[KwartzLab] Computer Science from the Top and Bottom

[Stephen Paul Weber]

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It is no secret that I'm fairly disgruntled in general with the state of 
University education, especially in my field.

Over past months I've been working on the construction of a curriculum that 
provides base Computer Science concepts.  The core philosophy is to start 
simultaneously at the "top" with the highest abstraction level (building 
syntax and semantics) and the "bottom" with the lowest level (RAM layout and 
machine instructions), and then move in step towards the middle.

I am on track to have an edited second draft of the curriculum completed by 
the end of December, and will then wish to run a course based on this 
curriculum in the new year as a way to both test the philosophy and gain 
feedback.

The intended target for this first version of the course will be (1) 
programmers with no formal Computer Science background, (2) people with a CS 
degree who wish to get a refresher (or to heckle me), (3) mathish or 
sysadmin persons who have an interest in getting some base in Computer 
Science.  Based on conversations with people both in the greater KWartzLab 
community and Waterloo in general, I am convinced that there are many such 
persons in the region.

The format for this first version of the course will be a fairly fast-paced 
roughly 8-week (notionally, 1 night per week) presentation that involves 
a bare minimum of lecture-style and a maximum of tinkering with concepts and 
Q&A where students can get concrete answers to the bits of the material 
they're playing with or struggling with.  It will of course be entirely 
gratis for attendance and nothing will be mandatory.

All that said, I'm sending this email to gauge interest in the community in 
such a course, and also to get feedback from any interested parties on what 
sort of timeline (assuming a course starting early January) in terms of days 
of the week, number of hours per session people could put up with, etc.  
Venue would be TBD, though I would love to do it at KWartzLab.

- -- 
Stephen Paul Weber, @singpolyma
See <http://singpolyma.net> for how I prefer to be contacted
edition right joseph
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