The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2008: §1512    Home    Papers/Indices    prev (§021)    Next (§1513)
Thu, Nov 6, 1:00 - 1:25, Pueblo A     Paper (refereed)
Recommended Citation: Battig, M E.  Piltdown Man or Inconvenient Truth? A Two-year Study of Student Perceptions about Computing.  In The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2008, v 25 (Phoenix): §1512. ISSN: 1542-7382. (A later version appears in Information Systems Education Journal 8(33). ISSN: 1545-679X.)
CDpic

Piltdown Man or Inconvenient Truth? A Two-year Study of Student Perceptions about Computing

thumb
Refereed15 pages
Michael E. Battig    [a1] [a2]
Computer Science Dept
Saint Michael's College    [u1] [u2]
Colchester, Vermont, USA    [c1] [c2]

Survey results from a two year project are presented. The survey instruments were developed through review of the literature involving similar studies of student perceptions and with the assistance of social scientists. The study includes both high school and college student perceptions of computing. The survey also contrasts student perceptions of “Computer Science” versus “Information Technology.” The results show that little difference exists between college and high school students’ perceptions. We suggest appropriate action items based on this and similar research coupled with a warning to avoid jumping to hasty conclusions based on empirical research where the numbers may not tell the whole story, i.e., avoid the embarrassment of the Piltdown Man fiasco from an earlier century.

Keywords: enrollment trends, student perceptions, information systems education, NSF scholarships, STEM, ITEST

Read this refereed paper in Adobe Portable Document (PDF) format. (15 pages, 795 K bytes)
Preview this refereed paper in Plain Text (TXT) format. (47 K bytes)
View the PowerPoint Slides (PPT) for this presentation. (1484 K bytes)

CDpic
Comments and corrections to
webmaster@isedj.org