Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!nbires!hao!noao!arizona!debray
From: debray@arizona.edu (Saumya Debray)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: First Languages (yet again)
Message-ID: <3730@megaron.arizona.edu>
Date: 4 Feb 88 20:49:44 GMT
References: <4022@ames.arpa> <2400002@otter.HP.COM> <932@its63b.ed.ac.uk> <2781@omepd>
Organization: U of Arizona CS Dept, Tucson
Lines: 31

In article <2781@omepd>, pcm@iwarpo3.intel.com (Phil C. Miller) writes:
> Part of the reasoning behind a technical education should be to prepare
> a student for the working experience.  I contend that exposing
> first-year students to a functional programming language does not fit
> that role.

Assuming you're not referring to two-year trade schools that crank out
programmers, I disagree.  In my opinion, a primary purpose of a CS
degree program is to teach students the basic principles of computation.
I feel that at the early stages, this is best done using a declarative
language.  Starting out with high-level assemblers like C or Basic can all
too easily damage students' brains to a point where they have a hard time
grasping any concept not directly available in these languages.

If your student progresses beyond the first year, he'll presumably
encounter languages like C; with early exposure to declarative languages,
he should have the background to use these in a disciplined way.  If he
doesn't progress beyond the first year, of course, the point is moot.

> [ ... ]  I have just changed jobs.  In no interview was I asked
> whether I knew ML; in every interview I was asked if I knew C.

A lot of interviewers are idiots who'll also ask you whether you've worked
on machine PQR and operating system XYZ.  Do you feel that, in "preparing a
student for the work experience", schools should dispense with computer
architecture courses, in favor of training on a dozen different machines?
-- 
Saumya Debray		CS Department, University of Arizona, Tucson

     internet:   debray@arizona.edu
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