Re: Looking for a good Ada 95 book

[ok@goanna.cs.rmit.edu.au (Richard A. O'Keefe)]

Mike Feldman wrote
[that he _chooses_ to teach CS1 and CS2]
Robert Dewar wrote
[that he put CS1 and CS2 at the top of his preferences]

I have never put CS1 at the top of _my_ preferences for one very
simple reason:  I am terrified of the responsibility.  I think a
lot of education "status" is backwards:

	early parenting is more important than
	kindergarten is more important than
	primary school is more important than
	secondary school is more important than
	first year of tertiary education is more important than
	later year undergraduate education is more important than
	graduate/postgraduate education.

By the time the students are in _my_ hands, they _ought_ to be mature
enough to take responsibility for their own education, using me as a
resource.  It doesn't actually _work_ that way, because resources have
not been applied appropriately at lower more important levels.

Last Saturday I heard that most (school) science teachers "wish they
were doing something else", which has me as a new parent _horrified_.
I suppose it won't matter much; the price of tertiary undergraduate
science education is about to double, and physics departments around
the country are downsizing and/or merging with engineering. I dunno
who bought this government, but it's sure not the government _I_ paid for.

Any student who gets Feldman or Dewar in CS1 is fortunate indeed.

-- 
Govt saves money by cutting legal aid, guilty plea rates soar;
poverty is a crime!  (See also recent Sci.Am.)
Richard A. O'Keefe; http://www.cs.rmit.edu.au/%7Eok; RMIT Comp.Sci.