Xref: utzoo comp.edu:2765 comp.software-eng:2626 Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!think!snorkelwacker!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!ubc-cs!manis From: manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) Newsgroups: comp.edu,comp.software-eng Subject: Re: CS education Message-ID: <5899@ubc-cs.UUCP> Date: 7 Dec 89 03:27:14 GMT References: <7334@hubcap.clemson.edu> <7335@hubcap.clemson.edu> Sender: news@cs.ubc.ca Reply-To: manis@grads.cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) Organization: The Invisible City of Kitezh Lines: 40 In article <7335@hubcap.clemson.edu> billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu writes: > Forgot one: the ability to search and utilize the computing literature > effectively in the process of solving practical problems. Taken to the extreme, this goal would result in courses such as `Generating and Maintaining MVS Systems': there are still a lot of jobs, and still a lot of problems, in the IBM mainframe environment. :-) :-) More seriously, the goal of a university CS program is not to produce trained people for industry, and more than the goal of a university physics program is to produce cyclotron jockeys. What I hope is that the graduates from our program are (at an entry level, to be sure) scientists, not technologists. That goal in no way means that a computer scientist cannot apply his/her knowledge and skills on practical problems. However, I would also like as many of our graduates as possible to be interested and qualified in advancing the science itself, in other words, in pursuing further study in the field. My attitude comes from the elitist notion that the role of a university should be one of developing future leaders of society. I am less interested in turning out students who know the complete bug list for 4.3BSD IPC than I am in turning out students who really understand CS, and choose to apply it in innovative ways, to contribute to the field, or to teach it to others. Teaching the principles of operating systems or compiler design is not done because the student will use it, but rather because it teaches the student some principles which are deemed to be important. (If the student doesn't see that by the end of the course, then either the student or the instructor--or both--are at fault!) -- Vincent Manis "There is no law that vulgarity and Department of Computer Science literary excellence cannot coexist." University of British Columbia -- A. Trevor Hodge Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1W5 (604) 228-2394