The goal of this project is to develop a model for a campus wide computation initiative that will transform undergraduate computing education in the institution and academic environment. The activities that make up this model will engage in computation students and faculty who are outside the typical computing community. The transformation is achieved through the involvement of (1) faculty leaders inside the computing community in teaching and research collaborations with faculty and students from outside the computing community, and (2) faculty and industrial partners who develop programs that highlight the increasingly important role of computation in their respective industries. The two colleges have developed and will implement a coordinated model for a computation initiative that will (1) attract non-traditional CS students to take introductory computing courses (not computer literacy courses) and (2) encourage faculty from non-CS departments to develop discipline specific courses that build on the introductory computation courses and incorporate higher level computation skills. The model is based on the framework of a curriculum in computational methods that includes a core of courses that addresses common applications of computation across disciplines, followed by additional discipline specific courses within other departments that focus on computation activities in those fields. The strategies that will be developed and implemented for transforming undergraduate computing education, specifically fostering change in the attitudes of students and faculty and increasing the visibility of computation, will serve as a blueprint for implementing similar changes at other institutions. Dissemination of the model for a campus wide computation initiative, along with strategies for implementation, will make it possible for the changes to be replicated at other institutions. This will ultimately result in increased competence and familiarity with computing skills amongst all graduates, particularly in the sciences, and a more visible role and presence for computing in the academy.
The major goal of this project was the expansion of undergraduate computing education across non-computer science disciplines. A core assumption of the project was that computation can play a role in many disciplines across engineering, the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities. We planned curricular changes that would provide the basis for an educational model that can be generalized to and adapted by other schools. The project goal of expanding computing education would be accomplished through the following major activities: Develop new introductory computer science (CS) courses that would attract both computer science and non-computer science (non-CS) majors. These courses would include core competencies and skills, with emphasis on specific applications relevant to a range of disciplines. Encourage students to enroll in additional computation courses offered by the computer science department. Encourage non-CS faculty to enhance existing courses by adding computational modules to their course curricula, or create new courses that incorporate computational elements. Course development would be facilitated by project funded professional development activities. On-going technical support would be provided to these faculty by the computer science department. Provide funds for faculty to develop and supervise summer research projects that would involve students in computationally intensive research as part of the process of developing computational modules for disciplinary courses. Develop a formal computational methods minor. Over the period of the project we had the following outcomes: Thirty faculty from fifteen distinct disciplines received funding that enabled them to incorporate computational components into their courses or create an entirely new course with significant computational infusion. Over two dozen courses were modified in the disciplines of astronomy, biology, chemistry, classics, experimental humanities, economics, electrical engineering, English, film studies, geology, history, mathematics, mechanical engineering, music, physics, political science, and neuroscience. Twenty-six of the funded faculty were at Union College, while 4 were from Bard College, Mount Holyoke College, and Denison University. Each of the funded faculty teamed up with a student who carried out a computationally intensive research project and/or worked directly on the development of course materials (laboratory exercises, class materials, homework assignments, etc.). In some cases the grant funding supported additional students who worked on refinements to the course materials after the initial use. A total of thirty-six students received funding from the grant. They came from many of the non-CS disciplines, as well as from the CS department. When surveyed, students who enrolled in the courses with computational components (the "infused courses") reported overwhelmingly that the computational component helped them understand the disciplinary material. For many faculty the computational component in their courses also opened up new research avenues for themselves and for their students. The computer science department developed a number of theme-based introductory computer courses. They all cover the same concepts and skills, but the assignments and projects in each course are focused around the course theme. The themes are: big data, robotics, game development, artificial intelligence, media computation, and engineering applications. Several majors on campus require one of the introductory courses (managerial economics, neuroscience, all engineering majors) and we have seen overall enrollments increase to the point where we are now teaching introductory CS to about 10% of the student body each year, with students coming from 25 distinct major fields. In order to further develop the ability of non-CS students to apply computing in discipline-appropriate ways, we developed additional intermediate level computation courses: Modeling and Simulation, Data Visualization, Natural Language Processing, and Web Programming. These courses are designed to be appropriate for and relevant for non-CS majors and count for our new computational methods minor. As a result of the work carried out under this grant, we have increased 7-fold the number of students taking introductory computer science on our campus, with enrollments coming from 3 times as many distinct majors as were represented when we taught our old introductory course. In addition, we have more than doubled the percentage of women taking introductory CS. Finally, between introductory CS and the infused courses in other disciplines, each year we now expose to computing the equivalent of 25% of our student body, or approximately 550 students per year out of a student body of 2000. Many other institutions have expressed interest in the work we have carried out. We have spread the word via conference presentations, workshops, and invited talks at numerous colleges and universities. These activities are ongoing, along with the curricular changes in our CS and non-CS courses.
