Here's my pet theory: when I try to put myself into an average high school student's shoes, they're already surrounded by all the CS achievements today; namely, video games and smartphones and Facebooks. They're exposed to them a bit too much. On the other hand, when I was a high school kid I didn't realize how CS is affecting our infrastructure and how many things are still unsolved. I guess this still applies to the current generation too. Combining these two, the field might look rather "finished" or "too competitive" to an average person, which could deter them from applying.
Why do so few people major in computer science?
301–310 of 627 posts
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#302Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's interesting to me about that data is the high rate of biological and agricultural sciences grads, relative to all other sciences. CS grad rates seem to fall right about where they should on XKCD's Purity Scale [1] (if CS had been included in it). 2004 was an outlier for CS, but it has reverted to its mean since. But bio and ag sciences are beating out Psychology, which is a bit of a reversal. Biology isn't eas…
Although biology and organic chemistry are much harder then CS anything, they can be learned in school and from school resources only. No one expects you to already come in already knowing how to code or configure linux. If you are good students willing to work, you will learn them, period. With cs, you are expected to already know a lot that was not taught in school - meaning that all kinds of cultural and social ef…
I have no particular opinion on harder/easier. (There is a lot of memorization in organic chemistry earlier on because you don't have the tools to come up with answers from first principles at that point.)
But, unlike CS, there isn't this assumption that you've played around with organic chemistry and/or chemical engineering in your spare time if you want to major in it in college.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#303The grief factor of learning to code is on a different scale to every other major. One missing semicolon will take your whole tower down, and you realise this in the first day of practical exercises. Even if you are of the opinion that CS is math, and coding doesn't come into it, you will hit a coding wall early on. In fact, every exercise in CS has this problem. You add a new thing (eg inheritance), and it breaks. B…
If you regularly experience grief in a subject, theN YOU SHOULD NOT CHOOSE THAT FOR A CAREER. You could be doing it for 30-40 years. Why make life miserable if you have a choice.
I've often heard people make "sensible" choices like these in undergrad. In their minds, it's a few years of toil that will yield an abstract form of an easy/successful life because "3. ??? 4. Profit", but for some reason they don't come to terms with the fact that their reward will be more of the stuff they hate, with longer hours and more pressure.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#304Slight note about Dan Wang picking 2005: That was the peak of CS degrees awarded because it's 4/5 years after the height of the dot-com bubble. So the upward bump in the mid-2000's is somewhat explainable as an anomaly. I think his point 1 is underrated. CS degrees are flat because aptitude is flat. You can compare CS degrees to other degrees over time at nsf.gov: https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2016/nsb20161/#/report…
> The number of grads for difficult degrees and the quality of grads seems to be another story. This is why I never believed the "There is no STEM shortage" stories. They were mostly based on the assumption that all STEM grads were qualified to work in STEM. That's not true in any field where you can complete a degree with a C or D average. I find it unfortunate that some of the larger software companies filter out a…
At the risk of sounding foolish, but isn't it easy for a company to filter out applicants in technical fields, simply by asking technical questions?
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#305Earlier quoted context omitted.
Given the gender skew amongst high-school programmers, this is almost equivalent to saying "women should not be starting a CS degree". It also further entrenches the advantages of people who come from affluent backgrounds. Given the success of some short coding bootcamps, it isn't inconceivable that novices could be brought up to speed within the first semester. We don't expect law students to have been amateur lawye…
> It also further entrenches the advantages of people who come from affluent backgrounds. If you can afford a video game console, you can afford a raspberry pi (or equivalent.) > We don't expect law students to have been amateur lawyers in high school No, but we expect math majors to have done some math before they get to college. I don't disagree with you that most people can be brought up to speed in less than a ye…
Honestly I think the only prerequisite for a CS major is to have interest in it. I never had any programming classes in high school and I switch my major 3 times until landing on CS. I had never programmed before in my life, but it was interesting to me and I found out I had an affinity towards it. I'm just saying this statement that you need to have some background to it is not necessary.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#306To an audience of CS majors this will probably sound like trolling but honestly I have never used any software written by a "computer scientist" that I came to value and rely on -- software that I consciously chose to use. Whereas I have found such software on multiple ocassions written by mathematicians or persons in some other field, e.g., physics, etc. As a user of software , I do not believe that a computer scien…
Do you use Gmail spam filtering? Google search? Windows? OS X? TCP/IP? I can assure you that software you've came to value and rely on was written by "computer scientists". So yes, your comment does sound like trolling. That or you're just completely misinformed.
In fact, I am an unusual case and I do not consciously choose to use those Google, Microsoft or Apple offerings, nor do I value and rely on the ones I occasionally come in contact with. In many cases I view those are necessary evils, not high quality stuff.
I use TCP/IP but I did not choose it. There were many competing protocols. It just became the default.
I am not going to argue about this but many of the folks who wrote the software that I actively seek out and value had degrees in Electrical Engineering, Mathematics, and/or Physics. I might use different software than most users.
The authors were not CS majors. It is what it is. Maybe this means nothing. But to me it means, at least, CS is not a prerequisite.
I am not denying the contribution of Computer Science as a field or the work computer scientists. And I understand why kids major in CS. All good.
I am just referring to the practice of writing software. I would question anyone who argued one must have a CS degree to write great software.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#307A better question is "why do we care". Software is about the only career I can think of where there are movements created to inject social status into it so that people get into it who are only interested so long as it comes with social status/trendiness. The major also doesn't fix the thought process. You either have it or you don't.
I think it is also the only career which people try to inject diversity just for the sake of it. Maybe I just live in developer bubble and don't know any better, but I've never seen a movement like "Girls do Plumbing!", "Black girls construction bootcamp" or "Mining for equality!".
How much do you hear at all about plumbing or other trades? A few minutes on Google turns up links like http://womeninconstructionconference.com/, http://www.new-nyc.org/, http://www.explorethetrades.org/women-in-trades/, etc. so I think it's most likely that you're seeing a combination of selection bias and the fact that software development is both a popular field getting general attention and one with an abnormal diversity rates compared with similar fields.
That's not saying that those fields are perfect but, say, a female/Hispanic/etc. accountant, paralegal, etc. won't be the only person fitting that description at most meetings. Skilled trades often have skewed gender, ethnicity, etc. ratios but they also don't get anything like as much attention so most of us are unaware of the problem or efforts to improve things.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#308I can share my personal story. I've always been computer savvy and would have loved to have gone into programming, now I'm trying to prep to go back to school for computer science, so I think it may be relevant. But even being good with computers I was never really a good student in high school, and due to moving around, parents divorcing etc, I had huge gaps in my math education(I still don't know my multiplication…
I don't recall any really heavy math in my Comp. Sci in the 1980s. There were required math courses yes -- calculus, linear algebra, etc. but none of that really was applied in the computer science classes. So I guess I would say don't let a poor math background stop you from learning programming. I have not used math much beyond arithmetic and basic boolean logic as a professional programmer.
Edit: certainly there are programming jobs that require a solid competency in mathematics. However there are many that do not.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#309Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you actually need millions for a software consultancy? You're hiring people who wouldn't be employed elsewhere. You could pay them less and cut prices to your clients and everyone would come out better. I mean you've spotted what you claim is a clear inefficiency. Your guys could be taking the jobs that Infosys and gang are taking.
>Do you actually need millions for a software consultancy? Yeah, I'd need millions to be convinced to do something I absolutely don't want to be doing.
In that case even with millions you would hit a roadblock. Even the prospect of a huge reward doesn't always cure burnout.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?
#310Dan nearly solves his own riddle with possible explanation No. 2: "You don’t need a CS degree to be a developer." He just doesn't spend long enough probing this issue. Majoring in computer science is like majoring in English with hopes of becoming a writer. Or majoring in economics with hopes of starting a business. You'll get all the theory. You'll mingle with all the lifers. But because you try to come into the gui…
I have to disagree; I routinely need to educate co-workers on how things like B-Trees works, what a sum type is and why it is useful, what the SRP means (and why it is useful), why testing matters, why abstraction matters, or even things like how to secure production servers. To take the B-tree example: I've run across a number of people who I feel are more apt to blame "the database" for being slow; "it can't handle…
>even things like how to secure production servers
You might find this, for old versions of Windows Server, in a trade-school IT degree program. You're certainly not going to find it for Linux in a regular Computer Science program.