Information technology (IT) is still in its infancy and its role in education is the subject of much experimentation – not just in applying technologies to the teaching and learning process, but also in the curriculum itself. Given the pace of change in computer technology, the need for a responsive curriculum and flexible strategies for its application to education cannot be doubted. In this essay, I discuss recent trends in computer science education rather than the application of the technology to the teaching and learning process.

Computer science has attracted significant targeted funding recently and might well continue to do so. The challenge is to respond in a way that preserves the broad aims of higher education while satisfying the immediate needs of our society. Clearly not all students will go on to further the basic knowledge of the science, so we must provide an education for the majority that produces an enquiring, analytic mind hand–in–hand with the vocational skills that are so desired.

The past decade has seen the number of graduates in computer science at York treble – and this is before the anticipated increase in graduates resulting from new government funding opportunities. This surge is undoubtedly due to the ever more ubiquitous impact of computers on our lives, and the resulting perception (true or false) that the field leads to greater career opportunities. Unfortunately, the expectations of many students are probably at odds with the reality of the computer science curriculum. Because powerful software enables the user to exert a high level of control over the computer relatively easily, many students come to computer science expecting it to increase their level of expertise with such computer applications. The vocational promise of the field, particularly in those "hot" areas so visibly touted in the press, is uppermost in the minds of many students.

However, like most scientific fields, computer science has theoretical foundations based in mathematics, and pervasive applications of mathematics in most areas. The curriculum is built on a significant mathematical foundation which students have to learn before they can tackle the high profile applied areas on a level that leads to a deep understanding of principles. The focus of the discipline is on the theory and knowledge necessary to build (engineer, if you like) the very tools that are used in such exciting applications in our society. In fact, the world needs relatively few people capable of building those tools, but considerably more people capable of understanding the principles – the capabilities and limitations – of such tools, and applying them to useful tasks.

For this reason computer science is the wrong field of study for many students. You don't need a computer science education to build a great web site, or an e–commerce solution, or to set up and maintain a computer network. External realities demand mass education in the area of information technology, but traditional computer science is, I suggest, the wrong solution.

To answer this apparent mismatch between the goals of a traditional academic computer science program and the needs of society we have devised a new information technology program (ITEC). The intention is to merge a technological core with the critical and analytic skills of a traditional liberal arts education. The technical core includes basic understanding of the engineering/scientific foundations of computing as well as the technical expertise to apply IT tools. Critical and analytic skills are fostered through courses that examine the cultural, social, and ethical dimensions of information technology. The justification for this is a perception that organisations need individuals who understand both the technology and the human dimensions (individual and organizational) of using that technology. Understanding the science of computing is important too, but for relatively fewer people – those who will design and build the structures others will apply.

Even in these early days of the program the attractiveness to students of this approach is already apparent, as shown in Figure 1. This is not just a matter of a program name sending the right marketing signals. The curriculum itself sends signals that resonate with many students. Those who are interested in a traditional liberal arts education but who want to use such an education to ride one of the dominant technological forces of our times will seek out the program. Our challenge at York is to build a program of the highest possible quality.

Until relatively recently, the first–year computer science student body in the Faculties of Arts and Pure and Applied Science was rather homogeneous as far as age and academic background were concerned – almost all students were embarking on their first degree either immediately or shortly after leaving secondary school. This is definitely no longer the case.

In the past two years, most of the enrollment growth we have experienced has come from students who have had some post–secondary education before coming to York. Growth in the "traditional" student body has not changed. This is demonstrated for example in Figure 2, which traces changes in the backgrounds of students who enrolled in COSC1020 (the first major stream course in computer science) for the fall terms of 1998 and 1999. The growth in students with a York background in

1999 is largely due to the inclusion of Atkinson students (following the merger of our programs) and the advent of the ITEC program. Prior to fall 1999, students with a York background were either repeating COSC1020 or had changed their major.

Most of the new demographic group are recent immigrants or international students, and for many of them computer science will be their second degree. Thus, computer science instructors face the task of teaching students directly out of high school side–by–side with mature students from diverse backgrounds, many of who already have a degree. In addition, some courses include both computer science and information technology majors whose educational objectives differ significantly.

Despite this increase in the diversity of our student body, there has been surprisingly little change in our teaching methods. Still more surprising is the limited use that we currently make of computing in the teaching process itself. Teaching is still for the most part face–to–face communication of information, coupled with the careful selection of assignment exercises that direct the students' learning activities. Computers are used in the teaching process, much as they are used in other disciplines, to facilitate the communication and presentation of information. And of course, they are crucial for carrying out many of the learning activities, if not the very subject of those learning activities.

Recently, in response to the increasing volume of work in COSC1020, we have begun to use computers to provide limited but immediate feedback to students on laboratory exercises. Our challenge is to find other ways to enhance the learning experience for our increasingly diverse student body.