It irks me when I hear that argument too. People get offended by the idea that "if you find first year COSC courses difficult, then programming is probably not

It irks me when I hear that argument too. People get offended by the idea that "if you find first year COSC courses difficult, then programming is probably not for you" - but in my experience that's completely how it turns out. All the programmers I know who started at university with no prior experience and went on to happy and successful* have this in common - they found first year COSC courses an absolute breeze, and went way ahead of the coursework in their own time just for the fun of it. (*includes myself and my sister)