The Daily Podcast on CS majors 9.29.25

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

Marymount in VA

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2023/02/26/marymount-eliminates-liberal-arts-degrees

Others are having to restructure or be combined with other depts.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Even in the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/05/the-guardian-view-on-humanities-in-universities-closing-english-literature-courses-signals-a-crisis

Easy enough to google it.

[Anonymous]

Colleges move very slowly, I would think programatic changes are a lagging indicator. Ie they are likely cutting some humanities programs based on data they have considering for 10 years. I use this info to predict future employability of any major

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Colleges move very slowly, I would think programatic changes are a lagging indicator. Ie they are likely cutting some humanities programs based on data they have considering for 10 years. I use this info to predict future employability of any major

No one can tell what the future holds, but agree that colleges pivot a bit too slowly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

Last five years? People who value the liberal arts have been saying this for decades, or maybe centuries now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

Do you have support for any of the three opinions you provided in the last paragraph?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

Marymount in VA

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2023/02/26/marymount-eliminates-liberal-arts-degrees

Others are having to restructure or be combined with other depts.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Even in the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/05/the-guardian-view-on-humanities-in-universities-closing-english-literature-courses-signals-a-crisis

Easy enough to google it.

Marymount eliminated degrees in mathematics science and economics, which I think we can both agree are extraordinarily popular-something tells me their 43 million dollar endowment may be more of a factor.

From the article you linked:

Jeffrey Cohen, a butter-voiced, bearded man who has been the dean of the humanities at A.S.U. since 2018, told me. On taking the position, he hired a marketing firm, Fervor, to sell the humanities better. It ran a market survey of eight hundred and twenty-six students.

“It was eye-opening to see their responses,” Cohen said. “In general, they loved the humanities and rated them higher than their other courses. However, they were unclear on what the humanities were—two hundred and twenty-two thought that biology was a humanity.”
The students also had no idea which careers humanities study led to, so Cohen decided to teach a course called Making a Career with a Humanities Major.

Doesn't sound like a lack of interest, just ignorance.

. Adjacent fields aren’t included in humanities tallies, and some of them are booming. Harvard’s history-of-science department has seen a fifty-per-cent increase in its majors in the past five years. The humanities creature who recites Cavafy at parties might fade away, but students are still getting their vitamins. There’s a lot of ethics in bioethics, after all.

The article emphasizes that students are mostly being convinced by institutions that STEM is all that matters, but finding themselves interested in the humanities, just lost. The article is pretty optimistic and just shows that the humanities need to change how they've traditionally approached things-attracting students by hermiting in the corner with their books.

The UK has a complete different issue and their economy is different. I want to narrow into the US, and stick to it.

[Anonymous]

Finished listening to this podcast;

First, coding does not equal Compute Science. Rambling on the history of code.org as it's a bad thing? nearly every field uses some sort of code. Even "Prompt Engineering" is beginning to look like code. I don't think teaching kids to code was bad.

The industry over hired and over paid in the last 5 - 10 years; they hired a lot of non CS majors to fill in roles. They even hired music majors that passed coding bootcamps.

CS majors will find jobs just not the dream $500K ones.

The AI state is right now like the early 1990s for CS - we haven't felt the boom yet. There are a lot of future billionaires working on sustainable startups.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

Marymount in VA

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2023/02/26/marymount-eliminates-liberal-arts-degrees

Others are having to restructure or be combined with other depts.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Even in the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/05/the-guardian-view-on-humanities-in-universities-closing-english-literature-courses-signals-a-crisis

Easy enough to google it.

Marymount eliminated degrees in mathematics science and economics, which I think we can both agree are extraordinarily popular-something tells me their 43 million dollar endowment may be more of a factor.

From the article you linked:

Jeffrey Cohen, a butter-voiced, bearded man who has been the dean of the humanities at A.S.U. since 2018, told me. On taking the position, he hired a marketing firm, Fervor, to sell the humanities better. It ran a market survey of eight hundred and twenty-six students.

“It was eye-opening to see their responses,” Cohen said. “In general, they loved the humanities and rated them higher than their other courses. However, they were unclear on what the humanities were—two hundred and twenty-two thought that biology was a humanity.”
The students also had no idea which careers humanities study led to, so Cohen decided to teach a course called Making a Career with a Humanities Major.

Doesn't sound like a lack of interest, just ignorance.

. Adjacent fields aren’t included in humanities tallies, and some of them are booming. Harvard’s history-of-science department has seen a fifty-per-cent increase in its majors in the past five years. The humanities creature who recites Cavafy at parties might fade away, but students are still getting their vitamins. There’s a lot of ethics in bioethics, after all.

The article emphasizes that students are mostly being convinced by institutions that STEM is all that matters, but finding themselves interested in the humanities, just lost. The article is pretty optimistic and just shows that the humanities need to change how they've traditionally approached things-attracting students by hermiting in the corner with their books.

The UK has a complete different issue and their economy is different. I want to narrow into the US, and stick to it.

Yes, and Marymount also eliminated their English major. So, I gave you an example.

In any case, people may have a passion for a certain subject, but most people can't make a decent living following their passion. I would love that if it were true. DD loves musical theater, but she knows there's very little chance that she will make a decent living following her passion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Finished listening to this podcast;

First, coding does not equal Compute Science. Rambling on the history of code.org as it's a bad thing? nearly every field uses some sort of code. Even "Prompt Engineering" is beginning to look like code. I don't think teaching kids to code was bad.

The industry over hired and over paid in the last 5 - 10 years; they hired a lot of non CS majors to fill in roles. They even hired music majors that passed coding bootcamps.

CS majors will find jobs just not the dream $500K ones.

The AI state is right now like the early 1990s for CS - we haven't felt the boom yet. There are a lot of future billionaires working on sustainable startups.

+ 100%. Gone are the $200K starting salaries, but that doesn't mean CS is dead. Most companies require tech people, and CS is not just about simple coding. Yes, AI can do some coding, but you still need a human to review and QA.

AI can also replace writers, btw, and just like AI produced code, you still need someone to review the AI writing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

Marymount in VA

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2023/02/26/marymount-eliminates-liberal-arts-degrees

Others are having to restructure or be combined with other depts.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Even in the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/05/the-guardian-view-on-humanities-in-universities-closing-english-literature-courses-signals-a-crisis

Easy enough to google it.

Marymount eliminated degrees in mathematics science and economics, which I think we can both agree are extraordinarily popular-something tells me their 43 million dollar endowment may be more of a factor.

From the article you linked:

Jeffrey Cohen, a butter-voiced, bearded man who has been the dean of the humanities at A.S.U. since 2018, told me. On taking the position, he hired a marketing firm, Fervor, to sell the humanities better. It ran a market survey of eight hundred and twenty-six students.

“It was eye-opening to see their responses,” Cohen said. “In general, they loved the humanities and rated them higher than their other courses. However, they were unclear on what the humanities were—two hundred and twenty-two thought that biology was a humanity.”
The students also had no idea which careers humanities study led to, so Cohen decided to teach a course called Making a Career with a Humanities Major.

Doesn't sound like a lack of interest, just ignorance.

. Adjacent fields aren’t included in humanities tallies, and some of them are booming. Harvard’s history-of-science department has seen a fifty-per-cent increase in its majors in the past five years. The humanities creature who recites Cavafy at parties might fade away, but students are still getting their vitamins. There’s a lot of ethics in bioethics, after all.

The article emphasizes that students are mostly being convinced by institutions that STEM is all that matters, but finding themselves interested in the humanities, just lost. The article is pretty optimistic and just shows that the humanities need to change how they've traditionally approached things-attracting students by hermiting in the corner with their books.

The UK has a complete different issue and their economy is different. I want to narrow into the US, and stick to it.

Yes, and Marymount also eliminated their English major. So, I gave you an example.

In any case, people may have a passion for a certain subject, but most people can't make a decent living following their passion. I would love that if it were true. DD loves musical theater, but she knows there's very little chance that she will make a decent living following her passion.

It's a bad one though. For someone arguing that there's no interest in the humanities, you really are going to use an example of a tiny school with no endowment shuttering multiple lucrative programs as your main example? I'm happy to see you didn't read any of the article you sent. Classic DCUM.

[Anonymous]

Honestly, I think these kids need to come up with a niche. Coding is a skill, just like writing. But you need substance to code or write about to distinguish yourself.

I'm certain someone who could code who also understands protein structures would have no problem getting a job. Or an entrepreneurial kid with business ideas who can code--that's how we have everything from Facebook to Uber to Google to AirBnB. You need to have something to contribute beyond just being able to code and I think you'll be highly marketable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

Marymount in VA

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2023/02/26/marymount-eliminates-liberal-arts-degrees

Others are having to restructure or be combined with other depts.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Even in the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/05/the-guardian-view-on-humanities-in-universities-closing-english-literature-courses-signals-a-crisis

Easy enough to google it.

Marymount eliminated degrees in mathematics science and economics, which I think we can both agree are extraordinarily popular-something tells me their 43 million dollar endowment may be more of a factor.

From the article you linked:

Jeffrey Cohen, a butter-voiced, bearded man who has been the dean of the humanities at A.S.U. since 2018, told me. On taking the position, he hired a marketing firm, Fervor, to sell the humanities better. It ran a market survey of eight hundred and twenty-six students.

“It was eye-opening to see their responses,” Cohen said. “In general, they loved the humanities and rated them higher than their other courses. However, they were unclear on what the humanities were—two hundred and twenty-two thought that biology was a humanity.”
The students also had no idea which careers humanities study led to, so Cohen decided to teach a course called Making a Career with a Humanities Major.

Doesn't sound like a lack of interest, just ignorance.

. Adjacent fields aren’t included in humanities tallies, and some of them are booming. Harvard’s history-of-science department has seen a fifty-per-cent increase in its majors in the past five years. The humanities creature who recites Cavafy at parties might fade away, but students are still getting their vitamins. There’s a lot of ethics in bioethics, after all.

The article emphasizes that students are mostly being convinced by institutions that STEM is all that matters, but finding themselves interested in the humanities, just lost. The article is pretty optimistic and just shows that the humanities need to change how they've traditionally approached things-attracting students by hermiting in the corner with their books.

The UK has a complete different issue and their economy is different. I want to narrow into the US, and stick to it.

Yes, and Marymount also eliminated their English major. So, I gave you an example.

In any case, people may have a passion for a certain subject, but most people can't make a decent living following their passion. I would love that if it were true. DD loves musical theater, but she knows there's very little chance that she will make a decent living following her passion.

It's a bad one though. For someone arguing that there's no interest in the humanities, you really are going to use an example of a tiny school with no endowment shuttering multiple lucrative programs as your main example? I'm happy to see you didn't read any of the article you sent. Classic DCUM.

LOL you asked me to name one example where a college got rid of the English major, I gave you one, and you claim it's a bad example.

Here's the thread:

me: yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.
you: Name one
me: Marymount in VA
you: that's a bad example because the school is tiny and has no endowment.

Classic DCUM, indeed. LOL

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just listened. My take away is the increased/continued importance of liberal arts. We can't predict the job market so many years out, so much better to focus on the critical thinking and writing skills that will be important to any job, regardless of AI or new technology.

This is what every businessperson has been saying for the last five years.
Send your kids to schools where they learn to think critically, analyze, speak up, and write effectively. Progressive high schools. That's why they tend to outperform in the last two cycles in college placements.

College professors need these kids in their classes. They are begging T20 AO for more of them. Private high schools focus on these skills more than public high schools.

yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.

Name one

Marymount in VA

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2023/02/26/marymount-eliminates-liberal-arts-degrees

Others are having to restructure or be combined with other depts.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Even in the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/05/the-guardian-view-on-humanities-in-universities-closing-english-literature-courses-signals-a-crisis

Easy enough to google it.

Marymount eliminated degrees in mathematics science and economics, which I think we can both agree are extraordinarily popular-something tells me their 43 million dollar endowment may be more of a factor.

From the article you linked:

Jeffrey Cohen, a butter-voiced, bearded man who has been the dean of the humanities at A.S.U. since 2018, told me. On taking the position, he hired a marketing firm, Fervor, to sell the humanities better. It ran a market survey of eight hundred and twenty-six students.

“It was eye-opening to see their responses,” Cohen said. “In general, they loved the humanities and rated them higher than their other courses. However, they were unclear on what the humanities were—two hundred and twenty-two thought that biology was a humanity.”
The students also had no idea which careers humanities study led to, so Cohen decided to teach a course called Making a Career with a Humanities Major.

Doesn't sound like a lack of interest, just ignorance.

. Adjacent fields aren’t included in humanities tallies, and some of them are booming. Harvard’s history-of-science department has seen a fifty-per-cent increase in its majors in the past five years. The humanities creature who recites Cavafy at parties might fade away, but students are still getting their vitamins. There’s a lot of ethics in bioethics, after all.

The article emphasizes that students are mostly being convinced by institutions that STEM is all that matters, but finding themselves interested in the humanities, just lost. The article is pretty optimistic and just shows that the humanities need to change how they've traditionally approached things-attracting students by hermiting in the corner with their books.

The UK has a complete different issue and their economy is different. I want to narrow into the US, and stick to it.

Yes, and Marymount also eliminated their English major. So, I gave you an example.

In any case, people may have a passion for a certain subject, but most people can't make a decent living following their passion. I would love that if it were true. DD loves musical theater, but she knows there's very little chance that she will make a decent living following her passion.

It's a bad one though. For someone arguing that there's no interest in the humanities, you really are going to use an example of a tiny school with no endowment shuttering multiple lucrative programs as your main example? I'm happy to see you didn't read any of the article you sent. Classic DCUM.

LOL you asked me to name one example where a college got rid of the English major, I gave you one, and you claim it's a bad example.

Here's the thread:

me: yes because English departments are closing due to a lack of interest.
you: Name one
me: Marymount in VA
you: that's a bad example because the school is tiny and has no endowment.

Classic DCUM, indeed. LOL

Not "due to a lack of interest." either. You're just wrong and loud.