Interviewer: “… First, what do you think your strengths are outside of math and computers?”
Student: “Well, I’ve always been good in physics.”
I: “How about social sciences and humanities?”
S: “I did all right in those courses-mostly A’s-but I can’t honestly say I enjoy that stuff.”
I: “Right. And would you describe yourself as a people person?”
The point? The purely procedural pieces of doing good engineering can be outsourced. Indeed, the first questions are about the engineer’s language skills.
As a social science guy, especially as one who made an early shift from computing and engineering as an undergrad, I relish the recognition of the importance of the “soft” sides of engineering. The idea here is that the real needs, and the real jobs, are in having enough engineering or programming skill to manage a project effectively, but also the social skills in order to engineer human processes.
The question remains, is it enough for these students to take a smattering of social science and humanities courses–to be well rounded–or is there a particular social curriculum that would be beneficial to students.
The Masters in Informatics was created to answer precisely this issue. In fact, for better or worse, it was created after a study of employers in New York State to determine what skills were most needed.
The social job market
Interesting piece in Tomorrow’s Professor about a hypothetical interview with a top engineering student:
The point? The purely procedural pieces of doing good engineering can be outsourced. Indeed, the first questions are about the engineer’s language skills.
As a social science guy, especially as one who made an early shift from computing and engineering as an undergrad, I relish the recognition of the importance of the “soft” sides of engineering. The idea here is that the real needs, and the real jobs, are in having enough engineering or programming skill to manage a project effectively, but also the social skills in order to engineer human processes.
The question remains, is it enough for these students to take a smattering of social science and humanities courses–to be well rounded–or is there a particular social curriculum that would be beneficial to students.
The Masters in Informatics was created to answer precisely this issue. In fact, for better or worse, it was created after a study of employers in New York State to determine what skills were most needed.
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