A relatively new addition to the AUN American-style liberal arts curriculum is the CIE 111, (Introduction to Computers & Computing), a course taught to all AUN students by the School of IT & Computing (SITC).
In his guest lecture on Friday, February 14, 2020, "An Introductory Overview of CIE 111", Dean of SITC, Dr. Mathias Fonkam, explained that this course was introduced in recognition of the growing need, call, and even push by educators and industry leaders such as Google to accelerate fluency in IT and computational thinking skills at all levels.
The Dean told the class that SITC seeks to move beyond just offering a course on computer applications or IT, the computer's part of the course title, to also introducing all AUN students to what he termed "Computational thinking skills" or the wealth of knowledge and skills computer scientists employ in problem-solving and trying to understand the human mind. That's the computing part!
"Fluency in Computers & Computational Thinking is seen by many employees today as the 'New Literacy' at par with the famous 3 R's - Reading, wRiting, and aRithmetic. This new literacy largely subsumes the earlier ones," the Dean added.
He noted that with the fast-paced revolution in IT & Computing and our growing dependence on them, everyone needs to go beyond the ability of just being able to use the computer or their applications.
"Everyone should learn how to use a computer to solve a problem beyond the Microsoft Office applications, " said Dean Fonkam, who presented an overview of some well-established fields of computer science such as computer architecture, operating systems, databases, web/cloud applications, and cybersecurity as well as emerging fields such as AI, machine learning, and Big Data.
The Dean encouraged the entire class, especially the non-computing majors from the other schools to take these classes seriously and peruse the online resources provided on the course Canvas pages to build their computational skills, noting that this is perhaps one of the most important life skills to have today.
"An edge in computers and computational thinking will set you apart in your field today."
Reported by Omorogbe Omorogiuwa