International Computing Issues as a Freshman Seminar

Chris HealyFurman University

CCSC-E October 31, 2009

Introduction

• Freshman seminar program• The need for verbal-oriented course• Global & green issues was my focus• ACM/IEEE curriculum 2001– SP2 (Social context of computing)– SP7 (Privacy and civil liberties)– SP9 (Economic issues in computing)

Approach

• Articles, mostly from IEEE Computer and CACM

• Sought quality articles for careful reading• Suggested questions, types of things to look

for in a paper• Two essays: vertical and horizontal views of IT

development in the world• Class participation

Example papers

• “From Subject of Change to Agent of Change – Women and IT in Brazil”

• “Engineering the Irish Software Tiger”• “Google’s China Problem”• “Recycling E-Waste: The Sky is the Limit”• “Competitiveness and ICTs in Africa”• “The Effect of National Culture and Economic Wealth on Global

Software Piracy Rates”• “Web Searching in a Multilingual World”• “Computing in Post-War Afghanistan”• “Little Finland’s Transformation to a Wireless Giant”

Retrospect

• Easy to find good papers– Economic issues– IT by region, e.g. China, India, Africa, Middle East,

Brazil, Australia, Canada, Singapore, Malaysia, Ireland, Russia, Finland

– 56 papers were assigned in total• World Economic Forum• Communications of the ACM• IEEE Computer; IEEE Spectrum

Retrospect (2)• Participation activity– Award points for contributions – standard error = ¼ letter grade– Laptop & wireless network

• Benefits of course– Freedom: Independent of rest of curriculum– Suite of seminars helped to increase total enrollment 30%

over previous year– Grade distribution: unipolar but still challenging

A B C D F

2 5 5 1 1

Student Survey

• Positive responses– Appropriate articles and sufficient variety– Appropriate work load (preparation, essays)

• Lukewarm– Easy to understand– “I learned a lot”; “Opened my eyes”

• Negative– Routine– Don’t want to take another CS course ?

Conclusion

• Seminar: More variety at the front door of the department’s offerings

• Show students professional, “human”, and inter-disciplinary issues

• Accessible• Practice critical reading, thinking, writing• Captive audience may be double-edged sword• Course Web site:

http://cs.furman.edu/~chealy/fys1107