“Colleges and universities around the state are finding it hard to keep up with a fast-growing appetite for computer-science courses.” …
Private schools have also seen rapid rises in CS enrollment.
Here are some articles relating to CS enrollment growth at a private school:
http://www.stanforddaily.com/2015/04/16/a-look-at-stanford-computer-science-part-ii-challenges-of-a-growing-field/
http://www.stanforddaily.com/2012/10/04/cs106a-enrollment-reaches-record-high/
Computer science PhDs (and anyone else qualified to teach CS classes, like electrical engineering PhDs) can get paid so much more doing research in industry than they can get paid teaching college classes, especially at a regional public school like Western Washington, that I imagine universities are having a hard time retaining them. Add to that the difficulties and stresses of getting tenure and the competitive granting environment and it’s a wonder any computer scientist stays in academia at all.
It’s kind of sad how difficult it is to get into these programs at great universities with noted programs, though. Especially since the industry needs them so badly around here. There are like hundreds of unfilled SDET positions just at my own company (Microsoft)! It’s kind of crazy to expect a freshman or sophomore to have shown “demonstrated interest” in the field before getting into the program; I feel like it shuts out the kids who didn’t have the resources to be exposed to CS during high school or earlier.
But I’m betting the culprit is simply a shortage of people who are qualified to teach the courses.
Very true. At some schools, one has to apply directly to the CS major for frosh admission; changing into it later can be very difficult due to lack of space. At other schools, frosh are admitted undeclared or in a pre-major status, but must face a heavy weed-out process to get into the CS major simply due to capacity limitations.
Also, the rise in popularity of CS has been very rapid. Considering that the hiring of a tenure-track faculty member is a several year commitment at least, and a several decade commitment if s/he gains tenure (or is hired at tenured level), and the popularity of CS has crashed at least once before (2000-2003), it may be difficult to size a CS department properly to handle the rapid changes in popularity of the major. Of course, some classes can be increased in size by adding TAs, but the supply of CS graduate students is not unlimited.
^Yes, good points @ucbalumnus ! It takes a couple of years to get approval and funding to hire a new professor, too - so even if a department saw that surge begin 2-3 years ago in 2013 or 2014, it may have taken them until now to get approval to hire 1-2 more tenure-track slots for CS professors for fall of 2017 (meaning they post the ad this fall and get someone to start next fall). That’s 4-5 years from the beginning of a trend until getting new profs in the door!
I feel like colleges should turn to a different model to get more people teaching - making partnerships with nearby tech companies to have those folks come in and teach, especially in Washington where there are so many! - but maybe even getting adjuncts is hard because CS folks don’t need the extra money. Still, I’m willing to bet there are some software developers who would teach on the side for the love and not the extra $$$. These programs would have to be willing to get some adjuncts with MS degrees, though.
And yeah I’m curious to see whether CS holds fast this time. I suspect that the field as a whole will, but I do think it will contract. Venture capitalists are starting to see that some of the “unicorns” and many of the other companies valued quite highly are not making the money they expected them to because they can’t monetize or scale (or both) - or they’re plagued with legal problems and opposition (thinking of Uber and Lyft). So I suspect in the next 5-7 years it’ll be a lot harder for 22-year-olds with a dream to get funding for new startups, and that new CS grads will be less willing to work for prayers and stock options instead of actual cash.
I also think the wildly inflated salaries for fresh BS graduates are unsustainable. As the shortage abates as more and more students major in the field I think salaries will fall because there’ll be an abundance of them. (And that’s the dream of the large tech companies, probably!) I just think that’ll happen more slowly.
My school (UC Davis) does something similar to this. We don’t have partnerships with tech companies, but we have some adjunct professors with years of industry experience (who may or may not have a PhD) that come in to teach classes on their specialty. As an example, I’m currently taking a databases class that focuses on implementing databases, and our professor is someone that worked at places like Oracle for years actually implementing these concepts. It’s honestly nice to have someone with extensive industry experience in the area teaching, compared to someone who’s always been in academia and hasn’t necessarily dealt with these things “in the wild”, so to speak. You learn a lot either way, but it’s kind of a breath of fresh air to focus on more real-world applications than theoretical concepts.
To a certain extent, I already see this happening. Personally, I’m generally risk-averse and in my job search I pretty much ruled out any earlier-stage startups for this reason. I know a lot of people who have a similar attitude towards startups at this point, but of course you still have the idealistic people who want to join/start the “next big thing” no matter what the risk is.
If nothing else, when someone comes on to the CS club Facebook page talking about how amazing their idea is and how they’ll change the world, people respond with a lot of skepticism unless they can give a very solid pitch. And incidentally, I’ve seen those posts pretty rarely over the past couple years compared to how often they popped up a few years ago. I don’t know what exactly could be causing that, but it’s definitely something I’ve noticed.
One thing to keep in mind is that the weeding out process does a very good job of getting would-be CS majors who just can’t cut it out of the major. But yes, the current tech boom encourages some people who could cut it to choose CS even if they otherwise wouldn’t, because that’s where the money is right now. As the starting salaries eventually fall (though they’ll probably still be pretty high), you’ll likely see fewer people that are in it solely for the cash. Not to say they’ll disappear, but it (hopefully!) won’t be as prominent.