As a second note, I don't consider Python a language suitable only for lower-level classes. I am currently writing a ray-tracer for my Advanced Graphics seminar completely in Python, and I've found that development goes a whole hell of a lot quicker than in C++, which my partner and I wrote our modeling/rendering enginge in last semester. I'm also working on a few personal projects (a replacement for pine/mutt in the style of gmail, among others) in Python.
In fact, the only areas I think Python is *not* suitable are low-level architecture-dependent programming. Our architecture class does CPU/memory stress testing using C, and our operating systems classes should also probably use it. I guess I feel that only in places where the architecture *is* the point of the project should a low-level language be used; in all other situations, the goal of the class ought to be to study the algorithms and focus on goals, instead of nitpicky details.
I guess that didn't directly address any of your questions -- just my thoughts on the matter.
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