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Why MIT switched from Scheme to Python (2009)

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284 points borski | 2 comments | 25 Jul 25 16:38 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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MontyCarloHall ◴[25 Jul 25 17:23 UTC] No.44685710[source]▶
Isn't this just part of the broader trend of CS departments switching away from teaching computer science to teaching computer engineering, which in turn is part of the more general trend of colleges becoming more vocational?

LISP dialects like Scheme are excellent for teaching pure computer science because they are the closest thing to executing lambda calculus expressions. Whereas Python is excellent for teaching applied computer engineering, because it's essentially executable pseudocode for imperative languages, and imperative languages are the most common language a computer engineer encounters in the real world.

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kec ◴[25 Jul 25 17:53 UTC] No.44686088[source]▶
Computer Engineering is its own discipline, typically lumped with Electrical Engineering, which is more about system architecture and design and only touches on programming at a low level such as device firmware.

What I think you're really lamenting is the devolution of CS education to vocational programming.

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1. lupusreal ◴[25 Jul 25 18:00 UTC] No.44686168[source]▶
I think he meant software engineering.
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2. leoc ◴[26 Jul 25 00:24 UTC] No.44690131[source]▶
“Software Engineering” tends to be about project management: schedules and organisation, estimation, defect rates and so on. For vocational training on existing IT systems (including some coding), which I assume is more what the course focused on, then “Management Information Systems” or “Information Technology” would be the more traditional names IIUC.