Re: Senior Professors Teaching Intro CS

[Ted Dennison <dennison@escmail.orl.lmco.com>]

Mike O'Malley wrote:
> 
> Prof. Feldman at GW (1991-1992).  During the course (if you'll pardon
> the pun) of these classes, I decided to change my major from business
> administration to computer science.  This decision was largely motivated
> by the fact that I was exposed to a senior professor in these intro
> courses- a recurring question during my freshman year was "Can I do this
> for a living?".  A TA would have been unable to answer that question,
> not having been "out in the real world" himself.  A senior professor, on
> the other hand, has enough experience to provide examples of what life
> in computer science is like.

I had a very similar experience my freshman year at Tulane (although,
I was an EE, not a business major at the time). My "CS1" teacher was 
only a PhD candidate, but he was the best teacher in the department and
had a lot of real-world experience (and war-stories).

My wife was a business major, and took an intro CS course from another
graduate student who had NO real world experience and wasn't half the
teacher (I took a course from him later, so I know). She had a miserable
experience. Needless to say she stayed in the business school. The sad
part is that she is actually pretty good with computers.

-- 
T.E.D.          
             |  Work - mailto:dennison@escmail.orl.lmco.com  |
             |  Home - mailto:dennison@iag.net               |
             |  URL  - http://www.iag.net/~dennison          |

ps. When he got his PhD, the fools let him leave to teach elsewhere.