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Senate Passes 'No Microsoft National Talent Strategy Goal Left Behind Act'
theodp writes: Microsoft is applauding the Senate's passage of the Every Child Achieves Act, a rewrite of the No Child Left Behind Act, saying the move will improve access to K-12 STEM learning nationwide. The legislation elevates Computer Science to a "core academic subject", opening the door to a number of funding opportunities. The major overhaul of the U.S. K-12 education system, adds Microsoft on the Issues, also "advances some of the goals outlined in Microsoft's National Talent Strategy," its "two-pronged" plan to increase K-12 CS education and tech immigration. Perhaps Microsoft is tackling the latter goal in under-the-radar White House visits with the leaders of Mark Zuckerberg's FWD.us PAC, like this one, attended by Microsoft's William "It's Our Way Or the Canadian Highway" Kamela and FWD.us President Joe "Save Us From Just-Sort-of-OK US Workers" Green.
Although I believe kids should be exposed to STEM courses, forcing them into STEM fields where there is no interest is a recipe for disaster. Better to let kids dictate where their interest lies.
Also, this is more of the corporate drive to lower wages in STEM fields no different than them wanting more H1B slave labor. More people in a field than there are available jobs means the corporation can dictate wages and get concessions on benefits that they would not otherwise be able to command.
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They can't claim that they're starved for labor when they're terminating it left right and center... then importing labor that has to be trained by the people they're firing.
My attitude on the whole H1B visa thing is that you need to require that they pay them... lets say 20 percent more than the going rate for domestic labor of the same kind.
If they NEED the labor then they'll pay the 20 percent. If this is just about money then suddenly their insatiable interest in H1B will vanish.
Highly skilled and high demand labor will still get imported and that's good. That's great. And the 20 percent in that context won't matter.
But the importing of entry level techs?... that should stop.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
No, and perhaps I am wrong. But it is early days. Hinton's breakthrough in 2006 has opened up machine learning to a wide range of things that we thought impossible with those types of systems. Look at what is being done with IBM's Watson system - it has shrunk from a room to three pizza boxes and it is being used for medical diagnosis. Also look at their "True North" chips - these are not computers, but neural chips: each chip has a million neurons on it, and it can form connections to any other neuron on the system. This is early days, and we are still learning how to organize and train these systems. It is interesting that Hinton's breakthrough was in a training algorithm. I think that the handwriting is on the wall, but I could be wrong. But what I expect to see in 10 years is analysts working with machine learning systems to define requirements and the system takes it from there. Remember that systems like Watson are not programmed - they are trained, and they read the same things that you and I read (Watson has read all of wikipedia), and can listen and speak. They have already proven that they can do original research and have original insights that are beyond the reach of people due to the complexity.
Everything I've read about deep learning is that they are great pattern recognizers. However, they are no closer to coding than they are to writing novels. What they are exceedingly great at is taking huge volumes of information and finding patterns. So the jobs that should be concerned are stuff like X-Ray technician, or general medical practiioners whose job is essentially managing a lot of data that most people haven't had the time to memorize/learn. The most disrupted job, will be truck drivers (the number 1 job in many states). And yes, driving is still just pattern recognition - stop at red lights, don't hit the car, when a car does this, you do this - type stuff. Give it a large enough amount of data and it can figure out what the results should be.
Once you start getting into creative pursuits, deep learning is no closer to that than it has ever been. It might be able to elevate patterns that we previously didn't realize were connected, but that's about the limit of it's "creativity".
What you won't get with deep learning (so far), is saying "take this API, then take this other API, then produce this unique solution that I have come up with for my unique problem". Example: We need a UI for a gas pump that will handle new EMV cards - deep learning, write a solution. Not happening. So I can only assume a statement of "coding will be obsolete in a few years" is either hyperbole or ignorance of the state of the art.
For goodness sake, not another of theodp's anti-CS education posts! Please Slashdot, end the madness and stop posting this drivel. We seem to be getting a few of them per week, and most of them are nothing but snide insinuations and misrepresentations.
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
Arts and foreign language are probably more important than computer science at the K-12 level.
While I'm not saying you are wrong, but that is very arguable. I for instance think computer science is far more important than foreign language at any grade level. I computer science is less important than art for K-5, but more important than art after that. These are just my opinions, and I'm sure plenty of people and even researchers have different opinions in this discussion.
If you want to include computer science without deleting existing core subjects, it will cost more money and class time. Are you willing to pay more in taxes to support schools? Are you willing to extend the class day and academic year so there is time to teach all these subjects? I am willing to accept those changes but to add comp sci without those changes will be destructive.
Although I am a bad person to ask here, because I am very willing to pay more in taxes to support more schooling. Both longer days and longer school years. I happen to live in an area where our taxes provide over $20k per student to our primary and secondary schools, and once my kids are at school ages (11 months and -7 months now) they will likely have access to academic rigorous summer programs (which I'm happy to pay for).
Based on the total number of core classes now, I doubt including computer science would add more than 5% of coursework over a year. That comes to less than $100 in extra taxes per year per citizen.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
I really don't want to sound like an H-1B apologist, but I do understand at least partially where companies are coming from. This comes from being on both the worker side of the fence and the "influencing hiring decisions" side, as well as about 20 years' experience in IT. Some people end up doing incredibly well at a job despite the first impression they give, and others really disappoint after a great first impression.
I do think they're going about this "fix" the wrong way, but I can understand why a company would be reluctant to pull someone off the street that they didn't know already in today's hiring environment and just sort of hope they work out. In my experience, the problem is that there are lots of domestic talented people out there who just can't sell themselves to hiring managers. Either they can't write a resume to save their lives, or they interview very poorly. Conversely, the extroverted schmoozers and posers interview incredibly well, especially in front of the management making the hiring decisions. These guys end up getting the jobs, not performing as expected, and we get the "we can't find any domestic talent" meme. The other two strikes against domestic hires are the perceived wage premium, although it usually takes way more in consulting dollars to clean up offshored or H-1B messes, and the fact that there is the offshoring/outsourcing safety valve that allows companies to ignore the first problem (inability to identify and keep talented people.) Bring the wild west of "expert IT recruiters" in and it's a huge mess.
Techies would never even consider unionizing, but I think a professional guild is a way to combat this. Standardize training, and find a way to equitably weed out the empty suits from the really talented who just don't interview well. The problem is that the H-1B or outsourcing route has to be closed off enough to give domestic hiring a shot at working.