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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Hi Bill,</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2> I value your time,global perspective. I also
value your well researched extensive knowledge base from which you
offer the latest research and thinking. I know I speak for many when I say
you are an asset on these lists. I am not sure we disagree on anything - only
how to rehabilitate IT and even then I am not sure anyone has the only right
answer; hence the thread. Maybe even rehabilitation may be too late/not
feasible.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I am wondering if stand alone IT will decline all
the way up to the tertiary levels if the trend continues. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Consider the drop from 7856 in IT Apps in 2004 to
4804 in 2007 and the translation is about a 40% drop in 3 years. This for a
subject that was the 3rd most popular in Victoria only about 10 years ago. Even
Software Development which enjoyed reasonably stable numbers around 3000 has had
similar drops if I am not mistaken. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Has any subject ever seen that sort of shakeout ? (
Apologies if my approximations are incorrect - I don't have a copy of the exact
numbers and dates )</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I accept your very powerful arguments regarding the
use of computers. Most of my degree was based on these types of applications
from numerical computations such as how functions are approximated using
computers to simulation of atomic and molecular behaviour using computer
programming. I actually ran into an ex Chemistry lecturer who was incidentally
quoting an American chemist who wrote the book " How to Use Excel in Analytical
Chemistry and in General Scientific Data Analysis". As I have been earmarked to
return to teaching senior Chemistry after an 18 year absence maybe this book
will come in handy ....:)) Forgive my digression.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Are you suggesting the stand alone senior IT will
also disappear as computers are absorbed into other areas ? </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>If so how will the current skill set needed by IT
professionals be ever attained ? </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I will add one more observation and invite
comment.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Who knows of any other senior subject ( apart from
IT ) for which teachers are wheeled in front of classes without the
requisite minimum 2 years of University training in that subject ?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Does anyone imagine a self taught Physics,
Chemistry, Mathematics, Accounting, History, Economics teacher taking a
year 11 to say nothing of a year 12 class ? Why have we/do we allow it in IT ?
</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Yours in continuing despair</FONT></DIV>
<DIV>Kevork Krozian<BR>Edulists Creator and Administrator<BR><A
href="http://www.edulists.com.au">www.edulists.com.au</A><BR><A
href="mailto:kevork@edulists.com.au">kevork@edulists.com.au</A><BR></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=billkerr@gmail.com href="mailto:billkerr@gmail.com">Bill Kerr</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=itapps@edulists.com.au
href="mailto:itapps@edulists.com.au">Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing
List</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Wednesday, September 26, 2007 5:13
PM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Re: [Year 12 IT Apps] What
Future IT?</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>hi kevork,<BR><BR>appreciate the effort you have gone to with
your comprehensive list and analysis<BR><BR>I went through your list and think
it can be abbreviated to three main things:<BR>
<OL>
<LI>tertiary admission (IT deemed to be less important than other subjects)
<LI>employment issues (gone to india, false perception or boring jobs)
<LI>trivial or boring or irrelevant or integrated from either student or
school perspective either due to school policies (not compulsory,
integration) or lack of teacher skill</LI></OL>I've taken out the "fun" item
because at the moment that's just being suggested as a possible solution to
the problem I think (ie. introduce game maker to senior school), it's not
there yet in Victoria - don't think it will solve the problems anyway based on
my own experience in one school in SA <BR><BR>Teachers don't have much control
over items (1) and (2). We might argue with the Uni stakeholders but they have
more say. We might argue that there really are good jobs out there but for
some reason its not getting through. By focusing on (1) and (2) there might be
some impact on the rate of decline but it's not going to stop the decline.
Vocational pathways will continue to be offered in senior school irregardless.
It's important but I see it as a side issue to the more important educational
issues <BR><BR>Item 3 is a can of worms partly because as a society we haven't
yet worked out what computers are really good for. It's an all purpose machine
that can emulate lots of other machines but what are they really good for?
<BR><BR>eg. the printing press was invented in 1450 but it took a generation
before new forms of printing became popular - the older generation had to die
out. eg. the first scientific illustrations didn't appear in books until 1484
<BR><A
href="http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/06/what-did-printing-press-change-and-how.html">http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/06/what-did-printing-press-change-and-how.html</A><BR><BR>I
would argue that there are unique and powerful educational purposes for
computers - eg. dynamically representing the exponential spread of an
epidemic, teaching calculus through vectors <BR><BR>I seem to be coming to a
position that stand-alone IT might have limited impact in education. But
nevertheless, the computer still is a vitally important, amazing and powerful
machine that all learners ought to be invited to explore more deeply - for its
powerful functionality, not just game playing, web surfing or the latest
application <BR><BR>It's more like this <BR>- the printing press led to the
book which led to literature which led to English literature<BR>- the computer
allows for the dynamic representation of systems which leads to what new
subjects (?) or what extensions of existing subjects such as physics etc.?
<BR><BR>I think mark guzdial is on the right path here: start with a rich
concept from the wider world of science or economics, for example, and then
use computers, including programming, to enrich the study of that domain<BR><A
href="http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/08/mark-guzdial-on-computing-education.html">http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/08/mark-guzdial-on-computing-education.html</A><BR><BR>I
see this sort of approach as more productive and more hopeful in the longer
term <BR><BR>cheers,<BR>-- <BR>Bill Kerr<BR><A
href="http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/">http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/</A><BR><BR><BR><BR>
<DIV><SPAN class=gmail_quote>On 9/25/07, <B class=gmail_sendername>Kevork
Krozian</B> < <A
href="mailto:kevork@edulists.com.au">kevork@edulists.com.au</A>>
wrote:</SPAN>
<BLOCKQUOTE class=gmail_quote
style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: rgb(204,204,204) 1px solid">Hi
Folks, <BR><BR>It is rather surreal following this thread. Let me explain
why.<BR><BR>1. Multimedia Victoria through the office of the State Minister
of<BR>Multimedia has just spent $500,000 in a 12 stop travelling roadshow
around <BR>Victoria trying to increase IT enrolments to fill the skill
shortage out in<BR>industry.<BR>2. Box Hill Institute repeatedly falls short
when requested to supply IT<BR>graduates to Google, Telstra and others. For
that reason they have held <BR>career information sessions to attract more
students. The information<BR>sessions have been presented by industry
employers.If anyone wants their<BR>names and email addresses I can find them
and pass them on.<BR><BR>It seems we are not sure what the causes are to our
problem of declining <BR>student numbers. The theories fall along the
following categories:<BR><BR>1. It is not rigorous enough. It is scaled down
and therefore does not<BR>appeal to those who want a good ENTER score.<BR>2.
It has been continuously eroded to the point tertiary courses prefer
<BR>students to NOT have completed a diluted IT course with programming
taught<BR>using outdated programming paradigms with monolithic 3G
programmming more in<BR>keeping with the late 80s and 90s. The IT courses
have been tailored to suit <BR>the teachers available to teach them rather
than the demands of industry.<BR>3. IT in secondary schools is entirely
disjointed from Year 13 at tertiay<BR>level unlike the much better links
that existed with the old Computer <BR>Science at senior secondary level in
the late 80s and unlike the better<BR>links that exist between Physics and
Chemistry between Yr 12 and 13 as<BR>claimed in an earlier email by a
tertiary level IT lecturer.<BR>4. It is too much/not enough FUN. <BR>5. It
is too theoretical/business management based with never ending<BR>systems
analysis<BR>6. It is/isn't practical enough.<BR>7. It is not being selected
because there have been declining numbers of<BR>jobs since the tech wreck of
2000. That was 8 years ago. <BR>8. All the jobs have gone to India so there
is no point chasing an IT<BR>career.<BR>9. IT is not a prerequisite for a
job since you don't even need it to do IT<BR>at Uni or TAFE. So why take it
if you don't need it ? You can take it later <BR>if you decide to follow an
IT career.<BR>10. The teacher doesn't know anything/enough about IT and how
to fix<BR>computers or how to set up a network so the students think they
know more<BR>than the teacher so they can't possible learn from him/her.
<BR>11. Students feel they know it all because they can download music,
burn<BR>DVDs, edit home movies, update their geocities or myspace personal
web area,<BR>use ipods, etc etc. What good would it do to take IT at senior
level when <BR>they know it all ?<BR>12. IT is not compulsory at junior
level so students do not see a link<BR>between what they have done with ICT
across the curriculum and a specialist<BR>senior IT class.<BR><BR>No doubt
you can add to this list. What is curious is that during the <BR>careers
seminars at Box Hill , industry people lined up a number of myths<BR>such as
job numbers have declined and systematically "busted" each one of<BR>them in
so far as the industry trends and employment availability. To be <BR>fair,
their brief was more on encouraging students to select IT at tertiary<BR>and
TAFE levels rather than any dicussion about IT at senior
secondary<BR>level.<BR>To also be fair an enormous amount of work has gone
in at the local level <BR>to make IT related courses more accessible to
secondary students. Many<BR>schools have tried to make IT at secondary level
more "work ready" in its<BR>delivery. For example, many schools teach
:<BR><BR>1. the VET Multimedia Certificate III <BR>2. the VET IT Certificate
III<BR>3. Aries<BR>4. Cisco CCNA and even the first semester of Cisco
CCNP.<BR><BR>Despite this huge effort with up to 5 senior IT and IT related
classes at<BR>my school ( IT apps, IT Software Dev., VET multimedia Cert
III, VET IT Cert <BR>III, Cisco CCNA ) , I have had less than 12 students at
Year 11 level ,<BR>enrolled across these subjects for next
year.<BR><BR>Whilst there are some valid reasons why students have turned
off IT ( listed<BR>above ), I still feel that we have missed something
obvious in the evolution <BR>of our subject so that it has become less
attractive. Part of it has been<BR>the hijacking of ICT across the
curriculum to relegate IT to a doormat (<BR>service ) for other subject
areas.The idea of ICT across the curriculum has <BR>as much merit as English
or Maths across the curriculum.<BR>I am not sure where the answer(s) lies
but maybe we need to survey the<BR>customers more closely to establish what
their reasons are in order to fine<BR>tune our efforts. <BR><BR>Yours in
despair<BR><BR>Kevork Krozian<BR>Edulists Creator and Administrator<BR><A
href="http://www.edulists.com.au">www.edulists.com.au</A><BR><A
href="mailto:kevork@edulists.com.au">kevork@edulists.com.au</A><BR><BR>-----
Original Message -----<BR>From: "Russell Edwards" <<A
href="mailto:edwards.russell.t@edumail.vic.gov.au">edwards.russell.t@edumail.vic.gov.au</A>><BR>To:
"Year 12 IT Applications Teachers' Mailing List" <BR><<A
href="mailto:itapps@edulists.com.au">itapps@edulists.com.au</A>><BR>Sent:
Tuesday, September 25, 2007 8:41 AM<BR>Subject: Re: [Year 12 IT Apps] What
Future IT?<BR><BR><BR>><BR>> On 24/09/2007, at 7:00 PM, Cameron Bell
wrote: <BR>><BR>>> Unfortunately the current assessment and VTAC
admissions scheme means<BR>>> that students tend to take a
strategic approach to subject selection.<BR>>> The ENTER
score is the goal. While a few students have a clear pathway
<BR>>> mapped out and will chose subjects based on
interest, many aim to<BR>>> maximise the ENTER score, then
see what courses they qualify for (often<BR>>> making
monumental errors of judgement as evidenced by the drop-out rate
<BR>>> in first year uni). Why would a student take VCE IT
if they felt they<BR>>> could get a better score by taking
say, history. There is nothing about<BR>>> having VCE IT as a pre-
requisite for ICT courses at the Uni's - they <BR>>> want English
and Maths Methods. (Does that say anything about the
VCE<BR>>> courses or is it that they want to make it as
easy as possible to<BR>>> qualify?) Students could well end
up in well paying careers in IT <BR>>> without taking it in
Yr 11 or 12.<BR>><BR>> Well, that has been true for a long time. When
I did my VCE in 1992/3, we<BR>> certainly had maximising our
tertiary entrance score as the primary goal. <BR>> Like all my
computer geek friends, I actively avoided choosing VCE IT<BR>>
because it was boring!! I then went on to do an hons
degree in comp sci,<BR>> another degree after that, and work
for several years in science with <BR>> strong software
development component. To a 16-year-old who's been coding<BR>>
for half his or her life, spending a year looking at application
software<BR>> and business management jargon looks like a big
and boring step <BR>> backwards.<BR>><BR>> My impression is that
the VCE IT subjects (apart from Software Dev? I<BR>> have no experience
of that) are not designed with the IT enthusiast<BR>> (=future IT
professional) in mind. Instead they are designed to give a
<BR>> grounding in IT to people who will end up working in other
areas. This<BR>> is the type of grounding that will help
people work in environments that<BR>> use ICT (i.e. just about
everywhere, these days). It's not nearly deep <BR>> enough to
provide any significant level of preparation for an ICT
career,<BR>> and in fact I'd go so far as to say that anyone
who didn't find it boring<BR>> due to its simplicity is
very likely, if they enroll in a uni IT course, <BR>> to end
up in the drop-out group you mention unless they are willing
to<BR>> work very hard at it.<BR>><BR>> hehe, I remember making a
similar point last week on the yr7-10it list.<BR>> Must be
navel-gazing season!! <BR>><BR>> So we may as well forget about
"needing it" as a reason for choosing VCE<BR>> IT. If we don't
want it to go, it has to be made more interesting and/or<BR>>
easier.<BR>><BR>> Of course, the other option that should always be
dispassionately <BR>> considered, even though it's obviously
uncomfortable for IT teachers, is<BR>> that possibly it's
fading as a VCE-level subject for good reason.<BR>><BR>>
Russell<BR>> _______________________________________________ <BR>> <A
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