Jermayn Parker wrote:
I read this discussion and I think it's strange.
The universitys and tafes are usually taught by lecturers who have no formal understanding or knowledge themselves about web standards etc.
But there are many practitioners out there doing fantastic things
without formal knowledge either. Formal here I have taken to mean
tertiary courses in the area. Formal knowledge in a realm so new isn't
that important - yet.
It also is hard for them to change the content of their units as they usually
get revised every 5 odd years, also the lecturers are not paid for study and
revising the units, they only get paid for class time. So why should they do
extra unpaid work for ungrateful students???
In the realm of science, things are updated all the time. This is the
norm and is expected. Science university courses are frequently
re-written. It is also the norm that lecturers are expected to revise
and update the course as when needed. It's part of their job.
University educators are expected to do research as well, as well as
keep up their professional habits of continually updating themselves. So
they *should* be up to date. If they are not, then perhaps it is us who
has somehow failed them in helping to update them. We need to find out
how we have failed them, and how we can best help them to stay at the
fore-front.
But the strangest thing of all is this:
In this debate, we totally write off current practitioners who are in
the field today, as though they were a lost cause. Can you imagine if
the medical or law fraternity made a decision like this? We may still
have trepanning! Or doctors recommending smoking for relaxation ;)
As web developers, information architects and designers, we should have
the skills amongst ourselves to be able to profile who it is we want to
target, how to best target them, and bring them into the standards fold.
This is hard for us to do on an individual level.
What we lack is a professional body that is strong to enough to want to
promote professional habits of up-skilling to all Web Industry
Professionals, through various methods. I have a lot of hope that WIPA
will fill this void.
btw incase your wondering im not a lecturer - lol...
I have raised this issue with my previous lecturers and they informed me of
these government standards on lecturers
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 25/01/2007 10:02:12 am >>>
Doesn't the ACS (In Australia) claim to be our peek standards body? (Also
assuming that Web Dev comes under the "Computing" banner). Wouldn't they (or
somebody like them) be the ones to issue a certificate? (One look at their
web site will tell you how seriously they take web standards.)
The attitude seems to be that web development isn't real IT. The funny
thing is that people in the webby area also seem to feel this way. I
brought this up on another list and quite a few were adamant that an IT
professional was one that hooked up networks. To me, an IT person is
someone who can work with either information or computer systems, from
either the technical or human standpoint.
That would then include web developers, information architects,
usability consultants, and many other titles of those who work with the web.
WIPA should take this up with the ACS and get some recognition! :)
Kat
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