A preliminary comparative survey of computer architecture courses across the nation's top schools

  • Authors:
  • Nicholas Vaidyanathan;Elodie Billionniere;James Collofello

  • Affiliations:
  • Arizona State University;Arizona State University;Arizona State University

  • Venue:
  • Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges
  • Year:
  • 2010

Quantified Score

Hi-index 0.00

Visualization

Abstract

We provide a survey of introductory computer architecture courses across the top 40 engineering schools as defined by the US News and World Report, in order to discover the differences between course content, style, and outcomes. We acquire this data from respective institutional websites and propose a schema to effectively represent it, recommending a centralized database for aggregate curriculum analysis. We find evidence to suggest variance among course titles, place in a CS educational sequence, and content. We highlight key examples from universities that are especially outside the norm, and provide commentary on evident trends.