Last year I wrote about the search for a sexier topics among computer science types that it was hoped would renew student interest in the field. The latest data indicates that interest in CS as a major appears to have dropped 70% in recent years. Data to be released March 1st by CRA will reveal “a second year of double digit declines” in the number of enrolled CS students: www.cra.org/wp/index.php?p=104.
The peak years of interest for the field were the early 1980s and the late 1990s, which may point to a cyclical process (just like the cyclical warming of our atmosphere!) but the current interest levels are equivalent to those reported for the the mid-1970s. No equivalent data exists for information schools or LIS programs but most that I know are informally reporting very healthy enrollments. Of course, most iSchools are graduate programs so the comparison is not entirely fair. That said, computer science graduate programs are reporting declines also but the numbers are still up over their recent lows of 2000-2001. In absolute terms, there are still roughly 50,000 CS graduate students in the US each year, which swamps the number of information program grads by about a factor of 10. Still, these metrics are only part of the story. Our school graduates about 100 people per year and we have no plans to grow this number although there is healthy demand from applicants. A fuller picture also would have to look at the employment patterns of graduates and this is a complicated picture. CS grads generally do earn better than average wages but there are serious declines in employment prospects for programmers and database administrators. Similarly, our grads tend to get jobs pretty quickly (half are employed before they graduate) but the variability in salary is quite significant, depending on where grads ply their trade. As a senior professional told my intro class this week, there will be no jobs for them as traditional catalogers, but plenty of opportunities for them to help implement better information systems and services. Regardless, in the sex appeal stakes, we all know information trumps computation.
Dorothea | 12-Feb-07 at 7:55 am | Permalink
No jobs as traditional cataloguers? That’s overblown. MPOW has been looking for a Head of Bibliographic Services for over a year, and my sense is that there’s a chronic shortage of Asian-language cataloguers.
Sure, I would advise any would-be cataloguer to learn them some MODS and Dublin Core and the like as well as MARC and AACR2. But “cataloguing is dead!” strikes me as neither helpful nor true.
Prentiss Riddle | 12-Feb-07 at 12:54 pm | Permalink
The CRA blog post and graph make me wonder what the full study says about the addition of computer engineering and other allied fields to the picture. Taken at its face value, the graph would indicate that the sum of computer engineering *plus* computer science in 2002 was greater than the local peak of computer science alone in 1999-2000. Of course computer engineering didn’t appear out of nowhere in 2002; it’s conceivable that the total of all computer-related majors in 1999-2000 came close to the all-time peak in 1982-1983 when CS had fewer rivals.
Is it proper to say that there *are* declines in employment opportunities for programmers or that there *were* declines after the dot-com bubble burst in 2001? The mood is back up in the tech sector, and that may be why (again at the risk of reading too much into one graph) it looks like the decline of interest on the part of incoming freshmen could be leveling off.
Mike Welling | 17-Apr-07 at 1:48 pm | Permalink
What do you think about CS as a viable career path these days? Do you think it’s something that a young person should really look into? It just seems that there is so much competition- especially with large 3rd world players out there now.
Paul Perth PC tech | 20-Apr-07 at 1:25 am | Permalink
Interesting article, I think as computers are becoming more and more common place, people that use computers are becoming less un-trendy, and computer gurus are becoming more common..
Though alot of computer jobs dont involve much contact with people which i think can leave you quite unsatisfied.. depending on your personality…
in my job I travel around to different places, meet people and fix their computers so i really enjoy it, its actually quite social.. for a it related job anyway.
Ross | 24-Apr-07 at 6:50 am | Permalink
Interesting Article. You got my eye on your title. Idea is needed for us computer scientists
Anonymous | 19-Jul-07 at 4:30 am | Permalink
Computer science used to be a male dominated field but now days there are hot sexy women in this field, with big cars and fat wallets(i know it sounds masculine lol)
Charlotte | 28-Jul-07 at 4:01 pm | Permalink
Very interesting, hope you continue writing more about this. thanks!
Andy | 28-Oct-07 at 9:38 pm | Permalink
Though it is true that Computer Science has lost its glamour these days as compared to early 80’s, but our teenagers still find this field quite interesting while choosing their career path. I am very sure that there will be huge engineering job opportunity in future despite drastic fall in job prospect graph.
Alex | 02-Nov-07 at 4:27 pm | Permalink
Well, my sister has graduated in CS. Im Mechanical engineer and computer addict. Here in Slovenia CS is still mostly male dominated although it is not in equal ratio like previous years. Be aware, ladies are on the way…
stacey | 06-Aug-08 at 3:21 am | Permalink
computer techs need more space, good read
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Kabonfootprint | 25-Aug-08 at 2:54 am | Permalink
Very interesting, I like this kind of writing more . Hope to see more like this. thanks!
Dimas | 10-Sep-08 at 6:23 am | Permalink
Wow…
Nice articles…
Open Minded…
Thanks