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What an interesting article! That set off my bullshit detector about half-way through. "School boards fight to keep CS out of schools, since every minute spent

What an interesting article! That set off my bullshit detector about half-way through. "School boards fight to keep CS out of schools, since every minute spent on CS is one less minute spent on core subjects like English and math. The students' test scores in these core subjects determine next year's funding, so CS is a threat." School boards fighting to keep CS out of schools? Huh? I followed the link, and found a story from 4 years ago about how kids can use the internet but don't know much about it. The most supportive paragraph I found is from a quote by Computer Science Teachers Association's Chris Stephenson "Stephenson said computer science classes might be an unintentional casualty in the push to increase academic standards. Computer science is not considered a core subject by the No Child Left Behind law, which influences school priorities and budgets." Looks like the CSTA were the ones pitching the piece to the Post, but who knows. What I do know is that we need more Computer Science taught in schools, and the U.S. is definitely falling behind. But what I don't know is this idea that school boards are actively fighting CS in the schools. Not until somebody can show me something better than he did. (I'd also caution against stories about one school district here or there being extrapolated into some kind of a national disease.) Please pardon the nit-picking -- this was a really good article all-around -- but this is an important subject in the states. The conversation over here is not advanced by throw-away accusations from left field.

mhurron 14y ago
> What I do know is that we need more Computer Science taught in schools Why?
- woodchuck64 14y ago
  You can't understand and be productive in today's world without understanding computation.
  - mhurron 14y ago
    Many, many people are. It might not seem like it when you work entirely with computers but it just isn't that big a part of what most people do day to day. A computer is a tool, no different than a hammer in most peoples jobs. They read their email, browse some websites and do what ever specific thing in whatever specific application their jobs tell them to. They don't need to know anything about what the computer is doing and they don't care to know. Cars make more of an impact of peoples lives than their computers do but we don't have someone constantly saying how we need to make everyone a mechanic. Eating is more important to life but we don't have a movement to make everyone a chef. Knowledge of how a computer works or how you make it do something someone else hasn't written an app for is just not at the same level that reading, writing and arithmetic are. Step back from what you do all day and actually watch what people do. Knowledge of why stuff happens on the devices they use just isn't that important. They know what button to hit and that's all they need to know to be productive in what they are doing.
    - woodchuck64 14y ago
      Computation should be at the same level of importance as reading, writing and arithmetic, given that no other paradigm is contributing more to job obsolescence right now. But, sure, you can be productive without understanding computation. I should have said "maximally productive". Even a chef benefits from understanding how recipes mimic algorithms.
    - lotu 14y ago
      > Cars make more of an impact of peoples lives than their computers do but we don't have someone constantly saying how we need to make everyone a mechanic Actually I have seen many care enthusiasts who criticize people that don't change their own oil and spark plugs.
- nulagrithom 14y ago
  I can tell you it wasn't available in my high school. We had one class called "Web development" that was nothing more than playing with a WYSIWIG editor. One student was kicked out for creating their webpage in Notepad, because the teacher thought it was "hacking". This was discouraging. I enrolled in the local community college during high school and took a "Programming 101" class. We learned how to use if statements, variables, functions, simple loops, and almost made it to arrays after _3 months_. 102 and 103 weren't much better. This was also discouraging. The head of the CS department eventually told me not to waste my time taking the CS classes there, that they were worthless and won't transfer, and I should wait until I get to a university. Is this what we want?
jbooth 14y ago
If CS isn't on the list of things that we measure, doesn't it stand to reason that it's going to get the short end of the stick? Whatever you measure, that's what you get more of, sometimes in a way that is not at all what you were expecting, and often at the expense of things that aren't measured. We've all seen management-by-measuring go sideways in the business world, why should schools be different?
- lotu 14y ago
  Having CS as a "core" thing that everyone must learn might actually be very unfair and destructive. Even at the collage level where people choose to go into computer science we have a very high failure rate and people still aren't sure why. I doubt there are enough teachers up to the task, also anyone that is qualified to teach CS is also capable of making twice as much money by not teaching CS.

mhurron 14y ago

> What I do know is that we need more Computer Science taught in schools Why?

woodchuck64 14y ago
You can't understand and be productive in today's world without understanding computation.
- mhurron 14y ago
  Many, many people are. It might not seem like it when you work entirely with computers but it just isn't that big a part of what most people do day to day. A computer is a tool, no different than a hammer in most peoples jobs. They read their email, browse some websites and do what ever specific thing in whatever specific application their jobs tell them to. They don't need to know anything about what the computer is doing and they don't care to know. Cars make more of an impact of peoples lives than their computers do but we don't have someone constantly saying how we need to make everyone a mechanic. Eating is more important to life but we don't have a movement to make everyone a chef. Knowledge of how a computer works or how you make it do something someone else hasn't written an app for is just not at the same level that reading, writing and arithmetic are. Step back from what you do all day and actually watch what people do. Knowledge of why stuff happens on the devices they use just isn't that important. They know what button to hit and that's all they need to know to be productive in what they are doing.
  - woodchuck64 14y ago
    Computation should be at the same level of importance as reading, writing and arithmetic, given that no other paradigm is contributing more to job obsolescence right now. But, sure, you can be productive without understanding computation. I should have said "maximally productive". Even a chef benefits from understanding how recipes mimic algorithms.
  - lotu 14y ago
    > Cars make more of an impact of peoples lives than their computers do but we don't have someone constantly saying how we need to make everyone a mechanic Actually I have seen many care enthusiasts who criticize people that don't change their own oil and spark plugs.
nulagrithom 14y ago
I can tell you it wasn't available in my high school. We had one class called "Web development" that was nothing more than playing with a WYSIWIG editor. One student was kicked out for creating their webpage in Notepad, because the teacher thought it was "hacking". This was discouraging. I enrolled in the local community college during high school and took a "Programming 101" class. We learned how to use if statements, variables, functions, simple loops, and almost made it to arrays after _3 months_. 102 and 103 weren't much better. This was also discouraging. The head of the CS department eventually told me not to waste my time taking the CS classes there, that they were worthless and won't transfer, and I should wait until I get to a university. Is this what we want?

jbooth 14y ago

If CS isn't on the list of things that we measure, doesn't it stand to reason that it's going to get the short end of the stick? Whatever you measure, that's what you get more of, sometimes in a way that is not at all what you were expecting, and often at the expense of things that aren't measured. We've all seen management-by-measuring go sideways in the business world, why should schools be different?

lotu 14y ago
Having CS as a "core" thing that everyone must learn might actually be very unfair and destructive. Even at the collage level where people choose to go into computer science we have a very high failure rate and people still aren't sure why. I doubt there are enough teachers up to the task, also anyone that is qualified to teach CS is also capable of making twice as much money by not teaching CS.