I think most students don't care. They don't ever understand what's going on with the pointers and are often content to just keep trying combinations of the syn

I think most students don't care. They don't ever understand what's going on with the pointers and are often content to just keep trying combinations of the syntax until the appropriate result comes out and the compiler stops yelling at them. Maybe the point is that if you don't require C++, students will (obviously) often pick the language what provides the easiest way to complete their lab in a timely fashion so they have social time or time to work on other classes. Even those who DO care and would absorb the low level knowledge provided won't take that "risk" by doing their labs in C++ since early on it just means their work will take longer to complete than classmates. Note: As I said my school always allowed the usage of C++, usually allowed Java as well. It's definitely a bad thing if courses require Java to be used.