Technically speaking: fostering the communication skills of computer science and mathematics students

  • Authors:

  • Jessen T. Havill;Lewis D. Ludwig

  • Affiliations:

  • Denison University, Granville, OH;Denison University, Granville, OH

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 38th SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education
  • Year:
  • 2007

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Abstract

The Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Denison University has introduced a significant new oral communication component early in both majors. The sophomore computer science and mathematics majors meet together each week for a "lab" taught jointly by a computer scientist and a mathematician. There were three goals in this endeavor: (1) to prepare students for the workforce and graduate school by improving their oral communication skills, (2) to nurture future researchers in both fields by exposing them to research early in their undergraduate training, and (3) to increase computer science students' exposure to mathematics. In the following, we establish the need for such a course, describe our approach, how it satisfies our three goals, and additional outcomes.