Now that I have started to learn some seroius PROGRAMMING with PYTHON langauge and recently I saw another programming language R, a language for STATISTICAL AND GRAPHICAL processing of data, I thought to write a blog regarding the frailities of INDIAN ENGINEERING EDUCATION SYSTEM.
This blog does not cover IIT/IIIT/BITS/IISC, the premier institutions of india, as their GRADUATES are world best. Also, the focus is mainly on COMPUTER SCIENCE/INFORMATION SCIENCE
During the first semester of our ENGINEERING, the university had kept a course on PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES, and they had asked the affiliated colleges to teach 'C', a language meant to do serious programming which virtually runs all the machines on this earth. Now i was a beginner in the field of Computers as my school did not have the option to take computer science where C++ was the language being taught in schools. Hell, to make matters worst, our school had only two option, choose biology/hindi for PHYSICS, CHEMISTRY, MATHEMATICS and those who did not want to study MATHEMATICS, they will study BIOLOGY with HINDI, a combination which would make everyone to get a JOVIAL laugh, and people do get laughter when I tell them that i have studied HINDI along with SCIENCE subjects.
Now coming back to the point, I believe that teaching 'C' as a first langauge in an engineering course, during first semester in itself is a crime the way studying mathematics and hindi together. The reason is that PROGRAMMING is nothing but problem solving. It is nothing related with langauges. Languages are a tool to solve problems. During the engineering courses,the focus should be kept on solving problems especially using mathematics, statistics and tools etc.
For Computer Science and Information Science, the important courses are AUTOMATA, COMPILERS, ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, DATA MINING, DATA STRUCTUCRES, DBMS,OS. The AUTOMATA is one of the most important course which teaches about CONTEXT FREE GRAMMAR, REGULAR EXPRESSIONS which are very important to construct PARSERS or to find patterns of data. Same is DATA MINING using STATISTICS.
When a subject like 'C' is taught, which takes many years of pracitce to learn, that too the one who teaches virtually has no idea about writing programs, that too, for the people who have tryst with the computers for the first time in their life, people are bound to lose their interest as it is really a moral crusher when we cannot write programs.
And then, we had 'C++', JAVA', VC++, also in our courses during the subsequent years. And the end result is same, - we had only bookish knowledge not the real one.
Now when i think on the course curriculum of my university, I tried to figure out that what our university was trying to do at the first place? Were they really interested in making ENGINEERS or they just wanted people to get degrees, who would be hired by infosys etc just by solving some crap puzzles, which would give them a space in TOI. This type of course is usually set for DIPLOMA colleges, which churns out technicians. Yes, you have read it right- TECHNICIANS,. ITI was an institute or rather, it is still there which produces technicians who do VOCATION jobs like plumbing, electiricians etc. Same are the SOFTWARE ENGINEERS produced by such universities of india. We are all, SOFTWARE PLUMBERS, TECHNICIANS who work in a TOP DOWN hirearchy with a proper system set up in place who is managed by a CLERK, who is hailed as MANAGER as these titles are EAR PLEASING and SOOTHING for the GROOM'S FATHER IN LAW, who is just happy that his SON IN LAW has travelled to US of A on a PROJECT, which is nothing but working as a labor and killing your own interests and life. But then, india is a changed place now and people really don't want to live their own life the way they want.
I really get laughter and I DO LAUGH, when I look back into my GRADUATION DAYS. I mean, is it really possible to learn langauges like 'C', 'C++', 'JAVA' into 4 months? And that too, in the industry, even a basic technique of PROGRAMMING is not even used, then why did our UNIVERSITY set up or design such curiculum? If you would say that by learning these things, you would get a job in MNC, then let me tell you that those MNCs of india never look for TECHNICAL SKILLS first of all, rather they want people who are UNDERCOOKED and INCOMPETENT technically, as these people are best choices to work as SLAVES for their life and they are pretty much happy also.
And this is precisely the reason that why all engineers in india want to do MBA, want to become MANAGERS, as they really have not got the GLIMPSE of ENGINEERING. What it takes to be an ENGINEER, no one has idea on this in india, not even me, because I am yet to do a WORK which an ENGINEER does. Until and unless, mathematics, statistics, algorithms, etc are not used to solve a problem, whatever I will do, it will not be ENGINEERING.
This blog does not cover IIT/IIIT/BITS/IISC, the premier institutions of india, as their GRADUATES are world best. Also, the focus is mainly on COMPUTER SCIENCE/INFORMATION SCIENCE
During the first semester of our ENGINEERING, the university had kept a course on PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES, and they had asked the affiliated colleges to teach 'C', a language meant to do serious programming which virtually runs all the machines on this earth. Now i was a beginner in the field of Computers as my school did not have the option to take computer science where C++ was the language being taught in schools. Hell, to make matters worst, our school had only two option, choose biology/hindi for PHYSICS, CHEMISTRY, MATHEMATICS and those who did not want to study MATHEMATICS, they will study BIOLOGY with HINDI, a combination which would make everyone to get a JOVIAL laugh, and people do get laughter when I tell them that i have studied HINDI along with SCIENCE subjects.
Now coming back to the point, I believe that teaching 'C' as a first langauge in an engineering course, during first semester in itself is a crime the way studying mathematics and hindi together. The reason is that PROGRAMMING is nothing but problem solving. It is nothing related with langauges. Languages are a tool to solve problems. During the engineering courses,the focus should be kept on solving problems especially using mathematics, statistics and tools etc.
For Computer Science and Information Science, the important courses are AUTOMATA, COMPILERS, ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, DATA MINING, DATA STRUCTUCRES, DBMS,OS. The AUTOMATA is one of the most important course which teaches about CONTEXT FREE GRAMMAR, REGULAR EXPRESSIONS which are very important to construct PARSERS or to find patterns of data. Same is DATA MINING using STATISTICS.
When a subject like 'C' is taught, which takes many years of pracitce to learn, that too the one who teaches virtually has no idea about writing programs, that too, for the people who have tryst with the computers for the first time in their life, people are bound to lose their interest as it is really a moral crusher when we cannot write programs.
And then, we had 'C++', JAVA', VC++, also in our courses during the subsequent years. And the end result is same, - we had only bookish knowledge not the real one.
Now when i think on the course curriculum of my university, I tried to figure out that what our university was trying to do at the first place? Were they really interested in making ENGINEERS or they just wanted people to get degrees, who would be hired by infosys etc just by solving some crap puzzles, which would give them a space in TOI. This type of course is usually set for DIPLOMA colleges, which churns out technicians. Yes, you have read it right- TECHNICIANS,. ITI was an institute or rather, it is still there which produces technicians who do VOCATION jobs like plumbing, electiricians etc. Same are the SOFTWARE ENGINEERS produced by such universities of india. We are all, SOFTWARE PLUMBERS, TECHNICIANS who work in a TOP DOWN hirearchy with a proper system set up in place who is managed by a CLERK, who is hailed as MANAGER as these titles are EAR PLEASING and SOOTHING for the GROOM'S FATHER IN LAW, who is just happy that his SON IN LAW has travelled to US of A on a PROJECT, which is nothing but working as a labor and killing your own interests and life. But then, india is a changed place now and people really don't want to live their own life the way they want.
I really get laughter and I DO LAUGH, when I look back into my GRADUATION DAYS. I mean, is it really possible to learn langauges like 'C', 'C++', 'JAVA' into 4 months? And that too, in the industry, even a basic technique of PROGRAMMING is not even used, then why did our UNIVERSITY set up or design such curiculum? If you would say that by learning these things, you would get a job in MNC, then let me tell you that those MNCs of india never look for TECHNICAL SKILLS first of all, rather they want people who are UNDERCOOKED and INCOMPETENT technically, as these people are best choices to work as SLAVES for their life and they are pretty much happy also.
And this is precisely the reason that why all engineers in india want to do MBA, want to become MANAGERS, as they really have not got the GLIMPSE of ENGINEERING. What it takes to be an ENGINEER, no one has idea on this in india, not even me, because I am yet to do a WORK which an ENGINEER does. Until and unless, mathematics, statistics, algorithms, etc are not used to solve a problem, whatever I will do, it will not be ENGINEERING.
2 comments:
it took one whole week for me to understand what is a "Link" in linked list..Another month to understand "void" pointers in list/tree. Way back in 2002 when internet was not at peek, never heard about internet that sucked and throw more than 250kb, i used to go online, open a page, switch off the connection, read and have a "save-as" then again do the same. LOL. I am not even computer science student. I am a economic student during 1998-2000. comp.lang.c was my nntp favoured.
Now a days, during campus, they take student based on aptitude. I guide some freshers in my company. They come from campus. At first, they struggle to understand basic of RDBMS. When i tell normalization they ask "what"..!! Then they under go a re-birth from starch, learning basics.
A wonderful article indeed..
@sathya shrayan: Thanks for the comment and the compliment :)
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