CSE Exit Survey Results Viewer

Results Page for the BS-CSE Undergraduate Exit Survey, Answers to Freeform Questions, 2014-'15

Answers to: 'What single aspect of the CSE program did you find most helpful? Explain briefly.'

The project classes (390*)
None
I would say the courses which focused on working in a team and using established procedures. Those were particularly outside my comfort zone and helped me improve in those areas the most.
Group work, it taught me to tolerate and work with people in a major full of people very much inclined to work on their own and be individuals
I think the most helpful aspect of the CSE program is the faculties. Most of professor are very helpful and willing to help students. Students can always get enough info not only about the class, but also some other sides, such as future development , graduate school applying, from professors.
The Software series prepared me greatly for my first internship.
Courses that involved taking on large scale projects (Such as the junior project and capstone courses). These courses gave the most experience in performing functions that we will actually need to perform in real life situations at software development jobs.
The single most helpful thing I can think of was an off-the-cuff remark during Software Engineering where the instructor mentioned that I should google Gang of Four. This made sense of a lot of the stuff I had heard in bits and pieces throughout my career as an OSU student and finally got me to see why we were doing what we were doing a lot of the time.
Survey class to put together my graduation outline. It gave me insight on the steps and classed needed to graduate in great detail.
The subscription to safari proquest online. Provides a lot of additional resources.
The many different technologies I was exposed to while taking classes.
I liked the enterprise-like classes such as 3131, 3132, 3901, 5234, 5236, and capstone. In these classes we had to plan out what we needed to do and work within frameworks like most modern developers do.
I found the skeletons of sample course layouts to be the most helpful. That is where I often went to find out answers to my questions regarding my current and which future classes I should have taken and in which order. The ability to walk in and not have scheduled meetings was nice.
Nothing really. Much less fund than ECE.
The project level class. Was able to put previous knowledge to use and work as a team. Realistic feeling of what a SE does on a day to day basis.
Project courses. Theyre the things that will get you ready for the work you will see in internships and careers. Employers love to talk about them, and getting the experience in an academic setting is valuable.
I found the explanations of the foundations of computer code to be the most helpful - Software I, II series. With this strong foundation, I felt capable of learning and understanding all computer languages at a general level.
The math requirements were very important in aiding my understanding of CSE concepts in later courses. The networking, AI, and operating systems courses were also very interesting and useful for developing a well-rounded knowledge of computer science.
The design project courses were very helpful because they gave me a better idea of the sorts of design principles that are useful in large projects and those principles were directly applicable to my own projects.
I think the Capstone projects were overwhelmingly the best preparation for working after graduation
The program provided a very wide breadth of knowledge, which gives students who complete the program a certain amount of versatility.
The structure of the project and the capstone classes. They really helped to provide a bridge between theory and real world implementation.
The breath of the program. How much you learn and experience in the CS realm.
I thought that project classes (especially Doc. Bogguss class... Hes the best by far!) was very helpful in that they were structured like an actual job environment. In addition we were able to learn good coding techniques.
The group project courses (390#) and the Capstone project are by far the best preparation for entering industry, where you will never again have succinct and unchanging requirements the way you do in academic courses, and you will never work on a project in isolation. While many students fear these kinds of classes because they do not want someone elses work ethic or abilities to negatively effect their grade, learning to work with all kinds of people is really key to having a successful engineering career.
I can doing research in my interested field with professor
Courses which give students a chance to gain experience simulating real projects while using ideas learned in the program (as opposed to only being told concepts and them not being provided along with real-world context)- in particular the project and capstone courses.
The project class where we programmed a working version of the first level of Mario helped bring everything I had learned together. Before that class I felt like I had learned a bunch of random facts, but I wasnt sure how they would be used together. Project classes as a whole were very helpful.
I enjoyed the AI class most, even though I didnt do that well grade wise. It had a great mixture of design patterns (we dont get enough of these in classes!), algorithms, data structures, and abstract overviews that made each piece of the class relevant and made learning seem worthwhile and productive. Many of the principles in that class I have used in other classes completely unrelated to AI.
capstone. It gave em an opportunity to work on a real project for a company. I learned a lot from working as a team with our business contact at the company.
CSE program has very good courses provided, and I hope we could have more courses related to computer science.
Interactive development or something. We made a game and in this case Mario. This class was very helpful in understanding the flow and design of large programs that utilizes many classes and data models. Helped me actually understand and combine what I had been learning so far.
Engineering Career Services
The coursework was set up in a way to make students employ critical thinking throughout the entire course. All courses did not have the same level of difficulty, but critical thinking was necessary to do well.
curriculum like software I&II and Foundation I&II and CSE 3901 are very important and helpful for career.
The most helpful aspect of the CSE program was probably any of the classes involving projects (actual projects, not necessarily the weekly labs in the software classes for example). I felt that the classes made up of projects helped to strengthen the fundamentals established in earlier classes while giving a lot more context to how actual software development will be.
Project classes and Capstone classes because they truly immersed you into the experience of working with a team and applying your skills in order to produce working software.
The CSE 3901 project course was extremely useful as it exposed me to industry tools for the first time.
I found the project courses the most helpful due to the real world experience in a team setting.
The Foundations courses were most helpful for me. I feel that the fundamental knowledge I gained from those 2 courses has really prepared me for solving real-world problems in computing, as I can generally trace just about any problem I need to solve back to a simple algorithm that I can write up in pseudocode and analyze for time/space complexities.
The variety of classes available in different fields of computer science is very helpful in determining possible career choices.
I guess I would say the ability to access CSE workstations and accounts from off-campus was the most helpful. As someone who commuted to campus for half of my years as an undergrad, this saved me the inconvenience of always needing to be on-campus to complete work, especially in my earlier years.
The good professors as little of them as there were. The ones that actually helped expand knowledge and took an genuine interest in helping their students become better individuals.
The capstones and project courses. They will help immensely during the hiring process.
Capstone and working with a sponsor. This is the most real world application of our knowledge that we had the opportunity to do.
The ability to analyze large problems and breaking them out into smaller problems. In a working environment, you might face large problems that might seem daunting initially, but you need to find a way to understand the small parts in order to understand the whole system.
Labs and projects mainly.
Large range of CS topics to choose from when signing up for classes.
The willingness and ability of faculty to teach courses. I knew nothing computing related, now I know a lot.
The focus on understanding the computer conceptually will help me in the long run.
The staff. The staff is very knowledgeable and generally helpful.
Capstone class projects and CSE3901 specific with Paolo Sivilloti
Range of materials covered.
The advisors were very available for students to help any questions that I had.
I appreciated the focus on taking courses other than those just in the CSE department. For example, the ECE courses, higher math courses, etc.
Strong math foundation in most courses.
Learning Java. Java has been crucial in a lot of the work Ive done outside of school, so its probably the single most important skill I gained here.
I found that some of the professors really cared about the students. Those professors that go above and beyond to know students by name, help them with issues, and happily answer questions are always the best. The teachers are the face of the department, so having good ones really helps.
3901; Great overview, great instructor (Dr. Sivilotti) 5911: Great to work with real life clients
The single aspect of the CSE program that I found most helpful is the overall engineering-style learning. The problem-solving skills Ive gained, along with the logical reasoning from the CS classes, have given me a greater ability to find solutions to complex problems in not only my CS endeavors, but also in my everyday life. When I first began this program in 2010, I thought all the math, sciences and non-programming related classes were pointless, because I didnt see their overall purpose. Now that I am all but finished with the program, I truly understand the reason for those classes.
I think the best part of the CSE program was that it helped me develop the basic skills I need to be a software engineer. It helped teach me basics so that when I got to internships, all i needed to learn was the new lanagues, but i had the fundamentals down.
The software sequence was effective in establishing the basics early on.
I absolutely loved Computer Vision. It helped me find the nitch of CSE that I want to end up in and set a goal for myself and grad school (eventually, not right). I also loved the foundations classes--super helpful for interviews at top tech companies.
Project courses
Connection with other students. Getting help, not only from professors but from other students helped so much.
The inclusion of professors that have day jobs outside of the university in various computer related fields was a huge advantage in learning.
I think the advising team does a good job. They have always been patient and helpful with ALL my problems.
The Capstone and Enterprise applications courses were most helpful to me. After 2 internships I believe these courses have helped prepared me for a full-time job and the work Im interested in doing.
I found the software requirements analysis class to be extremely useful. It is very valuable knowing how to express software systems on paper so others can understand how it works.
Project courses. I think that as an engineer, hands-on experience with real-world problems is the single most important requirement in a degree program. The project courses are where I truly felt that I was learning.
Solid foundation classes(system, algorithm...).
The advising was the best part of the program.
I found the project courses to be extremely helpful. They allowed us to develop a semester long project in order to give us insight to how the professional world operates. These projects are also great talking points in interviews and can show an employer what a students abilities are.
I got experience in working in groups which I have heard and guessed would be an important skill in the computer programming world.
I think that having the opportunity to take higher level classes at or above the 5000 level really helped me mature and grow my programming skills. I wish that other students were subjected to the same difficulty of being forced to a very strict and stressful timeline in order to produce a solution to something they start with 0 understanding of.
The project courses where we had something to work on through out the class. The capstone and cse3902 where probably the two classes that I learned the most.
The technical electives. They allowed me to learn about the topics that I really find interesting.
I found that the courses covered a broad spectrum of the software development field.
Most professors were nice and cared about how you were doing.
I think the capstone class was the most helpful. It is a great bridge between college and the real world.
The Capstone project along with the NEWPATH program allowed me to gain more hands on experience. Solid foundation in logic/math courses was very helpful as well.
Project classes and hands on software engineering.
Lack of focus on specific languages, focus on learning languages.
The courses were tremendously helpful with helping me find a good job after graduation and learn the basics of CSE. Overall, Im extremely satisfied with the OSU CSE department and faculty.
I found the tech electives most helpful. Classes such as Networking, Info Sec and Software Engineering were some of the best classes taken.
Learning about the lower end of computer systems. Helped me understand how a lot of the basic aspects of computers and how they work.
Nikki was very helpful with advising throughout my years at the university. I took a couple of classes that the professor was considered hard, but I learned and gained so much from it.
No comment.
I found the algorithms classes to be the most helpful so I am glad they were required. They taught about useful data structures and how to analyze the cost of some algorithms execution. Software classes were also helpful to become more comfortable with programming in general.
I was able to take one course (only one, mind) that I imagine Ill be able to use in my career.
I really enjoyed the ability in higher-level classes to use multiple programming languages in labs. I felt that this really opened up avenues for exploration for students to learn more languages to add to their repertoire.
Passionate teachers and staff
The Capstone class truly helps you understand what it is like to professionally create something from our knowledge gained in Computer Science and Engineering. You are given one semester to finish a project and follow all the necessary Software Development Life Cycle checkpoints. I suggest making more than just one of these Capstone classes as a requirement. Other classes may help you gain knowledge in certain fields, but this class is the only one that helps you understand what the real life will be like. It is not busy work as I tend to think some things are in several of the other required classes.
I found the open hours at the advising office most helpful, when I could walk-in and receive in person suggestions and feedback about any CSE related questions.
The intro sequence (I took 221/222/321) was very helpful... with no programming experience coming in it felt as if I was put on a level playing field.
Diversity of required education was important to learning how to think in any given situation. I have come to realize that while I may never need stats or physics again, the learning of how to think about a problem was an important tool to add to my collection.
The most helpful aspect of the CSE program to me was the mathematical course background we aquired. Simply learning c or java for one class or another does not improve overall understanding of complexity or difficulty of problems.
N/A
practice the logical thinking ability
The single aspect of the CSE program that I found most helpful was the ability to have some freedom in the choice of technical electives. Students come from different technical backgrounds and are preparing for a wide range of positions after graduating, so the ability to tailor your tech electives so that you can learn in the areas you need most is very helpful.
Labs. I cannot stress how important it is to have students go and actually program something. Its particularly helpful if there are step-by-step labs where students make a program one step and then modify its functionality as they continue forward. Ultimately, most of us will be programming in our jobs and its very important that all CSE majors have extensive experience coding in multiple languages.
Large project courses such as the capstone course which are more open allowing students the ability to study more advanced topics at a more realistic pace then set in most classes that give you a to much to fast to remember.
The degree it gives me for a job I want.
The resources available helped to furnish my learning experiences (access to Visual Studio and stdlinux for classes) quite well; I would not be able to get by as well on Notepad++.
I like the group project classes because they simulate how real life work situations are like and how you have to adapt and react.
The aspect of the CSE program that I found most helpful was the team projects in most classes. As a student whos done a couple internships, I understand the important of team communication and team cohesiveness. Granted, most students originally dislike the idea of a team project, but I feel like the many projects I did. CSE 3902, Capstone, Architecture, Databases are all examples of classes that used team projects.
The breadth of the curriculum. Being familiar with almost all parts of Computer Science, and having a solid understanding of the foundations such as algorithms and data structures.
Most helpful was going over the different algorithms and the system components (foundations and systems classes).
I believe the new curriculum established during the semester change is much more coherent, and I found the foundations course to be very helpful at mastering this field
Game design was one of my favorite classes because it was very hands on learning experience vs. reading from a book/slides. It was a very helpful class because students generally had to learn and explore the technology by themselves/with group members, instead of memorizing information. Also, it was a good team building experience
The teachers (usually the part-time faculty/professors) who currently had jobs in the work force were the most effective at teaching the material and helping students understand the relevance.
I felt the program had a good system for introducing students with no computer science background to programming.
Cant think of anything.
The ability to get help in every possible avenue.
Projects. It makes you apply knowledge and they are more fun than lectures.
Flexibility in choosing course. For a Major as CSE, a lot of students may have background in some basic ideas, so students would have the ability to overload credit hours. This helps to learn more staff in a semester.
Personally, I think I had good timing with my course schedule. It helps taking classes that have some concepts in common around the same time. Also I had most of my general education courses completed before I started in CSE, so I could focus on programming projects and concepts more intensely without having to worry about subjects I was not interested in.
The fact that all of the professors were well versed in their areas of study and were able to answer questions well. All of them were willing to help out with questions and that was very useful as I got to developing a network with all of my former professors.
The CSE program provided a good base of learning for moving forward. I dont just know x number of programming languages, but I know enough of them to learn a new one fairly easily.
Having lab days in the early years of CSE was very helpful, as it made me go to class for attendance. Due to this, I had time put aside during the week to get help from the professor. I am a fairly shy person, so having the professor available during class made me less hesitant to ask for his help, while learning how to write & implement programs as I began to learn about Software development.
When instructors do a good job in laying out examples and really showing us as students how things work instead of just showing us some code and being like, figure it out on your own
I found many professors in upper-level courses to be very willing to assist students with difficult subjects.
ECS, while perhaps not an aspect of CSE, was extremely helpful in finding an internship that led to a career for me after graduation.
The variety of CSE courses that I could take to increase my knowledge within CSE. If I wanted to learn game design I could find plenty of classes that would teach me. If I wanted to learn how to crack software, I would find classes to help build my knowledge.
Exposure to many different things(Database, AI, info sec, operating systems)

Answers to: 'What single change in the CSE program would you most like to see? Explain briefly.'

Better flow of content throughout sequences. Many times, I learned content in one class that would have been very beneficial to have taken before a previous class. (i.e. Architecture before Systems 2)
Make the major room(Dreese 172) nicer, as most of CSE students spent hours in there coding and the room often smell and dirty, and the computers in that room needed some upgrades.
Its difficult for me to suggest improvements. I enjoyed my time in the university essentially at all points, and struggle to think of changes. I suppose I particularly enjoyed the courses offered by Mr. Boggus, and got the vibe that they were on the table by him putting them forward- particularly the create a game in C# course. It had this feeling as though the course was his, though thats just an assumption of mine. Id like more courses with that feeling, of being put on by a driven individual as a passion project.
Move toward modern programming languages, and also, instead of pure theory, would like to see more application of theory (i.e. dont just tell me how C# works, show me a system that uses optimal C# code and explain why its important)
I think CSE program dont really have enough distinguish between job education and research education. Since part of students want to have a job after graduation. For this part of students, we have enough class, such as project(3901/3902) and capstone(590X) to offer them opportunities to practice. But for part of students who want to pursue graduate school education, and even future research career, I think our department doesnt really offer enough research opportunities, and theory classes for this part of students.
More security classes. I would have loved to take all security classes for my electives.
More focus on projects that involve actually writing software, less focus on projects that involve writing and presenting power points.
I think an emphasis on the importance of good software design needs to be throughout. Too many students I have seen have terrible design skills and end up leaving OSU and getting jobs presumably using the same terrible code that they turned in for assignments.
Some of my professors didnt seem very interested in lecturing. Also the fact that I have had part time professors with no office hours/office at OSU making it very tedious to communicate outside of classroom.
More emphasis on design and design patterns / anti patterns.
A more defined course plan for specific disciplines.
Update in technologies used, I feel as though we sometime learned software that is not used that often anymore (RESOLVE, EJB, ect.). Also I did not find the required ECE 2000/2100 classes useful beyond the logic gates learned in 2000, the signal transformations we difficult and not applicable for anything else.
I always felt that when I came in with a question. It would never be fully answered. A lot of the time I would have class scheduling issues and my response would normally be tough luck. Try again next semester. But you have a lot of clients so you cant make everyone happy.
I wish it didnt convert to semester system since it caused a headache for both me and my advisor.
More teaching of source control. Big part of industry and is not taught in a class but students are expected to know it.
More industry-applicable projects/courses. The were several courses that, based on internships, would have been useful to me (ie Enterprise Computing) but they were not being offered due to lack of interest. These courses were not advertised. I did not know of their existence before reading through the course catalog. These courses would be far more useful in industry than things like artificial intelligence. So far in my experience, the only advisor worth a damn is Dr. Strader. Get some better ones to help her out. I can look up DARS Web on my own, I dont need to sit in an office and have that pointed out to me, have advisors have some actual knowledge and advice. Nikki is good, the rest dont do their jobs.
There were times I wish I could have taken slightly different classes than those offered, but this really only occurred once so it was by no means a huge problem.
I wish that the algorithms course would focus more on the efficient design of algorithms instead of just analyzing the runtime of the same algorithms. Additionally, the ECE courses were almost completely irrelevant in relation to my current plans or any other courses that I have taken here, and the labs that we completed in those classes were extremely outdated.
I would like to see an extra course teaching a modern programming language directly rather than the multitude of courses teaching abstract programming principles.
I would like to see many of the classes stray from a testing format and achieve a stronger focus on labs and projects. A few classes muddied this goal, including a project for the sake of a project rather than for the principles of teaching. However such projects teach students skills in problem solving and communication which testing fails to encompass. Projects also teach students skills in debugging and testing which are, once again, lost in testing formats.
Somewhat more of a focus on practical applications versus theory would be nice. Several core classes in the major tread over one another to cover the same theoretical material.
I would prefer the survey class to do a better job of making me understand what I needed to do in terms of coursework. I didnt really end up with a good idea for where I needed to be after my first couple semesters and I felt as though I could have been taking a heavier course load to get more done early.
I would like to see more group projects and diversity in groups. Many students pair up with dorm-mates for the length of their program, leaving out transfer students.
I dont think using OSU components were helpful at all. I went into a technical interview and used OSU components (mistaking them for java components)and my interviewer was just confused as to why I was calling java methods with different names......
I would like to see more flexibility in the combination of allowed technical electives based on a demonstrated interest in certain subjects. I have felt forced to give up the chance to take a class I was genuinely interested in (Ex. classes on Hadoop/ distributed processing, databases 2, etc) because I had to fill the either/or category requirements for technical electives. I also think that Database 1 and Software engineering should not be in the same category and should both be required. In my experience, these are the two undergraduate classes that give you the most preparation for having a job in industry. I would also suggest that CSE needs to update the available program options to match areas of industry that are rapidly expanding such as Big Data (ex, Big Data Engineering and analysis)or web development (Web based application engineering and design). If a specific program is not offered for things like this, then I still think the department could put together recommended lists of course work for students who are interested in pursuing a specific type of engineering, and this could be based off of feedback from alumni, industry representatives, etc.
Update the hardware like computers in CSE labs.
High level course offerings: Student-accessible information is limited and inconsistent (e.g. courses listed on the CSE site as being offered in the spring, but dont appear when scheduling for spring classes), the advisors couldnt provide any information about these courses (why are they not offered, will they ever be offered). There were a large number of classes I really wanted to take (Intro to Cog Sci, Neural Nets, Data Mining, etc.) that werent offered, I never found out why they werent offered despite being listed as offered, and I had to take courses less relevant to my future career path. Also, a very late course cancellation put me in a bad spot my final semester. I think a safety net (preferably a solution other than over-scheduling) for this scenario would be very beneficial. If nothing else, labelling courses as potentially cancellable. Students having access to this course information, a course-cancellation safety net for at least graduating seniors, and (if possible) more regular high level course offerings.
There should be a more advanced class on how to use databases than the 3000 level one. There is a 5000 level database class, but that goes more into how to create database software than using a database. While 3000 was a good intro, databases are used by everything now and there should have a higher focus.
The CSE program should put more of an emphasis on application of designs and principles rather than just memorization and theory. More time spent doing meaningful projects that demonstrate the lessons learned in lecture and then being tested about the application/results would be much more beneficial and longer lasting than simply memorizing slides for an exam. It also helps students to learn about problem solving through debugging, which many of my classmates struggle with.
Mandate enrollment in ECS in year 2. I very much regret not registering until my senior year
Give more flexible options for some required or electives non-cse courses.
I took classes mostly out of order but I feel assembly language and hardware should be even more of a choice than even a selection between two. They can be helpful but unless you plan on working with them I feel they wont help me in the long run.
The CSE guidance office expects the students to make decisions about their major and courses without providing the students with or directing the students to adequate documentation. I still dont know what the difference between CIS and CSE is and my advisors never mentioned the existence of a CE degree. Likewise, several of the advisors, when asked about the difference between core choices, did not know the differences.
Some of the coursework was quite difficult for me partially because I lacked resources to complete coursework unless I was on campus. Perhaps more lab space with appropriate workstations would absolve this.
It was good in general
Id like to see all of the CSE courses held up to the same standard of quality. Some of them, like Software Engineering Techniques, are just poorly taught and dont actual give you any benefit from taking them. Its not as big of an issue for elective classes as they dont make up the core of the degree program but for something like the class I mentioned it should be of a certain enforced quality.
Well spoken english speaking professors only. Too many professors are simply unintelligible.
More Security classes because it can open up more interest in that area of the field. It is a very interesting area and it would have been nice to see more opportunities in it.
More emphasis on using modern tools in class. It seemed to me that the focus of many classes were highly academic and less practical (i.e. lacking utilization of industry-wide standard tools)
Students need to be more exposed to what is actually being used in the real world along with current best practices. Many of my courses were lagging behind.
I would like it if the software development capstone course was 2 semesters long instead of only one. One semester can be enough time to make a working software application, but not the BEST working software application. My team, for all intents and purposes, completed our Android app, but I did not feel very good about handing it back to our sponsor, because I knew how clunky and poorly-implemented it was. I feel that it would have taken at least an extra two or three months to really perfect the app and get it to a point where I would have been proud to turn it over to the sponsor.
Access to adequate computer labs and CSE study areas. Only two labs are available to CSE students. The Caldwell labs only requires that a student is taking a CSE course and that is a good requirement. The problem is that courses for learning Microsoft Office software is also under CSE, which should not be the case. The result is that the lab is crowded with students working on Excel and other Office programs. Two problems arise from this. 1. Many seats that could go to CSE students are occupied by Microsoft Office CSE students. 2. CSE students working on programming assignments have a good chance of being next to students working on Office assignments instead of programming assignments. This makes it hard to get help from peers on the assignments. The Dreese Lab is only open to CSE Majors which thankfully removed the problem of having Microsoft Office students in the lab. On the other hand, the CSE Major Lab is pitiful. Opposed to the Caldwell lab which has over 100 computers, the Dreese Lab only has 8 computers. A table with 8 chairs is also in there. Also the condition of the room ranges from moderately worn to outright dilapidated. Due to the small capacity of the room I frequently visited it but had to work somewhere else. After viewing the faculty lounge on the 8th floor, with its far better furniture, the great disparity between what the students are offered and what the faculty are offered is disappointing. Ultimately, the working and study spaces offered to CSE students is a disgrace to a university with the reputation Ohio State University has.
I would like to see more investment in the equipment/facilities provided to CSE students. In comparison to some other departments at OSU, it seems like CSE is lagging behind in terms of modernity, which is troubling seeing as CS is one of the fastest growing and evolving fields there is. This means providing more advanced work stations in computing labs and more advanced labs in general (having labs be open more often would be a plus as well).
Probably how some of the courses are taught. Some of them are very out of date and need restructured. I have seen some restructuring happening in the beginner courses after I have taken them but I believe a lot more is necessary. Maybe ask some of the professors to take educational courses on teaching
I think some of the project courses are great at teaching team dynamics but some are lacking in structure. For me personally the information security course would have been far better if it was lecture based with distinct labs for each security topic. The current system of lectures mixed with android app development in teams was mediocre. Also for the game design capstone, I think its a shame that the course is not merged with ACCADs equivalent course. Having teams of 6-7 with half artists and half programmers would produce better games and be an amazing teaching tool for interdisciplinary teamwork.
Increase length of capstone to 2 semesters. Could do two different project or one larger one.
More emphasis on how to maintain code. The paradigm of Leave the code slightly better than how you found it is hardly ever touched upon in the whole curriculum.
Integrate the Math with the CSE department. Learning Math was incredibly easier when they related to computer topics. The Math department is awful or I have had the strongest streak of lackluster professors.
3901 should be split into two classes, there is way too much material for 15 weeks. The content is extremely practical when looking for jobs though, so that is why more focus should be given to that. Actually, in general, if you want to most help students for jobs after graduation, there should be more focus on web and mobile programming. I understand those subjects arent pure CS, but there should be more than one web and mobile class, and the mobile shouldnt have to be 5000 level. You do learn CS topics (such as OO, etc) through these projects. Also, there should be a focus on debuggers in the intro series. No professional just passively stares at lines of code, instead these use a debugger to actively find problems.
more mathematical classes through the CSE department.
Slightly more classes teaching practical software development, such as a course teaching software development with C++.
More coursework on engineering practices, not just CS.
Principle of Programming failed to emphasize passing by reference vs passing by value.
Introduce more graduate level classes to undergraduates, such as allowing selected undergrads to attend computer vision labs and related courses at OSU.
More information on CSE specializations in core classes
Unfortunately, the worst part of my experience was some of the professors. Many were unable to properly communicate the course material to their students. I would like to see students being taught by professors who are better at communicating their ideas.
Make electives easier to schedule.
I would like to see version control (preferably git) education incorporated into a core classs curriculum. Employers love to see that you not only can build the software, but also that you know how to use other tools that facilitate its development.
More help from the advisors! My first year, I went in and had the advisors really helping out and provided the four-year course plan for me. After that, the advisors were very off-putting when I would come in for help with picking courses. I come to be told which ones are good and bad, not to be told to look up all of the information myself. After my first year, I was pretty much on my own to pick courses and hope that I had all of the requirements to graduate.
Lighten up on the group projects. I learned less of the material when projects were split up. I understand the goal of preparing students for a real world environment, but rarely did project groups model real world situations.
I would like to see more of an emphasis of real-world programming assignments. Apart from the project course and capstone, I dont feel as if I had many opportunities to work on projects closely related to what Id see in a business setting.
I would like to see more focus on real world applications. So many things we did, we will never need to know which made the assignments less interesting.
ECE classes should not be required any more. I dont see the things we learned in those classes coming into play at the average software job.
I took the introduction to cse when it was still resolve, but I really didnt find it very engaging. I was glad to have been in the robot project in FEH and taken programming in high school, because Im not sure I would have stayed hooked on it (I can in undecided). Also, I loved FEH for the robot project. I wish there were more accessible multi-disiplinary classes. Lastly, I wish there was a programming version of stats. So instead of using minitab or R, you write a matlab program that implements it. I feel like I would have learned a lot more implementing programs.
More structure in classes. I dont it is very fair when the difficulty of a class is based on, not the class, the professor. How I can take a course, and my friend can take the course. My friend might get an A and I may get a C. I did more work, and had to study more, but because he had an easier professor, he got the better grade. I think difficulty should not be based on the section but the class itself.
Require an internship in computing to graduate, even an on campus internship. Provides great marketable experience when getting a job and at other universities it is a requirement.
1)Some courses are way too different when taken with a different Professor (this especially includes content). I think the core courses should be moderated a bit more so that each student learns the same set of skills and does not miss out because they didnt get the right professor. Ive taken the same class a few times (networking, operating systems, architecture come to mind) and I feel like the curriculum completely different for each of them, as well as languages used to program. These could be a bit more fine tuned to ensure that each student is learning the same skills. 2)CSE labs REALLY need a separate group work lab or at least labs where people are supposed to be quiet like a library. All of the labs I have ever found do not allow for a quiet workplace so I was forced to do some work at home. I know Im not the only person that has complained about it, so hopefully it gets changed. 3)
More courses on servers and complete applications, not just small programs.
Linear algebra should not be required unless specifically pursuing computer graphics courses. I found the course totally useless and havent used it since the course.
The ECE courses required by the CSE department have no place in this curriculum. They were an incredible waste of time, poorly organized, and for the most part, unrelated to anything I will ever need to use in a job as a software developer.
More class option about web development, app development and new technology.
Be more involved in curriculum development. Most of my knowledge about computers came from an internship, and I didnt learn many important techniques that are applicable in a work environment from classes. In addition, I had a huge overlap of unimportant information (learned the same graph theory techniques in 3 separate classes; we didnt cover much else).
Offer more options for technical electives and have more class openings. The major has many students but scheduling is always a pain. Also, improve the computer labs for students in the major. Many of the other engineering majors have clean and up to date labs.
I do not have a firm idea of what jobs I specifically want or can get aside from the general idea of a career in computer programming. It would have been nice to get more information and guidance on this as I do not know nearly as much as I would like to going out into the workforce.
I wish that courses were more flexible in that they werent forced to have x amount of midterms or even a final. CSE can be very hands on in terms of learning, and most courses are very theory based. It seems that a lot of students here only learn the theory and then are thrown in to the real world with zero actual development experience. I wish there was a bit more of a mixture between the amount of theory and actual projects that students must take.
Better instructors, there are maybe three or four in the entire major. I dont like paying a lot of money and going into debt to be taught be people who are not teachers. In several classes the material was being taught by graduate/phd students or just over all poor teachers. For example, my computer architecture teacher had numerous mistakes in the slides each week, which were corrected by students mid-lecture. This made the class extremely confusing, forcing a massive curve since the class average was so bad. Get better instructors.
Please get rid of resolve. It does teach the intended concepts effectively, but the student does not gain any ability to program in a realistic environment with a practical language.
I wish that the transition between classes had been more fluid. I had a hard time coming back to concepts learned several semesters earlier and not touched on in the interim.
a universal curriculum between professors. One section of the course is really hard. While the other section of the course is easy. Need to make the difficulty of the course the same level in between courses.
I would like to see more real world applications. Although theory is important, it is less so in todays world than actually being able to successfully code projects.
to have a program for tech interviews
In classes such as security and databases it would be beneficial to have more real world projects. Security was very high level and did not prepare me for any of the security issues I dealt with during internships and such. Similarly, the databases class revolved more around theoretical design than actual development and deployment of a database system.
More practical hands on approach. A focus on actually showing how and why the practices taught work. More clarity with professors.
Fix the absolutely god awful advising. I was signed up for ~8 different classes that I not only didnt need, I didnt even have the prerequisites TO take them, or even understand them. I was signed up for them without my input, and I cant get them removed to fix my GPA. This is unacceptable. I understand the quarter to semester transition was difficult, but theres a difference between difficulties and overriding the system to do the equivalent of taking a student who has never taken a science class and signing them up for organic chemistry... eight different times. In a row.
In the software capstone courses, it annoys me that business students with a poorly thought out startup idea are able to use the capstone courses to build their product. I believe that the software capstone courses should be reserved for nonprofits, established companies and researchers who know what they want and will definitely use their product.
I would like to see a broader range of classes in the CSE department that are not based solely on programming. Many of us will not take a programming job and could use other courses. For example further networking courses, courses on virtualization,etc.
More tech elecs, most of my tech elecs were choosing from the either or courses and I couldnt focus in on what I wanted to learn.
The classes need to be more equalized. Classes being taught by different professors some times did not produce equal results. Some were more difficult than others that you learned alot in but did not do well. Looking at the equivalent class with a different professor that a different classmate had made there slides and midterms easy compared to the same class that you were taking too.
None that I can think of.
I think there is still some room for improvement in regards to group work. Some of the groups I have had throughout my time here were not necessarily doing equal work but received equal grades with the justification that that is how the real world works but in reality that isnt always how it works.
It would have been nice if it were shorter so I could have gotten a job and learned things that are actually useful.
I would like to see an option where students could choose to do research instead of taking the Capstone course (with the research being comparable).
Changes to the intro sequence, since it isnt very helpful in the professional world.
Although I know this would most likely never happen, I would like to see the CSE Program get rid of General Education Requirements. Yes, they are required in order for you to not lose sight or knowledge of other areas of importance, like how to write a paper properly, and to keep yourself more broadened rather than specified to Computer Science. But I believe this should be done in high school or something. In college, I am picking a major. A major in which I will become a professional at for the rest of my life. A major in which I picked so that I can learn anything and everything for to become that professional I want to be. These major classes tended to be difficult for me considering my Computer Science background before I entered college (it was nonexistent). For me to being spending time on these General Education Requirement classes, which, as many may say are to be easy As, inhibits me from doing what I actually want to do. I found myself caring less and less about these classes simply because they were of no interest to me, ultimately lowering my GPA (the opposite of what one would want from them). And my GPA lowering doesnt help when it comes to looking for jobs. I could explain more, but this is the gist of why I would like GECs to be dismissed.
Maybe longer office hours at the CSE advising office.
Capstone is awful. Truly truly awful. No resources given, no clear requirements, and faculty were not helpful to work with. Also, class options that give real-life skills (github, python, etc)
Better focus of Career path in class work. A piece of time in which the adviser sit with each student and conducts a survey as to what the student would like to do and design a course plan to best prepare the student for that career choice. The program seems an assortment of classes without strong purpose or direction within them. outlining specific course paths within the major would go a long way!
Better lab space with sufficient software to meet the needs of engineering students. The art college has a more comprehensive computer lab then the CSE department. This is VERY disappointing.
Other capstones besides Game Design and Software offered regularly.
Better environment in grader room
I would like too see the degree audit system improved. Many times I found it difficult to tell exactly what requirements I had completed, what requirements I needed to complete and what courses I needed to sign up for to complete these requirements. There is also no good way of seeing what prerequisites are needed for unfulfilled requirements.
I would like to see the CSE program focus more on the application of principles so that the students develop skills that are useful in the job marketplace, rather than simply teaching the academic underpinnings and leaving practical application for the birds, like you do now.
I would like to see more challenging topics covered in classes and more hands on learning. It great that I have an understanding of algorithms since this is arguably the most important skill for an engineer is the knowledge of what is possible. Since it is always possible to research a solution given you know the algorithm is useful in a given context. However, I have done research on implementing algorithms written in SIGGRAPH papers and found it difficult to understand the material even though I knew them principle information. It would be nice to see a course which allows you to implement some of these types of algorithms so that students may become more comfortable with reading and writing at a graduate level by the time they graduate as an undergraduate.
More help with coding labs. Right now its either you complete understand and complete the lab or you have no idea and do not know even what questions to ask. More guided help on coding.
Professors who actually care about helping their students. Yes, it sounds like a knee-jerk reaction to what seems to be professors trying to help in some tough-love style, but I have never seen such unhelpful, even somewhat apathetic and uncaring excuses for teachers in my life. A total overhaul of staff is unrealistic, but a further evaluation of professors (especially through my time at OSU) shows how little theyre actually willing to do their job. Ive been refused at office hours, given petty responses in emails, flat-out ignored, and at times disrespected by professors, even the supposed good ones (i.e. Matthew Boggus, for example). I would like to see professors above 2000 level classes that actually take the time and effort to teach a class, instead of assuming their knowledge should come from a Google search.
Classes should target teaching teaching students how to apply the knowledge learned into real life.
Personally, I know this may go against the general idea of CS as Computer Science, but I would like to see classes be oriented towards specific coding examples, rather than being general. I know that can be difficult. For example, I like to learn things in a hands-on way when it comes to coding; Id much prefer to see an example where pass-by-reference and pass-by-value are shown to have differing effects on a project, rather than simply be told that these two ideas have different effects. One way to solve this would be to have homeworks that give small examples for ideas like this.
More focus on software design, such as designing a system so that it is extendable, testable, easily understood and easy to fix. These always take a backseat to just getting the work done. If our work compiles and performs the correct logic, then we usually get an A. In industry, these skills seem to be incredibly important but under-utilized. Teaching functional programming more in addition to object-oriented, and the pros and cons of both. More web technologies.
A less redundant approach to the material being taught, such that the material being taught in classes is kept unique and some of the redundancies that currently exist between classes (such as having to learn and re-learn material such as algorithms, running times, basic boolean algebra, etc) is eliminated. This can most likely be done by eliminating or easing pre-requisites to certain courses or removing them as required courses for graduation.
I feel professors need to better explain the importance of the foundations course, being in my opinion it is the absolute core of this field and a shocking amount of students do not feel this way. It was the main skill I was able to use to get the starting job I desired, and it gives a better understanding of the importance of this field. Also, the CSE lounge is shockingly out of shape. Some money should be invested to help excite and attract incoming freshman into this incredible and lucrative career path. Right now it does not quite achieve that.
More coursework more similar to real life job situations. Remove tedious labs that are more of a chore than tools for learning. For example, sorting algorithms. Dont make a lab that requires you to rewrite the sorting algorithm, instead make a lab that requires you to call on each individual algorithm and compare the run times. Something like that.
The CSE dept/program really needs to provide a day or a website that explains in-depth the various pathways students can take through CSE. I had no idea I liked infrastructure until I completed internships because the CSE program doesnt offer any applicable classes or information that teach data center infrastructure. Making students aware of different career paths and the daily life of those career paths would significantly improve this program.
I would like to see more emphasis on security and education of software exploits. I feel ignorance of these will only lead to more vulnerable software.
Less incorporation of other classes such as ECE where it feels unrelated.
improvement in the facilities.
Some more classes that contain material for common jobs. I would have become a stronger candidate if I had familiarity with tools such as .NET, actual Java (I thought a sorting machine was a real thing during an interview and they had no idea what I was talking about), etc. Getting the foundations is very important, but broadening it to real-world applications is also very important. Internships and free time (or lack thereof) gives you some diversity, but there could be more provided through the program.
Improvement of major lab in Dreese. Not only the computer of the major lab is very old. The major lab is so small. Although Caldwell 112D has been assigned to be used by major students only, the more important thing is place for group work. Project course such as 3901,3902 Capstone is extremely important and requires team work. Thus, I would suggest reserve some study room for us to use. Using school library source is not enough. A room that can involve 4 to 8 people would be large enough. Most team wont have more than 5 people. One last suggestion, we want two big monitors! All programmers want big monitors. lol.
When I first started, RESOLVE was the big language for teaching but we were later expected to just know a language to use for coding and in all werent adequately trained in practical use of languages to create the programs needed. As I understand it, that seems to have somewhat changed, however it is an important aspect for the mid-degree shift from the introductory classes when moving into the more advanced classes. This may have simply been an issue with the order in which some classes were taken on my part, but the only courses which seemed to fill this role were 1 hour classes focusing on a language.
I would like to see a more structured course flow. I know there are recommended focuses but I found it difficult to follow one. Also, I did not know about it from the beginning. It would be great if there were some pre-filled tech elective schedules that laid out the classes that are related to each other and what sequence to take them in.
Making sure that the professors genuinely want to teach and want to see their students learn. There were some times that it felt like we were given work that had nothing to do with what we had learned and the professors werent very helpful when there were issues.
We need up to date classes, equipment, and facilities. We learn about technologies from years ago. The mobile app dev class has a long wait list every semester for a reason; students are interested in learning about technology that is here and now. It is the responsibility of the CSE department to provide relevant coursework and engage students in this way. Our facilities are terrible compared to many other majors. We have 7 computer in our major lounge. Computer is in the name of our department and we have only 7 machines reserved for our majors. It is very disappointing. Call Microsoft and get them to sponsor a room renovation.
I wish professors would schedule in time to work on labs in later classes, or give in-class demonstrations of them writing code. Even posting a video of them giving a tutorial on writing a program to get you started on the lab would be beneficial. There is a huge difference between viewing slides which contain code snippets you may need to begin writing a program, and watching the professor write and explain the code as he gives a short tutorial.
It would be cool if there were some resources on the CSE website to help learn specific languages for when we take courses that force us to use a language weve never used before. Knowing one language basically means you know them all but sometimes it can be frustrating to have to learn something new on top of new concepts. I dunno, its all I could think of.
I would like to see more current CSE issues being discussed somehow, such as developments in AI, languages, theory research, etc.
The amount of emails sent out to the listserv gets a little overwhelming. It would be better if students could subscribe to some keywords in the emails that they would be interested in and have the option to limit the number of emails they will receive.
Removal of some of the unnecessary classes (in my opinion) like Chemistry.
More current/web and app based class options