IT in Education

IT’s impact on education

The emphasis on IT education is shadowing other engineering studies. If everyone studies computer science, who will build the roads, asks Anil Seth

A few days ago, a headline glared at me. 70 percent of IIT graduates choose IT jobs. My first reaction was, “an example of market forces at work.” But I could not get that headline out of my head. We expect a song to keep repeating in the head and not a headline.

If we compare this with the past, these numbers may not be very different. In my younger days, if my memory does not fail me, we used to have headlines that most IIT students went abroad. The present scenario is, perhaps, much better. But still, it disturbs me.

Even in our college and around us, the students are getting jobs in the IT field, though typically these are students from the IT and electronics branches. So where exactly is the impact of market forces upon our educational system?

We insist on having an equal number of students study w, x, y and z. The students want to study x and the employers hire students to work on x. If market forces were at work, w, y and z would shrink, or even disappear. Actually, not all fields have equal numbers. At newer colleges, the managements decide to teach only x and y, and forget about w and z.

Should we not have some dynamism in the number of students who study a particular subject? Should we not have some means by which a student can take a few more courses and develop knowledge in another field?

How are we handling the need for dynamism? Our society wanted more seats for software engineers. The number of seats for computer engineering remains the same. We created another department called Information Technology. Now that it is a different department, there should be a difference.

I believe the search for the appropriate differentiation from a dozen sources resulted in a dozen variations. At least I can’t tell the difference and I teach in both departments. The differentiation is cosmetic and administrative. I doubt if the curriculum of these courses varies significantly across other universities either. If one has to decide on a common set of courses, virtually the same set of courses would be selected.

Why not a smorgasbord?

I can’t imagine a university not teaching database management systems. However, I can imagine a student opting to specialise in embedded systems and choosing not to study database management. Instead of another department, we should have increased the number of seats in Computer Science and Engineering, and created a smorgasbord of courses. We may want a Kashmiri apple to look and taste the same, but I doubt if that is what we are looking for in students. We may need a standardised process but certainly not a standardised product. IT companies can appreciate the difference as no two of their products are ever the same.

Are they relevant?

There is another point which rankles. If we can’t find a civil engineer, would we hire a software engineer instead? Even the idea sounds ridiculous. Why does it not seem equally absurd the other way around? The field is no longer so new that we must necessarily depend on or poach on students of other subjects.

Is what we teach so unrelated to the work content that on-the-job training is a must and that educational background matters very little? Is the study of subject x not required because w, y and z will do just as well? Are the companies happier with x but manage to work with w, y and z as well because the demand far exceeds the supply? I wish we knew the relative performance of the employees based on their educational background. In the absence of hard facts, any analysis would really be based on hand-waving arguments.

Should the market dictate?

The final point which needs to be explored is whether we can afford to take the risk of market forces playing havoc with our manpower needs. If everyone studies computer science, who will build the roads? Why not outsource them to the Chinese or Americans? It may cost too much. Then pay our own civil engineers well and hold them accountable for the quality of roads they build.

While students are fickle, the departments cannot be created overnight. We cannot have a specialist in data mining suddenly being required to teach mining. We cannot even rely upon the experience of the US because they have the problem of convincing students to study engineering, that being a geek is not a tragedy.

If departments are under threat, they will innovate. We may find the same pancakes but with different flavours of syrup. It will lead to excitement and creation of exciting new courses with the future in mind.

A course close to my heart is game programming. At least half of this course is likely to be physics and mathematics, two fields which are very important but can’t attract students.

The remaining half may include psychology and philosophy, as well as computer science.

As Prof Djikstra once remarked, it is not the task of the university to offer what society asks for, but to give what society needs.

Indian universities need to get out of the existing pre-packaged degree options and start thinking about what our society needs. If universities do not manage market forces, market forces will manage them.

Anil Seth, a physicist by training, is currently a professor of IT at PCCE, Goa. E-mail: anilseth@sancharnet.in