Why is Baruch's MS in BCIS program so weak?

[gladiator]

This might sound more so of a rant than anything. I do not want to badmouth my school however as I am almost graduating from the CIS Masters program I had high hopes for.

A little background on myself, I unfortunately do not have the required programming and math skills to be considered a candidate of the MFE program. Athough I always had interest in the topic and monitored these forums as a 'lurker'. I thought a CIS degree fit me better, I had a lot of experience with computers but not programming.

After four semesters of classes, I only found that the only useful class was OOP1 and 2. (Which befuddles me why the school doesn't also teach some Java.) I did pickup some other languages along the way on my own.

Case in point, in one of my Excel classes the whole semester's material could have been condensed to at most, a three day workshop. Another example is DBMS class, the professor just reads notes written by the distinguished Professor Holowczak from a projector.

As with any degree, it is how you apply yourself. I feel that I really tried to learn beyond the curriculum however, there's just not enough guidance along the way.

Now I know the CIS program is designed for students with no computer background, but makes me wonder after graduation do I really have the leverage against students from other school?

 

[DominiConnor]

This is the first feedback I've seen for that course.

One bit of shared responsibility is that they have a Masters course for people who have no experience of programming. If I had my way there would be no such thing, anywhere, most of the output is simply dreadful.
Partly because if someone has reached the age of 22 without programming, one has to ask why ?
Also they are usually badly taught, sometime horribly so, the Baruch CIS one actually sounds better than most (no, that's not an endorsement).

But you seem to be above the average from that cohort in that you have put in the effort to teach yourself.

I find that most CompSci courses aren't very good, indeed I wrote a bit of a rant about it at the Register By "good" I mean teaching you things you couldn't have worked out yourself in less time and cheaper. Also "good" means "hard". If you don't stare at the whiteboard wondering what the
hell all that shit means every so often you are doing the wrong subject.

Personally, I don't have a big problem with them not teaching Java. It contains no concept that isn't present in other languages, and if you're any good you can teach yourself. The supply / demand for Java skills is simply awful, recall that although I'm talking about CompSci, I am a headhunter, and putting my official hat on, my advice is to learn something else.
The right place for Java in a course is in comparative languages, and as a Mickey Mouse environment to explain some types of algorithm and design patterns. You cannot teach OO properly in Java because it was designed explicitly to keep the complicated bits out because OO can hurt the brains of the weak.

The DBMS course sounds awful, and from what I guess about the sort of jobs you will be going for, one of the most damaging failures. As it happens my gang of interns are getting a harsh lesson in Real database programming, they won't entirely like it, but it will seriously upgrade their average lifetime earnings.

One hint for anyone who does a CS course, take the "Comparative Programming Languages" course. If you expect to have a career that is decades long, the programming landscape will change, and if you have some understanding of different languages, you are more likely to survive those transitions. I am of course assuming that the course is done properly...

Ironically the Excel course may also be a survival skill. My standard advice to people whose careers have gone tits up, is to dig in hard and master Excel / VBA. Most CS courses don't mention it at all, but it does seem a shame that they didn't do it properly.

 

[marina]

CIS programs are designed to expose you to computer science. They are not supposed to teach you algorithms or programming. They may be teaching scripting languages and SQL and how to use some software. After completing CIS program you are supposed to know how to use a computer/software, not how to wirte software.

 

[Alexei]

The only way to become and stay competitive as a software developer is to learn new technologies and frameworks; it is a continuous self-guided process.

 

[joel_b]

It's an arts & science college, not an engineering school. The MFE program is an aberration there, and it's obvious if you talk to any of the undergraduate departments. The undergraduate math is barely related when I met with them I found most of their upper level math courses are rarely if ever offerred!! MTH 4500 is the only course that is really related to the MFE.

Personally I think you should have realized the gap, if you had really looked into it. I did, and went to an engineering school for CS, and learned how to program instead for MFE prep.

A CIS degree is somewhat of an interdisciplinary thing, you get exposure to lots of things, but none of it is in-depth. In today's reality I don't ascribe a ton of value to something like that, as you dont get hard skills, so you better have a lot of drive on the side. I think it's better to specialize for a job in this kind of environment.

You also haven't even mentioned what type of career you are actually looking for, which kind of makes it tough to say if you are disadvantaged or not.

edit: did not realize it's a masters in that case I'm kind of concerned given it's being called an Master of Science, it's through Zicklin and the concentration is 'Business' Computer...

 

[gladiator]

Domini, I read your article in The Register and could not agree with you more.
I think the stem of the problem is that the program requires NO programming knowledge for admissions (and I fit that criteria). It's very hard to devise a curriculum around that, as I experienced first hand that some students come with an Undergrad in CS or Comp Engineering.

They obviously excelled in all the classes with ease without even attending.(Which I wonder why bother with learning what a FOR loop is again if you knew everything already? Just for the 'paper'?)

I'm definitely not looking for a Quant position, although a job that would expose me to some financial programming would be desirable.

However, I do want to work in the financial sector. That leaves me with either IT work or a business analyst. Perhaps be the intermediary between coders and business end-users.

Any pointers or recommendations?

 

[DominiConnor]

Seeing the curriculum, I think business analysis might be the way forward for you. That of course means building up an understanding of some area of the biz. BAs can start off with a level that is comparable to having read and grasped Paul Wilmott's Introduction book.

An alternative to this is front office Excel developer, where you extend the basic VBA skills you have, and pick up how to connect to Bloomberg, some database and do calculations. THat's best done by a mix of the books by Jackson & Staunton and one of those by Walkenbach.