Martyn Clark

What makes them succeed? Entry, progression and graduation in computer science

Significant attention has been paid in recent years to student attrition, and rightly so, since rates are rising and need diagnosing. Little attention seems to have been paid to the converse--the successful student. It is widely believed among academics that high school grades--in the UK, A-levels--are poor indicators of final performance, although we persist in using them as entry criteria in the absence of any other index into a students potential. This study, conducted in parallel in two traditional (pre-1992) UK universities, focuses on one discipline that has peculiar characteristics in intake, student expectation and entry criteria. We confirm some widely held beliefs, and scotch some others. As with all such studies, the number of confounding factors is large, but we draw conclusions where possible that are of relevance to all disciplines, and discuss how we mean to proceed.

A Bourdieusian Approach to Understanding Employability: Becoming a "Fish in Water".

It is assumed in the current policy environment that higher education should lead to graduate employability, although understandings of employability are generally limited. In this paper, we discuss issues relating to graduate employability with reference to a case study of an information technology (IT) student progressing to a graduate role in the IT industry. Our analysis uses Bourdieu’s ‘thinking tools’, habitus, field and capital, to discuss the importance to graduate employability of individual positions and dispositions, workplace culture and organisation, and the social contacts developed as part of undergraduate life. We argue that employability needs to be understood in relational terms. In particular, the value of skills and knowledge depends on the work and workplace to which a graduate progresses. Similarly, employable graduates need a ‘feel for the game’.

A case study in the acceptance of a new discipline

What factors contribute to the acceptance of a new discipline? The disciplinary map is not static but not all candidate disciplines find acceptance in the academy. This article presents a case study of the acceptance of a discipline in one university. It argues that a close association with an existing high‐status discipline was fundamental to the acceptance of the new discipline at the case study institution. In contrast, the evolution of the discipline to include lower status applied material was crucial to the emergence of a discipline independent of its parent. In addition, acceptance was influenced by a series of serendipitous factors that are likely to be specific to the case study institution.

Getting participation through discussion

Student participation is a vital component of any taught course. Where the course is concerned with the learning and teaching of theories and concepts, as opposed to skills and experiences, the key activity in which students can participate is discussion. In large classes it is impossible for teachers to engage every student in discussion but they can talk to each other. This paper relates one teachers experience over two years of trying to encourage students to discuss concepts such as systems and information using electronic bulletin boards. The paper focuses on how the exercise has evolved over time in response to reflection on experience and suggests some guidelines for making a success of this type of exercise.

Computer science in english high schools: we lost the s, now the c is going

High Schools in England began to teach computing long before the advent of the personal computer and the graphical user interface made it possible to teach aspects of information technology skills to non-specialists. We demonstrate that early high school computing was highly consistent with academic and professional practice. This consistency was eroded from the mid-1980s when the English school curriculum began to emphasise IT skills at the expense of computer science. We explain this development and argue that it helps to account for the growing difficulty in attracting students to university study in the discipline. Finally, we consider some current developments in the English high school curriculum, and reason that they raise concerns that they worsen prospects for the study of computer science.

High school computing clubs: a pilot study

While classes in IT skills are endemic, high school students in the UK rarely experience computer science. We present a pilot of a scheme that aims to go some way towards addressing this. Specifically, computing clubs were run on high school premises by high school teachers using material prepared by the University of Leeds School of Computing and supported by volunteer undergraduate mentors. Feedback suggests that the clubs were highly successful in their objectives of broadening understanding of the idea of a computer and introducing the concept of a computer program. School students, their teachers and the undergraduate volunteers all report an enjoyable, purposeful experience.

The relationship between CS education research and the SIGCSE community

The nature of the SIGCSE Symposium has seemingly evolved over the past ten years. Ten years ago the typical Symposium paper focused on the sharing of someone’s interesting or innovative idea on some aspect of the teaching component of being an undergraduate CS instructor. This could be a pedagogic technique, a “nifty” assignment or even the use of a lecture prop. It was also a primary source for the dissemination of courseware to support CS education (CSEd). The annual gathering at the Symposium was in many respects a large idea swap meet. The most recent Symposia have become infused with the notion of assessment; not techniques for the assessment of students and learning outcomes, but the assessment of the ideas or techniques being presented at the conference. It is seemingly no longer sufficient to develop an interesting or innovative technique/courseware/pedagogic approach, it must also be, using the tools of CSEd research, formally assessed. This panel seeks to explore this phenomenon by examining different perspectives on the question of the relationship between the SIGCSE community in general and the Symposium in particular and formal CSEd research.

State Support for the Expansion of UK University Computing in the 1950s

Fifty years ago, a major injection of government funding allowed six UK universities to purchase commercially produced computers. The funding facilitated a significant increase in computing resources for science and engineering research in the UK. Two government agencies-the University Grants Committee and the Advisory Committee on High Speed Calculating Machines-played notable roles in this process.

The transition from school to university: would prior study of computing help?

We investigate issues in the preparation of students for undergraduate study. Specifically, we focus upon the question of whether computer science students would be better prepared if they were required to pass a school level qualification in the discipline. Thus we investigate the school level curriculum in detail and make a comparison with the demands of a typical UK university first year. We conclude that there is no reason necessarily to see a school level qualification as assisting the preparation of students for undergraduate study in computer science. Rather, we hypothesise that the value of the qualification will depend heavily on the nature of the teaching experienced.

CS++: content is not enough

University education in computer science requires that students learn something of the nature of the discipline. We argue that, in addition to content knowledge, two of the many things the educated computer scientist might know about are the computer science pantheon and the metaphorical structure of the disciplines technical language.