(Please attach to MIS Revised Program Proposal)

ADDENDUM

submitted

February 1, 2005

Response to MISO Department’s

Proposal for Revised Programs and New Programs

Computer Science Department

1/26/05

The Computer Science Department has reviewed the proposal for a revised MIS curriculum submitted by the MISO Department to the A2C2 Course and Program Proposal Subcommittee, to be considered on January 26, 2005. Based on our review, we would like to make the following comments to the A2C2 subcommittee.

The current MIS program has been an effective major and has served its students well. Many MIS graduates have gone into entry jobs that involve some programming and we have received feedback from both graduates and their employers that they were prepared for these jobs.

The proposed curriculum will take the MIS program in a different direction. In particular, the proposed curriculum offers significantly less content in the area of computer programming literacy. Although this may be a viable direction for MIS, there is an existing industry need in this region for MIS students with the current technology background that will no longer be met.

Nonetheless, we support the MISO Department’s right to make this curriculum change. However, we request the following specific points be addressed:

  1. The inclusion of Computer Science courses in the electives list should be removed.
    The Computer Science courses listed as acceptable electives include only those numbered 300 or above. Since all of our 300-level courses have at least two other CS courses as pre-requisites and there are only 6 S.H. available for MIS electives, it is misleading to indicate students can use CS courses for their electives.
  1. It should be noted that the concerns raised by the outside reviewer about the four CS courses: 234, 250, 385, and 410, were never brought to the attention of the Computer Science Department. Furthermore, they are incorrect.
    The comments made in this proposal give erroneous information about these courses. In particular, the report states that these courses have “an almost exclusive emphasis on individual work rather than team work.” However, CS 234 includes a formal, in-class lab component where students work in groups every week. CS 250 includes informal group work in class and usually one team programming assignment a semester. And both CS 385 and CS 410 include major group projects every semester. We recognize that students need to develop their individual programming understanding and skills and also learn the skills necessary to program in teams. Thus, we work on this explicitly throughout these four courses.
  1. It should be noted that the comment made by the outside reviewer concerning the redundancy of CS courses in the current MIS curriculum is wrong.
    The reviewer’s comment is specifically: “Furthermore, they [the four CS courses currently required] are redundant in the current MIS curriculum.” This is not true as the current MIS program does not offer any courses that teach computer programming and problem solving, Database programming, or software engineering processes to the extent that we cover these issues in computer science.
  1. Should the MISO Department decide to include more computer science content into their program at a later date, the Computer Science Department will work with them to design and offer appropriate CS courses.
    We will work to design CS courses as needed by the MISO Department, should they chose to add computer science content back into their curriculum at a later date. Additionally, we will continue to work with them and A2C2 to ensure that we do not have two different departments offering “redundant” courses for our students.

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Joan M. Francioni

Professor and Chair, Computer Science Department

Response to CS Department’s Response of MIS

Proposal for Revised Programs and New Programs

Management of Information Systems and Operations Department

1/31/05

The MISO department has met and discussed your responses that we received on January 26, 2005 shortly before the CPPS meeting time. The following is our responses:

1. the MIS faculty have agreed to drop the CS courses from the elective list of courses for the revised program.

2. For your concerns about the reviewer's comments listed in #2 and #3, those responses were direct quotes from the reviewer's report that is now a matter of the College of Business and university record. His comments are his own opinions and we do not have control over his observations. In designing the revised MIS program, MIS faculty considered and investigated several sources with the reviewer's comments and the IS Curriculum Model as part of the those sources. End of discussion.

3. As for your offer about designing a CS course especially for the MIS program, we thank you for your offer and will keep it in mind as we continuously improve and meet theneeds of our customers.

Respectfully,

Kimberlee Snyder, Ph.D., C.P.I.M.

Chairperson, MISO Department

WinonaStateUniversity

Som 324C

(507) 457-5173