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I'm not sure that is a big distortion of what she's saying. It seems to me like she's suggesting that keeping up with modern computer science isn't necessary t
by bicknergseng 12y ago
I'm not sure that is a big distortion of what she's saying. It seems to me like she's suggesting that keeping up with modern computer science isn't necessary to teach computer science. With her all caps "WRONG"s, she seems equally incontrovertible. While I don't think teaching iOS8 beta dev is necessary in a modern cs curriculum (which I don't think many people are suggesting), not approaching the massive shift in the industry towards mobile is equally absurd. It's not about mastering every library or IDE or language (which again, the parent comment didn't suggest), but there is certainly no reason that CS fundamentals cannot be taught with a nod towards modern computer science.
Yes, employer expectations are often absurd, but so too is the expectation that teaching Java without ever building an Android app does everything sufficient to "equip students with skills." If a curriculum is going to spend a month on linked lists that's fine, but do something real with them instead of implementing stdlib over and over in a vacuum. Use some popular libraries as teaching tools to demonstrate good and bad code, ways things have been done in real life, etc. Don't pigeonhole on jquery widgets, but build a webapp in rails or node or go or c or jsp or whatever. Hell, build it in Haskell and teach some killer fp at the same time. But don't just spend 4 years teaching students how to implement x to do arbitrary y with no practical examples or connection to real life.