3 ms·

All programs, not just CS, have widely varying quality levels, probably leaning toward "bad", on average (there are a lot of colleges and universities in the US

All programs, not just CS, have widely varying quality levels, probably leaning toward "bad", on average (there are a lot of colleges and universities in the US). Fussell (and probably many others, but I've read him) blamed the rapid, great expansion of colleges and universities when the GI Bill injected a ton of money and eager new students into the system after WWII. He wrote that in 1983, but the system still seems to be reeling from that, and it may simply have stabilized (perhaps unavoidably, hard to say) at a much lower average quality level than before. Generally, institutions that existed before the war are still very good. Ones founded or converted (from, say, teaching colleges) after are much more hit-or-miss.

throwawaygh 5y ago
CS was "equally bad" to other not great fields in the aughts. It has gotten exponentially worse as enrollments have exploded. CS is embarrassingly bad even relative to the already low standards. I'm not exaggerating when I say that many computer/data science programs are 100% staffed by pure mathematicians who both have never done academic work in computer/data science and also have never worked a day in industry. Find me a single mathematics department that offers a BS in Mathematics and in which 40+% of courses are taught by failed psychology PhDs. That's the state of CS at many institutions. Again, I take your point that everything is not great. CS is a whole order of magnitude worse. Even at places that aren't great.