Dave, Sounds like a wonderful program. Is it continuing? If not, why not? If so, how has the structure changed so that it sustains itself as an ongoing effort?
-- Russ Abbott Professor Emeritus, Computer Science California State University, Los Angeles On Fri, Oct 29, 2021 at 12:40 PM Prof David West <profw...@fastmail.fm> wrote: > Pieter, > > Your plans are admirable and exciting.I wish you the best in this > endeavor. If you would have any interest, I would be happy to share my > experience in New Mexico developing and delivering an industry award > winning program — the Software Development Apprenticeship. > > We totally blew up the academy. The program had no courses — instead we > defined "competencies" that had to be demonstrated — acknowledged by peers, > professors, and industry professionals — at five different levels: > basically following directions or rote learning; applying knowledge solo; > applying in different context; mentoring others / sharing knowledge; and > making an 'original' contribution or extension to the knowledge. Everyone > had to master all the "competencies" to level 3, but would vary widely by > individual interest in which ones were achieved at higher levels. > > We had a "one room schoolhouse" where students worked in teams on > real-world development projects alongside industry professionals, graduate > students to freshmen mixed on each team. > > If we had packaged the knowledge delivered in the program into traditional > semester credit courses it would have been the equivalent of two > undergraduate and three graduate degrees. Subjects far transcended > programming and other computer science topics to include business (of > course since business constituted the vast majority of our projects), hard > and soft sciences, writing, presentation, inter-personal and "soft" skills, > philosophy and history (Computer Scientists and Software Engineers are > abysmally ignorant of their own history and the thought foundations of > their discipline), art (including computer graphics of course, but much > more), and math (but probability and statistics and geometry instead of > calculus). > > Students learned 'on-demand'. The project to which they were assigned > would require some specific knowledge and they would "demand" that > learning. Actually, every six weeks, students would complete a learning > plan and the faculty had to combine them into a set of modules for lecture > and presentation in the ensuing 6-week interval. All teaching took place in > the same open lab/classroom, so everyone either directly or by "osmosis" > picked up on what was being taught. > > The program was immensely successful. Our student body came from the > poorest county in the poorest state (sometimes Louisiana would take first > place) and were woefully unprepared for college. But they succeeded: one > exemplar student entered the program lacking even rudimentary user skills > like "cut and paste," but was a team leader and J2EE mentor at the start of > his second semester. (He was also the only one who figured out why the Hero > — movie of same name — did not kill the warlord unifying China in a > wonderfully written essay.) > > Our student body was 70% minority (mostly because of where we were and the > mission of the University) and 51-54 percent female. > > Half of the students in the first year of the program had papers (not > student presentations but full papers) accepted to OOPSLA and Agile both > conferences had a 90+ percent rejection rate). Every student was place in > jobs, often before graduation and often with the companies who gave us > apprenticeship projects. > > The preceding is just bragging, but I am very proud of what we did. > > We had two faculty, myself and Pam Rostal and both of us worked 70-90 hour > weeks which would not be sustainable long term. We did attract a lot of > attention and industry "superstars" would drop by to mentor in their > particular area for 2-3 weeks at a time. > > If you have interest in any details, please ask off-list and I will be > happy to respond. > > davew > > > On Wed, Oct 27, 2021, at 12:25 PM, Pieter Steenekamp wrote: > > The public education system in South Africa is largely broken. For those > who can afford it, we have very good schools, but the majority cannot and > the education options for them are bleak. > > I plan to do something about it. > > This is my second attempt. About three years ago I started a school as a > proof of concept with a radical model to have very high quality yet very > low cost education and it failed miserably. (I managed to make plans for > the kids and I don't believe any suffered from the experience - I pulled > the plug before too much harm was done). I've thought, and discussed it a > lot, and I'm ready to roll out my second, very different attempt. > > The basis of this is that there are plenty of resources available for > free, and provided you manage the environment properly, kids can and will > teach themselves. > > My plan is a model with two legs, both legs offering very high quality > education, but the first leg is relatively expensive and has "bells and > whistles" to attract the wealthy and the second is bare bones to make it > affordable for those kids whose parents can't pay. > > The profit from first leg schools then cross-subsidise the costs of the > second leg schools. > > The concept for both legs are copied from https://www.khanlabschool.org/ > , adapted for local conditions of course. The second leg schools will just > be a low cost version, but the education offered will still be world class. > > Our academic year starts in January. I'm working flat out to have my first > school of the first leg open in January 2022. Then to have the first school > of the second leg open in January 2023. Then to learn from the experience, > adapt and roll it out so that every child in South Africa has access to > world class education in five years time. > > Pieter > > .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > archives: > 5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/ > 1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/ > > > > .-- .- -. - / .- -.-. - .. --- -. ..--.. / -.-. --- -. .--- ..- --. .- - . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn UTC-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam > un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > archives: > 5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/ > 1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/ >
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