At the risk of looking a little too hard for that silver lining in the big black cloud, I am beginning to think that some very good things might come out of the current bust in computer science education.
If you have been living on another planet for a while, you might not be aware that there is a crisis in computer science enrollment in university and college computer science courses across the country. Current research indicates that enrollment in postsecondary courses has dropped by 40% with some suggesting that the drop in applications to these programs may be down by as much as 60%.
These figures are worrying for a number of reasons. Prestigious programs that have traditionally attracted far more applicants than they can accept, now have a smaller body of well-qualified students from which to choose. Many middle-sized computer science programs have had to reduce the number of students they admit (fewer students in each class, but also fewer courses, and less revenue for the department). And at some small colleges, computer science is at risk of disappearing all together. Of course, these are just the short-term problems.
In this increasingly technology-based and globalized economy, long-term failure to produce enough qualified workers is a sure path to the economic backwaters. Few realize that computer science is not just the backbone of technological innovation. It is the engine that keeps every single industry up and running. Try to imagine the drug companies, the hospitals, the banks, the insurance companies, even education, without skilled computing professionals.
So why on earth is this a good thing? These same dropping enrollments are engendering discussions that are long overdue. In the light of diminishing student interest in computer science, computer science educators have finally begun focusing on our failure to teach computer science in a way that engages all students.
In a recent issue of the ACM SIGCSE Bulletin Inroads (Vol. 38. No. 4), Lisa Kaczmarczyk muses that the very ubiquity of computing may be the greatest problem facing computing education. “Computing studies do not appear cutting edge to the majority of students and the public – not in a way that appeals to their passions.”
Computing education she argues, needs to be reenergized. “The world of possibilities beyond the external, beyond the metal box and blinking screen, is what we need to instill in the public and in our students. It has to happen in every class that we teach, so that our students become entranced with the potential of computing.”
Kaczmarczyk then poses three important questions for educators.
* What course do you teach?
* Can you make it truly interdisciplinary? (No exceptions, no excuses, no hall pass.)
* How are you exciting your students to become more passionate about computing?
These are core questions and it is very exciting to find that more and more educators are raising them, in middle schools, high schools, colleges, and universities.
Dropping enrollments are providing a powerful and long-overdue incentive for reenvisioning computer science education.
At CSTA, we have just released a second edition of the ACM Model Curriculum for K-12 Computer Science with a new foreword that explores how a number of different educators are creating new instructional practices to make our discipline more relevant and engaging to today’s students.
What are you doing in your school?
Chris Stephenson
Executive Director