Published this month, ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, has joined with the IEEE Computer Society (IEEE-CS) and the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) to develop “Computer Science Curricula 2023” (CS2023). CS2023 provides a comprehensive guide outlining the knowledge and competencies students should attain for degrees in computer science and related disciplines at the undergraduate level.
Educators in technology believe that it is essential to establish uniform curricular guidelines for computer science disciplines to maintain an ongoing vitality of the field and the future success of the students who study it. The availability of a shared global curricula ensures that students develop the knowledge and skills they need to succeed as they graduate to become industry practitioners, researchers, or educators. Additionally, by supporting consistency in the field across the world, the curricular guidelines enable efficient global collaboration—whether among professionals working across borders for an international company, or among academics from different nations coming together for a research project.
Growing importance of artificial intelligence reflected in CS2023 Curricular Guidelines
Traditionally, these guidelines are updated every ten years. CS2023 builds on CS2013, the most recent global curriculum framework developed by ACM and IEEE-CS, the world’s two largest associations of computing professionals. ACM and IEEE-CS have consistently focused on curating content from the world’s foremost experts for the creation of curricular guidelines, and with the rapid expansion of AI since CS2023, the addition of AAAI to the developing body was both essential and welcome.
New and Noteworthy additions of the CS2023 report include:
- The addition of AAAI as a core partner of CS2023 reflects the growing importance of artificial intelligence as a discipline, as well as how AI is disrupting the teaching of computer science.
- Because computing touches so many aspects of personal and public life, CS2023 goes beyond simply outlining technical competencies to include a knowledge unit called Society, Ethics, and the Profession (SEP) and incorporating it in most other knowledge areas to encourages educators and students to consider the social aspects of their work.
- To meet the disciplinary demands of artificial intelligence and machine learning, mathematical and statistical requirements have been increased throughout CS2023, but individually identified for each knowledge area so that educators can accommodate the needs of students with varying levels of mathematical background.
- CS2023 is designed to be a primarily online resource at https://csed.acm.org/, both for utility and so the curricular guidelines can be updated more frequently to keep pace with the rapid changes in the field.
The Committee Chair explained that “So much has changed in computing since we issued the last curricular guidelines in 2013. While the core skills and competencies that we outlined in 2013 form the foundation of this new work, we were painstaking in our effort to make sure that we reflect where computing is today. We also tried to emphasize a whole solution approach in terms of addressing issues of Society, Ethics, and the Profession, and a whole person approach in terms of emphasizing the need for students to develop professional dispositions. Finally, from the outset, we envisioned this report as a living document that will be regularly updated and can be accessed by computer science educators on an ongoing basis.”
The revised Guidelines for the Computer Science Curriculum is designed to be a primarily online resource for easy access and so that the curricular guidelines can be updated more frequently to keep pace with the rapid changes in the field.
Link to the Computer Science Curriculum: https://csed.acm.org/
Source: https://www.acm.org/media-center/2024/june/cs-2023