President's Message
IT, CS, CT, Oh My!
Opinion from Joe Kmoch, SIGCT President
Welcome to the second issue of SIGCT’s online flagship publication, the Journal for Computing Teachers (JCT). JCT is available online to anyone worldwide. Our editor, John Thompson, and I hope that you enjoy this issue and consider either writing an article or encouraging one of your colleagues to submit an article for the betterment of teaching and learning about computing.
The title of this piece comes from recent conversations I’ve had both about the lack of students preparing themselves for computing fields and around the kind of coursework that is needed to stimulate students to climb aboard. I get so frustrated when I talk to CS folks about teaching computing skills and happen to use the term IT (Information Technology). They think that IT has nothing to do with them. A similar frustration occurs when I talk to business or IT audiences and use the term CS. They think CS is way too narrow and has nothing to do with IT. I will argue that CS and IT are highly intertwined when looking at pre-collegiate curriculum and what is occurring in the workforce.
The US Dept. of Labor has for some years now created and updated information related to workforce issues, and in particular the number of new jobs in the future, along with additional job openings that will occur due to retirements and career changes. The most current statistics indicate what many of us have known: In the area they call "Computer Specialists" there will be about 800,000 new jobs created through 2016 and the total number of job openings by that year will be about 1.5 million (owing to retirements, etc). There is clearly a need.
I continue to find it interesting that presenters talk about this situation using the term "Computer Science." While I agree that there’s a workforce problem, using the term CS carries with it lots of baggage for many. To some of my colleagues, talking about CS means leaving out all kinds of computing areas such as Web design work, computer support and administration, network support and administration, and database administrators. Yet, all of these are part of the Computer Specialists category. NSF in their ITEST program uses these same statistics to request proposals supporting student development in IT as part of STEM initiatives.
To other colleagues, talking about IT means only applied knowledge, requiring training and certifications, not necessarily higher-level thinking skills and degrees. Yet, the careers within the Computer Specialists category almost all require post-secondary college, either a two- or four-year degree. Even the business community where most of these jobs will occur refers to IT careers with CS being either a subset or just ignored. Even in an upcoming STEM conference businesses want to hear how their IT needs are being addressed.
There are others of us who for purposes of dealing with this, particularly at the pre-collegiate level talk about an expanded definition such as the statements made in both the ACM Model CS Curriculum and The New Educational Imperative (NEI) document. In those documents you’ll find the list of topics in a CS curriculum includes virtually the entire set of skills and concepts that are noted for IT (see NEI, pp. 17-19). So for our purposes are we really saying that CS and IT are really encompassing the same careers, concepts, and skills? As stated again and again, CS is not just programming and IT is not just skills.
Confusing? You betcha. My hope is that each of us can embrace the entire body of knowledge, whether we call it CS or IT or CS/IT (a term some of us have embraced). After all, however we limit ourselves is how we limit our students and they’re the ones that need every opportunity opened to them to succeed in their future and to help our country meet the challenges of the upcoming decades.
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