From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
From: anothy@cosym.net
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Subject: [9fans] comp sci departments in universities
Date: Sat,  9 Jun 2001 19:05:38 -0400
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//It's a sad state of affairs, but I think that it will improve;

i think it already has, at least in some places. many universities were catering to the
dot-coms, hoping that the resulting alums would give money back to the school.
Stanford took a lot of heat for this practice because - unlike most schools - they
came out and said it. but i think the mentality that fuled the decisions in many
universities to make C++ a student's first programing language were fuled - at least
largely - by those universities lust for a bit of that pie. and as the dot-com era ends -
or at least the money returns to sub-stratospheric levels - at least some universities
have reversed that decision. i think more will follow, if only for the purely economic
reason that they find their alums are less qualified in the industry as a whole - once
they leave their dot-com who's primary products are their web site and their stock -
and thus less able to give the university cash back.

of cource, i'd _like_ to believe that many universities will come to their senses for
more "pure" reasons - realizing that what they're teaching isn't computer science at
all - but i'm a bit too skeptical to buy that without evidence.
-α.