because there just weren't any great candidates available except H-1Bs. I hate hiring H-1Bs because of the paperwork, but have done it when I need to and have never paid them less because they were H-1Bs (and, it cost more in reality because of the legal costs, my time, and HR's time).

Should be STEM in general

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm all for broadening interest in CompSci, it is my life. However, I think we need to encourage STEM more broadly. If you absolutely have to pick one area to start with, make it math instead. That would naturally boost the rest of STEM as a bonus.

The core subjects are (should be)

[Anonymous Coward]

        Reading
        wRiting
        aRithmetic
        Relationships
        Reasoning
        Remembering
        Reviewing
        Responsibility
        Reflecting
        Researching
        Reporting
        Resolve
And the 12 Maturities...
Ambition
Sociable personality
Fitness and good health
Curiosity, enthusiasm for learning and knowledge
Confidence
Stand up for principles
Develop and defend own opinions.
Artistic appreciation and accomplishment
Empathy
Excellence of Rs
Imagination and abstract thought
Temptation : Awareness and resistance. Self discipline

More at : http://vulpeculox.net/12/index.htm

"adding fewer than 50 words" ... like ! or ~ ?

[DutchUncle]

"Honest, I only added a few symbols! Why doesn't the program work anymore?" Besides, computer science used to be part of either math or engineering, depending in which school you went to; we could just go back to that and suggest that it be a REAL SUBJECT instead of just tossing web images together and claiming you "wrote" something.

The question should be

[Anonymous Coward]

How deep is the pork barrel?

Wrong question

[frovingslosh]

..."comprehensive immigration reform efforts that tie H-1B visa fees to a new STEM education fund" could be used "to support the teaching and learning of more computer science in K-12 schools,"

Translation: We'll do this and then we'll have to let more H-1B foreigners into the country to pay for it. The question isn't how many tax dollars this law will cost, it is how many American jobs it will cost and how further American technical jobs can be devalued by an in-flood of cheap foreign labor.

Re:Wrong question

[Anonymous Coward]

>in-flood

Influx.

They should've removed one to make room.

[hsthompson69]

current core academic subjects are English, reading or language arts, mathematics, science, foreign languages, civics and government, economics, arts, history, and geography

I get english, and reading/language arts (which is english), math, science, foreign languages I suppose is a wobbler for me, civics and government smells a bit like history, but sure, count it separate, economics is pretty important, as well as history and geography...but arts? Plain old arts?

I'm sorry, but if people want to make paper mache, or paint, or draw, or throw pots, you can do that on your own damn time. It's akin to having "computer gaming", or "stamp collecting" a core academic subject -> art is a *hobby*, not an academic subject.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[frovingslosh]

One? I would have removed all of the arts and all of the foreign languages. I would certainly place computer science higher than any of those on a list of things that deserve to be "core subjects".

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[guruevi]

Architecture is an important art with plenty of math worked into it, the human body in art is also a great case for both biology and math; art is important and should be a core academic subject supporting the rest however it should not be "arts and crafts" which is not art but a way of keeping kids busy.

It should be the reasons behind art, what makes a thing aesthetically pleasing, what harmonics are and how colors and light mix but how do you convince a populace that doesn't even understand half of the words in this sentence that that is what art is and why it's important?

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

It should be the reasons behind art, what makes a thing aesthetically pleasing

That's utterly subjective, and why I think it should *not* be a core subject. If you want to take it, fine, but don't force your bullshit on me. This sort of mentality ("I like it, so everyone should have to take it.") was part of the reason why I never took public school seriously and eventually just dropped out.

Re: They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

Protip: most kids don't learn English well until they take a second language. The English teachers don't know or teach grammar, and the kids often don't really understand what's going on until they see it in an unfamiliar language. I'd rather see foreign language starting as early as possible, perhaps kindergarten, and CS remaining an elective late in the school career when higher reasoning is possible. There are developmental barriers to starting heavier logic like CS early (look up Piaget), but language acquisition faces no such cognitive impediment (look up Chomsky).

Re: They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

Protip: most kids don't learn English well until they take a second language.

Protip: Nonsense. That has more to do with bad teaching than it does having to take a foreign language to understand the native language of your own fucking country. My high school forced people to take French when I was in school, and it was simply awful. Bad teaching will make any subject seem impossible to learn, especially since most people seem to have no desire to learn on their own, and would rather be spoon fed (hence, public 'education').

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

That says more about you and the people who failed you when you were a child than about the value of arts or foreign languages compared with computer science.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think what it says about him is that he cares about critical thinking and useful innovation more than uselessly 'learning' foreign languages (hint: learning foreign languages in classroom is very inefficient, and is almost never successful) or forcing subjective subjects (art) upon people and subjectively saying that it makes them better people.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

> That's utterly subjective, and why I think it should *not* be a core subject.

I'm not surprised you dropped out. Art is not utterly subjective, there is a large body of work and non-prescriptive codifications that cover it. It includes typography, design, marketing, psychology, maths, visuals, communication.

Without it you're not a real person, just some kind of autistic literalist who won't reach their potential. You know, like you.

Art is very much an analog of STEM.

Art can be the synthesis of technical and aesthetic considerations. Our communication is artistic. It's very important if you want to design objects, processes, interfaces, documents, software even, that aren't shit. You know, like you do.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

I'm not surprised you dropped out.

I'm more surprised than anyone with even an ounce of intelligence can withstand our abysmal education system.

Art is not utterly subjective

Of course not. The magical opinion fairy said so, so it must be objective.

It includes typography, design, marketing, psychology, maths, visuals, communication.

Why not just classify everything as art? Logic is art. Everything is art. People can't even agree on what qualifies as art, so it very much is subjective.

Without it you're not a real person

Nice job denying that it's not subjective while trotting out the usual ambiguous statements that literally don't mean anything concrete.

Am I also not a True Scotsman?

just some kind of autistic literalist who won't reach their potential.

It seems that "autistic" is nothing more than a buzzword you people like to use to describe anyone you don't like. Not even bad scientists (i.e. most psychologists) would agree with your usage of that word.

Art is very much an analog of STEM.

How comical! How comical!

It's very important if you want to design objects, processes, interfaces, documents, software even, that aren't shit.

It's very important that you dig a giant hole in the ground with a spoon before you develop a piece of software, to prevent it from being shit.

You know, like you do.

You're actually a loser who's addicted to cocaine. I heard you also beat your wife.

What, I'm completely wrong? I don't know shit about you, because you're just a random idiot posting comments online? Well, then perhaps you'd like to try not makes random assumptions about people.

So yeah, nice job making a long post that doesn't show that art is not subjective. All you've done is further convince me that you can't even come up with a coherent scientific definition of art that isn't utterly subjective.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

that*
making*

Anyway, I think it would be better to just refer to whatever it is you're thinking of by its specific name rather than just classifying everything as "art" and expecting people to know what the fuck you're talking about. You couldn't pick a more ambiguous term than "art." Because I have a feeling the kind of "art" I'm thinking of is different from the kind you're thinking of. Traditional art classes are a waste of time and should not be mandatory. I am not referring to mathematics or whatever else you or others classify as art.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[hsthompson69]

I'm not buying it.

Architecture is math. Calling it "art" misses the point of structural integrity and geometry.

The human body is biology. The human body in "art", without the requirement to be accurate, but merely aesthetically pleasing, isn't useful. You may be referring to Davinci's detailed human body renderings - in the modern world, we've no need of those since we have more accurate ways of imaging and reproducing the human body in images.

Art is a great hobby, but not a core subject. Hell, as a color blind person, by your definition, it's even less important.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm going to assume you're late teens to mid 20s. Because I can't believe anybody else would disregard art as important. I'm a software engineer. I tend to work from firmware up to middleware. I'm not a particularly artistic individual, though I appreciate it. As such, you don't want me designing something that people actually use directly. If somebody tells me what to do for an interface, I can do it, but coming up with it on my own, it's clunky and difficult to use. Every time. Now, there are those people with a much more aesthetic eye then myself. They come up with the actual user interfaces. Their stuff relies on what I've done to function, but without what they've done, what's the point of my work? Software which can't be used is pointless. I appreciate what they do, as long as there's mutual respect that their stuff doesn't work without my stuff, and my stuff is pointless without their stuff. And their stuff is more grounded in art, then it is in STEM.

And in all fairness, somebody who can't appreciate anything outside of function, is classified to some extent as autistic.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

You know what the difference between an architect and a civil engineer is? One has studied art extensively, the other hasn't. Nobody looks at a building and goes "wow, look at that structural integrity".

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[russotto]

It should be the reasons behind art, what makes a thing aesthetically pleasing, what harmonics are and how colors and light mix but how do you convince a populace that doesn't even understand half of the words in this sentence that that is what art is and why it's important?

Significant progress towards that last would qualify you for a doctorate, because it would certainly be breaking new ground in the field.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

> All you've done is further convince me that you can't even come up with a coherent scientific definition of art that isn't utterly subjective.
I don't think you understand what "utterly" means, and your very black-and-white mode of thought inspired the "jibes". We will not ever come up with a coherent scientific definition of art until we can do so with the mechanisms that underly thought and emotion. It doesn't change the fact that aesthetics exist, and although peoples responses to various aspects may vary, it's certainly true that people respond to forms, nuances, and even cluster to a great degree in their preferences. They can also recognise "good design" (a near optimal solution to a technical, cost, aesthetics problem, or something that works well).

> What, I'm completely wrong? I don't know shit about you

Funny, because you can tell a lot about you from your post - you're very literal minded and can't detect hyperbole, sarcasm. You're also prone to being defensive rather than realistic about what you actually know. You probably don't have much exposure to areas outside your work and where you live, and if you haven't fixed that by the time you're 20 years older, you'll never know what you're missing.

If you actually know anything, or are good at anything, you could at least own up to the fact that you got there by being open-minded, receptive, and figuring out what you don't know. Have you lost that skill?

Anyway my life is too short for you/this. Good luck.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[hsthompson69]

No, it tends to be looking at a building that has collapsed because it was artful, but structurally unsound, when people go all, "wow, that was really pretty, but didn't have a lot of structural integrity."

That being said, for a job that has only around 100k jobs in the US, out of a total of 150 million, doesn't seem like it warrants being a core subject:

http://www.aia.org/press/AIAS0...

"The National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) estimates the number of architects licensed in the United States at 105,847."

http://www.deptofnumbers.com/e...

"There were 139,004,000 jobs in the US in July 2014 according to the CES survey of employers. The CPS survey of households showed 146,352,000 employed persons for the month. "

Around 7/100ths of 1% - sounds like a hobby market to me.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

I don't think you understand what "utterly" means

Sure I do.

We will not ever come up with a coherent scientific definition of art until we can do so with the mechanisms that underly thought and emotion.

So, you admit that it doesn't exist. But even if you did come up with such a definition, I don't think it would change anything in regards to this conversation, because what I'm speaking of is the traditional type of art class found in schools (painting, making sculptures, etc.), and was always what I was talking about. I will never support making those mandatory.

Categorizing absolutely everything as "art" will not change my opinion.

It doesn't change the fact that aesthetics exist

No one said that they don't exist.

They can also recognise "good design" (a near optimal solution to a technical, cost, aesthetics problem, or something that works well).

What is and is not good is subjective, as are a number of other words you used there.

Funny, because you can tell a lot about you from your post

Only in your imagination. This focus on irrelevancies doesn't seem very creative to me, by the way.

You're also prone to being defensive rather than realistic about what you actually know.

Then you're being rather defensive yourself.

You probably don't have much exposure to areas outside your work and where you live, and if you haven't fixed that by the time you're 20 years older, you'll never know what you're missing.

I could easily say the same about you, fool. And if you haven't dug giant holes in the ground with a spoon, you won't know what you're missing.

It's always funny to me to see people apply their subjective standards to everyone else as if they're objective. "You won't be a True Human if you don't do X!"

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

I'm going to assume you're late teens to mid 20s.

Based on absolutely nothing. I'm actually 33.

Also, my age has nothing to do with the validity of what I say.

Because I can't believe anybody else would disregard art as important.

You think you speak for everyone else, do you? Believe it, fool; there are all sorts of people on this planet.

Besides, what I'm *actually* saying is that I believe it should not be mandatory as a class.

Now, there are those people with a much more aesthetic eye then myself.

Subjective.

Software which can't be used is pointless.

What is and is not pointless is subjective. Though I would agree with your opinion.

And in all fairness, somebody who can't appreciate anything outside of function, is classified to some extent as autistic.

I'll have none of your pseudo-psychological nonsense, thank you. You might think you can diagnose random people over the Internet with autism, but it's simply not going to work out too well for you, I think.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

>> We will not ever come up with a coherent scientific definition of art until we can do so with the mechanisms that underly thought and emotion.
> So, you admit that it doesn't exist
No, I don't. Do you believe your mind does not exist?

> I'm speaking of is the traditional type of art class found in schools (painting, making sculptures, etc.),
>I will never support making those mandatory.
These are a synthesis of a means of expression (which requires technical skill) and the expression of something worthwhile in the medium. Do you support making lessons in other forms of self-expression mandatory or are you saying that e.g. students should not be required to sully themselves in e.g. any study of literature?

> What is and is not good is subjective, as are a number of other words you used there.
Human society isn't a prolog database. Sorry about that. However there is sufficient clustering in opinions that you cannot credibly claim that there is no substance to any concepts in art.

> It's always funny to me
I'm sure it is. The problem is that you exist in a society that is not wholly utilitarian and is not driven evidentially. That makes it your problem.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

No, I don't.

"We will not ever come up with a coherent scientific definition of art until we can do so with the mechanisms that underly thought and emotion."

Do you support making lessons in other forms of self-expression mandatory or are you saying that

I support making very basic things that provide demonstrably useful and measurable benefits (basic math, the native language of your country, etc.) mandatory. Subjective things such as painting don't interest me.

Human society isn't a prolog database.

Nor does it need to be.

However there is sufficient clustering in opinions that you cannot credibly claim that there is no substance to any concepts in art.

Popularity does not change reality. If many people have a certain opinion, then all that means is that many people have a certain opinion; nothing more.

That makes it your problem.

While I do think it's a problem, it's not objectively a problem.

In my opinion, you're being pretty melodramatic about someone not wanting arts and crafts to be mandatory in public schools. Sometimes I wonder if you even understand what I'm talking about.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[Anonymous Coward]

Things exist and have value even if there is no coherent scientific basis for them.

Like for example, the sun, before any understanding of nuclear physics.

>Sometimes I wonder if you even understand what I'm talking about.
I think you don't. There is much more to life than what you consider "objectively beneficial" subjects such as arithmetic, and you're quite wrong to think that they quantify in any kind of constant fashion.

But good luck, enjoy whatever you can.

Re:They should've removed one to make room.

[jeIIomizer]

Things exist and have value even if there is no coherent scientific basis for them.

I'll give you that they exist, but value is subjective.

There is much more to life than what you consider

Look, no one's going to forbid you from taking art classes. If you like that sort of thing, then take them, but don't force them on others. Why is this so hard to understand?

and you're quite wrong to think that they quantify in any kind of constant fashion.

They can be measured far more easily, and have practical value to a grand majority of the planet.

Stupid idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Ultimately, no significant cash would reach the classrooms, but piles of new regulations and requirements would.

We do not need more STEM workers; we have a surplus as is proven by the fact that wages in the field are essentially flat (a shortage would drive wages up). US employers do not even want American STEM workers; they want the inexpensive, pliable, and held-hostage-by-immigration-papers variety. Half the STEM workers we already have are working outside of their fields and we have millions of unemployed. If we need to have ANY effort to boost ANY career area via education manipulation it should be a massive boost in the skilled trades like welding.

Education is simply NOT a federal responsibility, and every federal intervention has made things worse. If you read even the letters by ordinary Civil War soldiers to their families you see how far our education system has degraded - in comparison I'd rate most current high school grads as illiterate. The education most Americans got in "the basics" in the 1930's (often in one-room school houses, often run by a young woman with a two-year degree) produced a generation able to build the and use the industrial might for WWII - something the current generation probably could not do. Many of THAT generation were then able to go on to college and get actual degrees (as opposed to degrees in ethinc or women's studies) and then "put a man on the moon". Subsequent generations educated with lots of federal government meddling are unable to put a monkey into space today (even given all the information the earlier guys had to learn the first time and given far more time than the earlier guys had). The feds are too slow to react properly (they'll set standards that rapidly become obsolete and will still be pushing stuff when industry no longer uses it) and any money gets filtered through too many hands, funding too many "experts" and administrators before it gets from the taxpayer, to Washington, back to the taxpayer's state and ultimately trickles into his child's school. For every million tax dollars, I'd bet $10 makes it into a classroom, where we keep being told teachers need to buy their own chalk despite education funding being higher per-pupil than ever before.

A further problem is that things like programming are more like art than many other things - a bit of a "calling" where you need to like it and have a talent for it or you will suck at it no matter how well-trained. Most kids will never be programmers, never care about programming, etc. Teaching all kids CS stuff is a bit like forcing all kids to join the chess club or the marching band.

Re:Stupid idea

[Anonymous Coward]

> If you read even the letters by ordinary Civil War soldiers to their families you see how far our education system has degraded

In 1870 20% of 14 year olds were totally illiterate. 100 years later it was 0.6%. In some instances letters that survive were written by having someone transcribe them for the illiterate and having someone at the other end read them aloud to illiterate spouses or parents.

> The education most Americans got in "the basics" in the 1930's (often in one-room school houses, often run by a young woman with a two-year degree) produced a generation able to build the and use the industrial might for WWII

The illiteracy rate at 14 was still an average of over 3% in the 1930s, very much higher than now.

http://nces.ed.gov/NAAL/lit_hi...

Re:Stupid idea

[GrimShady]

The illiteracy rate at 14 was still an average of over 3% in the 1930s, very much higher than now.

yes back then they had not discovered yet that it is just easier to redefine how to measure illiteracy than to teach better. We got that all fixed now though :)

Re:Stupid idea

[Anonymous Coward]

If you read even the letters by ordinary Civil War soldiers to their families you see how far our education system has degraded

There was a 20-25% illiteracy rate in the US around the time of the Civil War. Its less than 1% now. Unfortunately there were no measurements for "reading level" back around the time of the Civil War so a true quantitative test to compare the two periods of time is not available. Your anecdotal evidence of "Civil War soldiers letters to their families" alone doesn't cut it, sorry.

Many of THAT generation were then able to go on to college and get actual degrees

Look up US isolationaism pre WWII and the military-industrial complex that the US formed to enter the war late. The US government profited from the war as did many US companies. A strong economy combined with a strong population growth = significant advantage for oh, 20-30 years, i.e. an entire generation. Let's also not forget inequality of wealth issue which was relatively sane back then compared to today. Next argument please.

A further problem is that things like programming are more like art than many other things - a bit of a "calling" where you need to like it and have a talent for it or you will suck at it no matter how well-trained

I knew from 2nd grade I would never be an artist, yet I was required to take the class until 8th grade. Its called a well-rounded education.

Ultimately, no significant cash would reach the classrooms, but piles of new regulations and requirements would.

This I absolutely agree with. Vision and execution often have very different expected results. I absolutely disagree with CS being a core part of curriculum. We have enough problems with computer literacy, nevermind computer science itself being introduced. I _AM_ however, absolutely in agreement to have a logic class for every person before they get out of high school. You don't need to teach programming, you need the fundamentals of programming - logic. Make this one of the rotating courses that is attended for one hour per week. True / False, If Then Else, etc. are not difficult concepts to introduce in a formal classroom setting. e.g. "Tom had a hot meal for breakfast" ... OK, then Tom did not eat Cheerios (unless he added bacon to his Cheerios, but I digress...). Some folks got a bit of this in their math courses if they had a good math instructor but its severely lacking with most adults. I can dream though...

MM = 1000 * 1000

[Anonymous Coward]

This is common knowledge, right?

Re:MM = 1000 * 1000

[perpenso]

This is common knowledge, right?

MM = 1,000 + 1,000 = 2,000. And it would have been common knowledge about 2,000 years ago, not so much today. :-)

Stopping the race to the bottom

[cowdung]

I applaud this effort.

I recently toured 14 campuses in the US and it is clear to me that Engineering and Science is a low priority for most american youth based on the comments I heard from students and tour guides. Also, movies and tv shows keep portraying scientists, engineers and computer people as weird and devoid of social life.

If the US is to continue to be a country of innovation it needs to inform its youth that the highest demand jobs are those that involve MATH and Science and Engineering. It needs to give these subjects a higher priority in the curriculum. Because it is through these subjects that people will be able to BUILD the future.

Its nice that so many people are in to art history, or sociology, or communications. But what the economy needs is innovators that can bring technological solutions to make the world a better place. The salary discrepancies clearly show this.

Teaching programming will help students model and understand the world and to solve its technological problems.

70% of the youth in Asia chose Science and Engineering jobs. In the Americas the trend is the opposite only about 30% chose these fields. No wonder so many work at Walmart and are wondering if higher education is worth the investment.

Re:Stopping the race to the bottom

[Anonymous Coward]

No wonder so many work at Walmart and are wondering if higher education is worth the investment.

'Everybody's gotta go to college!' is a poisonous mentality that only kills education. If many people who don't belong in college/university (people who just want a job and don't care about true education, unintelligent people, etc.) start going, colleges and universities drop standards to appeal to these people in order to get more money, and education suffers. Most colleges are like this, and some universities are like this.

As someone who went to a good university, I can say with certainty that most people simply don't belong. They should go to trade schools, or stay out altogether. Colleges and universities are for people who want to increase their understanding of the universe.

Re:Stopping the race to the bottom

[MobyDisk]

Does this effort solves the fundamental problem that you bring up? Kids aren't interested in these fields because they are hard and mathy. American society does not value those things. I bet you could get more kids into CS by teaching them shop than by teaching them CS. Like you say: Society has to value BUILDING. Reinvigorate that first.

Re:Stopping the race to the bottom

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at it this way. A residential realtor had three weeks of training and earns more than most engineers.

It's a trick question...

[guygo]

The vaulted Speaker of the House has already stated it is a better metric to judge them on how many laws they have repealed. Oh... nevermind.

Bad idea

[blindseer]

When I was in school the "computer" class was not much more than learning to type. We got to play with AppleWorks and some sort of graphics program, the best one could get with 8 bits of color.

I recall a conversation I had with a co-worker about how we need more and better computers in schools or our children will be somehow educationally stunted. I pointed out how the Apple ProDos and Microsoft DOS systems we used reflected the Windows 7, Mac OSX, and Linux systems we use today. Elementary school children don't need fancy computers. I wonder if they need computers at all. I'm sure that skills like typing will be important, I took that in high school. Students will need to understand that computers do what they are told, not what you want them to do, but that is true of many things. Mathematics, physics, and chemistry have similar rules. I could argue that law has similar rigor, words mean things. If the law does not mean what you want it to mean then change the law. Perhaps that is a rant for another time.

Point is that computers are an important part of modern life. Computer technology is still changing fast, whether it is faster or slower now than when I was in grade school is debatable. Rather than teach "computers" to children perhaps we need to find a way to work computers into every subject. Art class should have a portion where students work in PhotoShop, just like they have sections on clay, paint, or colored pencils. Shop class should have a portion on CNC milling. Mathematics has all kinds of options to work in computing. Chemistry and physics classes can work in computers to run simulations and compare to real world experimentation, or do some statistical analysis on data collected in experiments.

I believe that teaching "computer science" at too young of an age is a bad idea. It will do little to prepare children for life as an adult. I suspect most implementations of "computer science" at anything other than college or trade school levels will be twisted into something that is not "computer science". It will be much like what I had in school, an excuse to play with expensive toys and the only real skills derived from it will be learning how to type. It doesn't have to be that way but I believe that is how it will end up because real computer scientists rarely choose to teach, they make more money doing something else. Much of the issues with teachers not getting paid enough has to do with the government funded education system we have now.

Re:Bad idea

[Anonymous Coward]

If the law does not mean what you want it to mean then change the law.

Or have a bigger legal budget than the opposition.

Re:Bad idea

[Anonymous Coward]

The point of CS education _should_ be to teach that the computer and the Internet is not magic, and that anybody can develop the ability to command it to do your bidding. It should be like driver's ed - what you should or shouldn't do with a computer.

Re:Bad idea

[Anonymous Coward]

I could argue that law has similar rigor, words mean things. If the law does not mean what you want it to mean then change the law.

You could argue that, but you would be wrong. The law means what the people in power want it to mean either because they wrote it or because they ignore the parts they don't like, as President Obama is fond of doing, but banish from your head any notion that the law is based upon either logic or reason because that is most definitely not the case. It's a common misconception among ordinary people, but the law is almost never logical or reasonable. It exists merely as a tool for use by the powerful to control the unwashed masses.

Re:Bad idea

[jeIIomizer]

It should be like driver's ed - what you should or shouldn't do with a computer.

That doesn't sound like Computer Science at all; it sounds like an abomination. If you want to force people to take "Microsoft Essentials"-type classes where specific software and tips are learned by rote, then give them proper names; don't lie and say it's CS.

Re:Bad idea

[physicsphairy]

I generally agree, but some free access computers would have been nice to have. I was interested enough in computers as a child to read all the available books in the library, including books on DOS and C and Larry Wall's Programming Perl, but I never had the chance to compile anything. Needless to say it didn't quite stick in the sense of learning to program, although it did provide a bit of foundation for such things later on.

When we actually did use computers the instructor always seemed like the least knowledgeable person on how to use them, and the class would mostly distract themselves with the internet while the instructor struggled with the projector and offered largely obvious comments.

The most I ever learned about computers was when I managed to put Trinux on a floppy, and then Knoppix on a CD, and commandeer my teachers' computers during lunchtime. But it's impossible to play around in normal circumstances -- the teachers of course find it far simpler to forbid you to do anything interesting rather than be responsible for fixing it if something gets broken.

Are computers a necessary tool for teaching math, science, arithmetic? No, probably they are just a distraction. Are they an interesting study and means to create and explore in their own right? Yes, absolutely.

Vocational math class ...

[perpenso]

From talking to older family members it seems that the US had a two track educational system in the 1940s and 50s too. One track vocationally oriented and one college prep oriented. Everyone took math classes of some sort for most/all of high school, even the kids on the vocational track. On the vocational track it was practical job site oriented math (which included some algebra and trig techniques) plus some financial literacy and home economics.

I think in this respect the non-college prep kids were better served back then.

Quizzes on operator precedence ...

[perpenso]

Count on school to turn highly interesting, mentally-stimulating subjects (like math) into boring rote memorization exercises.

I can see it now, quizzes on operator precedence for all the C language operators.

Re:Quizzes on operator precedence ...

[plover]

I also figure with our inept, corrupt lawmakers, they'll mandate something too specific that will tie future classrooms full of kids into the 2014 equivalent of punch cards.

Will have to cut art and music to fit it in

[Joe_Dragon]

Will have to cut art and music to fit it in

Computer and electronics literacy ...

[perpenso]

They probably won't be learning CS. Most people, including many around here, mistake CS for anything computer related.

Perhaps I'm being overly optimistic, but if they incorporate some practical computer lesson and projects into the curriculum it may not be so bad. Things that are more general and practical in nature. Perhaps creating a web page that involves a little java script, maybe connecting a temperature sensor to a raspberry pi and writing a script to read it, etc. Are these CS or EE, not really, more computer/electronics literacy in my opinion.

I'm thinking of a class project that we did in 9th grade science class. We had a transparent plastic box and lid, the box had cm markings on the side. In the box was placed a terrain model with hills and valleys. We added water to the box until reaching a cm line and while looking straight down through the lid traced the water lines. We repeated this at the various cm lines. In effect we created a topographical map. Were we doing geography in the university geography class sense, no, but it was a very useful lesson in the general sense of scientific literacy(*). I think we could do a better job with such lesson with respect to computer and electronics literacy.

Again, I admit to being perhaps overly optimistic. I'm sure the US Gov't could royally botch any such attempt to improve computer and electronics literacy through simple practical lessons and projects.

(*) It was also an incredibly valuable lesson when I later learned land navigation with map and compass, route planning, ... so many others were just stuck on how these lines on a topo map represented terrain features.

Just one more thing,

[MouseTheLuckyDog]

the teachers won't teach to the students.

A better question

[LynnwoodRooster]

Why do we have a federal Department of Education? Is there a set of common guidelines that apply uniformly for all school districts across These United States? A set of rules, goals, and guidelines that apply to inner-city Harlem, NY as well as ultra-rural American Falls, ID? Eliminate this Department, give the money back to the States, and be done with it.

Re:A better question

[Anonymous Coward]

Its now called Common Core, but is only recent in the department's long history.

Ignoring that bit for now, I believe a lot of what the department does is education funding, not making rules. Of course that means the federal level takes its "cut" before the funding gets back to the schools/students. You also have the additional disadvantantage of the ACA (Obamacare) being partially funded by interest paid on student loans. When the ACA passed, nearly 100% of all college loans became federal loans and the interest is needed to make the ACA "deficit neutral" when it passed. If you were to get rid of that now, banks would provide those loans and the ACA would have an even bigger deficit than it does now. Student loans are not dismissable by bankruptcy because the federal government doesn't do with less money, its not private banks that forced that. They were dismissable before the feds started taking them over.

I think you could have gotten rid of it 6 years ago without too much trouble, but now its integrated into too many other things to do away with.

A bit off topic, but thought I'd give you answers to your direct questions.

Re:A better question

[TechyImmigrant]

> When the ACA passed, nearly 100% of all college loans became federal loans and the interest is needed to make the ACA "deficit neutral" when it passed.

And the interest is 8 fucking percent. For a loan that has a government guarantee and therefore should be around 2%.

We just (yesterday) transmuted an offspring's student loan into a line of credit on the house with half the percentage. Presumably if everyone did that, the available interest money to the feds would be reduced by 100%.

278: 218 Representatives plus 60 Senators

[Anonymous Coward]

It takes 218 Representatives to pass a bill in the House and 60 Senators to close debate in the Senate. Therefore, the answer to the question (How Many Members of Congress Does It Take to Pass a $400 Million CS Bill?) is 278 members of Congress. You can actually manage with fewer than that if some don't vote, but that's the safest answer to the question. 278 is sufficient.

I imagine it went down like this:

[VortexCortex]

What if we just manufacutred criminals by making it illegal to tamper with a URL bar's contens, and then taught every kid to code!

"Genius! This thing prints money!"

-- Reform the fucking CFAA. Every kid has a million times more accessibility to coding and information than when I taught myself at age 8. If you're not coding it's either because you don't want to, or your parents are fucking daft.

Orders of Magnitude

[Anonymous Coward]

Lemme check: National Debt: $17 T
Program cost: $0.000 4 T

Where is the other $16 999 6 T of expenditure?

What are the proposed gains?

Who proposes this? Politicians? Techies? Techie-corporations?

Oh, I'm sorry; did my reality interfere with your politics?

Darn.

'Murica!

[Anonymous Coward]

F*ck yeah!

" I have an idea, lets make everyone programmers, then we can demand a decent pay! "
brought to you by the american society for cashiers.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

"programming class"

[globaljustin]

I did programming at school and

....and that's where the whole discussion goes off the rails. It seems like a simple concept..as you say, "the teachers knew what they were doing and how to teach things"...but anything "tech" is going to draw money, hype, and BS artists (irresistable to politicians)

We need **coding** or, if you prefer **programming** class in high schools.

as a distinction from your standard "computer" class...the one that teaches the history of computing and a survey of the technology

Part of the problem is the "STEM" concept has taken hold in mainstream parlance. It's a reductive concept...it turns something that ***anyone who went to high school understands*** the subjects of math and science in all their incarnations...and makes it into something that idiot education people can yell about.

I used to be an "education person" and I'm not insulting the profession...most teachers who follow modern teaching methods would completely agree with what I'm saying.

Education funding should be a non-issue. It's about as obvious as wiping your ass...it's just basic survival instinct.

I'm not making false dichotomies about the politics...****education funding issues are all Republican's fault****

The GOP uses artificial budget scarcity as a way to privatize school systems (justified by all the horrible test scores from the underfunded schools).

But look...STEM, whateverthefuckthatmeans...if it means Math and Science and the application thereof...stuff like coding...then lets do it.

Also, let's make a Computer survey class a prerequisite...just like all high schoolers must know a minimum of biology...seriously technology literacy should be factored in there.

Re:"programming class"

[Anonymous Coward]

Education funding should be a non-issue. It's about as obvious as wiping your ass...it's just basic survival instinct.

I'm not making false dichotomies about the politics...****education funding issues are all Republican's fault****

The GOP uses artificial budget scarcity as a way to privatize school systems (justified by all the horrible test scores from the underfunded schools).

It's that sort of no knowledge line of thought that's led the US to be 1st in $/child but close to last in performance/child. US schools are OVERfunded to the point they waste shittons of money building things like $50M highschool football stadiums.

http://rossieronline.usc.edu/u-s-education-versus-the-world-infographic/
"and performance versus eleven countries. The U.S. is the clear leader in total annual spending, but ranks 9th in Science performance and 10th in Math."

Greasy finger prints

[sparkeyjames]

That 300 to 400 Million must be just for the sanitary wipes to clean the keyboards of greasy finger prints and cheetos crumbs.

$400 million is not a trivial amount of money

[Anonymous Coward]

It works out to more than a dollar per man, woman, and child in the USA.

Secondly, how long will the money last before additional funds are needed? If the rollout takes three years, then starting in year four the public schools will need additional funds to keep the programs they have, unless the teachers want to work for free, and the equipment and textbooks are free as well.

Smacks of a lowball type pitch, like we're accustomed to hearing from businesses ("Now you can enjoy cable TV for as low as $19.95 a month...")

Re:$400 million is not a trivial amount of money

[PPH]

It works out to more than a dollar per man, woman, and child in the USA.

Not much in comparison to the entire tax take. But what is it per K-12 student? Or per instructor?

code.org's approach seems to be getting instructors up to speed on the curriculum. That amount of money might be suficient. But then what do we have to buy in terms of hardware, software, books, etc. for each student? $400M probably isn't going to hack it. So once you have the teacher at the head of the classroom and the kids don't have fully onfigured laptops, we will need to come up with more to protect the initial sunk cost.

If Microsoft thinks this means a copy of MVS on every student's desktop, they are having a wet dream the likes of which I can't imagine.

Re:$400 million is not a trivial amount of money

[tompaulco]

It works out to $4,000 per school in the United States. I would say that is a pretty good bargain. I know we have spent about $1 million outfitting our small (about 40 people) company's IT infrastructure. The fact that the U.S. government can do it for on average about 10 times that number of users for 1/250th the cost is pretty impressive.

It's 400 Million --- after typo was corrected

[Taco Cowboy]

According to this site - http://blogs.seattletimes.com/... - the cost will be around $300 Million to $400 Million, per year

But what can 300-400 Million buy these days ? Let's see ...

According to Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L... - one F35C comes with the price tag of US$299.5M

It's up to you guys to decide where you wanna put your $$$ --- on educating the younger generation or feeding your $$$ to the industrial military complex

CS Unplugged

[Anonymous Coward]

http://csunplugged.org/

"CS Unplugged is a collection of free learning activities that teach Computer Science through engaging games and puzzles that use cards, string, crayons and lots of running around."

Sorry, but... why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Critical thinking is probably the single most important thing they could add to the school system.... but the last thing politicians want is a population with strong critical thinking skills.

Re:278: 218 Representatives plus 60 Senators

[Concerned Onlooker]

Dammit. I got n+1.

Microsoft and Computer Science

[symbolset]

Microsoft thinks computer science education is teaching students how to use Office.

So, what is CS?

[RR]

I think this is a horrible, bad idea because we don't really know what computer science is. It's such a young discipline that many of the important pioneers are still around.

Well, the very first generation, the people who figured out how dancing machinery could represent arbitrary mathematical operations, those people died a generation ago. But many of the foundations of modern computer science, those were pretty arbitrary, and those people are either still around or recently dead: John McCarthy of LISP (1927-2011), Donald Knuth of sequential algorithms (TAOCP, b. 1938), Douglas Engelbart of the human-centered GUI (NLS, 1925-2013), Claude Shannon of Information Theory (1916-2001), Paul Baran of packet networking (1926-2011), Edsger Dijkstra of structured programming (1930-2002), John Backus and Peter Naur of programming language specification (BNF, 1924-2007 and b. 1928), and so on.

Naturally, there are disagreements about what exactly computer science should be about. Dijkstra argued it should be fundamentally mathematical, and forbade students in his intro to CS class from touching a computer or trying to "run" the algorithms that they worked through. Abelson and Sussman said it should be about program structure and interpretation, and their intro to CS class uses a language intended for clarity of teaching rather than for efficient execution. Some people think it should be about algorithms, as seen in those Code.org drag-and-drop algorithm block exercises. Clearly, most people think it should be about writing programs in whatever programming language is commercially useful, so most intro to CS classes are about Java. Yuck.

Since there is this wide variety of opinions about what computer science should be about, and especially the wide gulf between what the best do (MIT, Berkeley: SICP, in Scheme or Python) versus the worst (College Board, Community Colleges: Java), I think it's very premature to ask politicians to start mandating CS across this nation. You just know, whatever they decide, it will be wrong and slow to change. Let the field shake out another generation or two, and our grandchildren will see if the subject has matured enough by then.

Re:So, what is CS?

[tompaulco]

CS when I was in school was teaching kids how to program computers. It was in BASIC, but it was something. CS now is teaching kids how to browse the internet and how to illegally obtain music and videos. My stepson came out of high school CS class knowing how to burn DVDs, but had to ask me what program one might use if one wanted to write an essay.

AI I I

[Tablizer]

By the time they graduate, robots will write the programs.

Teachers with Modpoints

[drinkypoo]

U mad, bro?

$400 million dollars is peanuts for CS

[russotto]

Isn't that the cost of a CS education at Stanford nowadays

Re:$400 million dollars is peanuts for CS

[Anonymous Coward]

According to the summary, its actually $400MM which is $400,000,000,000,000 ( $400 trillion, or $400 million million)

400 trillion dollars is a huge amount of money that is in NO WAY peanuts.

How much does Python and a book cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

So how much does a Python interpreter and a book like Practical Programming from O'Reilly cost, anyway? What makes computer science so expensive? Schools already have laptops for students and Internet access. What are they spending all this money on?

If we had the best K-12 system today...

[Anonymous Coward]

If we had the best K-12 system today, in 20-30 years we would be able to compete in global markets again. And maybe even solve some problems that have been vexing us today, such as poverty.

i, for one welcome..

[mordjah]

.. all the new cs jobs ;-)

lol

[Anonymous Coward]

They say government and civics are core subjects but I'm pretty sure no one in america gives a shit or we couldn't continually elect horrible snakes to offices. Maybe it's just me because I took AP and Honors classes and was a TA for my old government teacher and hung out after school but again, no one knows what the fuck they're doing with government.

I imagine it went down like this:

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking as a programmer, OR C) Because there are 50000 other fucking things in the universe more interesting than coding if coding isn't the only thing you care about.

Also cowdung, IT jobs are not the highest in demand. It's not 2000 anymore, no one cares about IT. They still hire us all the time but that's because it's easier to find IT people than it is people with actual "skilled labor" experience in America. Go look at jobs, especially entry jobs, and you'll discover IT is literally the lowest paying profession in the country outside of food service and retail in most regions, until you get to upper mid and upper level jobs that require at least 10 years experience. You can work your balls off in IT for yeaaaaaars and get a "good" position in which you're still lucky to only make 45k a year, meanwhile some clown who spent 24 weeks learning to weld can make that money right out of the gate.

Re:Too White For Obama ... He Will Fail It

[sparkeyjames]

Your projector has it's light out.

um, I think you meant "vaunted", but....

[Anonymous Coward]

given that you seem to buy into the "progressive" idea that you can measure the value of congress based upon the number of laws they pass (with, I will note, absolutely no consideration for the quality and/or scope and/or EFFECT of those laws) I have a simple and basic question for you:

Just how many federal laws are the "ideal" number? (remember: YOU guys are the one asserting that the quantity passed is the measuring stick)

If any congress (a two-year "session" of The Congress) is only "successful" if it adds X number of laws to the books, then presumably one of two things MUST be true:

1. At some point congresses will reach a point beyond which no congress will be successful

- or -

2. The ideal number of laws is INFINITE and therefore the ideal is for the citizens to have no rights, no freedoms, no liberty etc (EVERY detail of EVERYTHING will have to be regulated)