Coding as a Foundational Skill
by wino_admin
"Everybody in this country should learn how to program a computer because it teaches you how to think." --- Steve Jobs
I freely admit that 2600 may be the wrong forum to bring this to.
Society today is beginning to develop the idea that to be successful, one must learn "to code." We do not seem to be interested in teaching people "to program," but rather just "to code." I am a very firm believer that schools should give students access to computers.
I believe that in this country and in many others, computer usage not only defines us (as a country), it can define our ability to learn and earn. I think that one thing we need to realize as a society is that continually pushing tech jobs and college at our children, while outsourcing the "dirty" jobs as much as possible (thank you M. Rowe), is causing a greater rift between classes.
I do not believe that every person should be able to program. I am not quite sure when the revolution in thinking began, but I can see its effects. Some are rather positive, such as society having the perception that "intelligence is hot."
I graduated high school in 2001, and that thinking was completely out of phase at that time. Other aspects of the "code push" can be detrimental to our ability to effectively bargain for wages. More people including references to programming on a resume can thicken the perceived talent pool and make it that much harder for us to get work. It is my opinion that this will result in the general public having less respect for what some of us do.
I do agree that there are some skills every person should have.
I believe every person who drives a car should know how to check fluids and change a flat tire. I believe that people should be able to do simple math in their head. I think people should know how to count back change for $20. We, as humans, have the ability to do all of these things, yet we very often lack the knowledge to do them. I am ashamed to say that I live in a country where some people think that spending an hour learning how to program is more important than learning how to balance your budget.
I am an IT worker. I have an A+, and I have taken some college classes, but I have no sheepskin. I am by no means an expert in anything. I work in Tier 2 desktop support for a large privately owned beverage company. This is not a glamorous job. Every summer, we hire interns.
Some of these interns stay, some do not. This past summer, we hired an engineering intern. He was one semester away from his BS. This user was given a task importing data into Microsoft Excel. He proceeded to write a VBScript to automate some part of his task. This is the part where the IT department gets involved. Every time this user opened Excel, he received a metric ton of VB errors. Which resulted in a metric ton of tickets. When I tried to explain to him the error was in his code, I was slapped with "I took a semester of VB, it's not my code." We, as desktop support, are not supposed to point fingers directly at the user, and this instance resulted in lots of wasted time.
Having a general idea of what program code is, and what its function is within the bigger picture, is probably a good idea. When we push non-technical people further into our world with things like the "hour of code," what we do is give inept users the ability to think they are computer experts. Most people do not understand the difference between having a grasp of a subject and being an Subject Matter Expert (SME). Some could argue that issues such as these are job security. While this may be true, there are much more pressing items in my day than fixing issues caused by a user who has 15 weeks of programming experience.
There are many programs available for people to learn programming.
These range from Internet-based programs (edX) to community colleges to 2600 meetings. Sites such as code.org are perpetuating the idea that everyone should be able to code, drawing on such visionaries as Ashton Kutcher, Dr. Oz, will.i.am, and Arianna Huffington. "It's important for these kids, right now, starting at eight years old, to read and write code," claims will.i.am.
I fail to understand why we need to have every eight-year-old in the country fluent in C, Java, Perl, or BASIC. The great tragedy is that by focusing our children so completely on CS, we are ignoring other important jobs and skills.
Arianna Huffington stated that "Learning to code is useful no matter what your career ambitions are." I fail to see where a train engineer, welder, CPA, janitor, construction worker, dairyman, or your average small business owner will find a benefit in the ability to properly implement a loop in Bash. I feel that this push is not only overreaching and overstated, but that it can, over time, further degrade the ability to do our own work.
Sources
www.discovery.com/tv-shows/dirty-jobs/bios/dirty-jobs-bio.htm