Talk:Bachelor of Computer Science

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should someone maybe add a list of some major colleges that offer it, or maybe typical degree requirements?

Done.--AlphaTwo 20:23, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Possible POV issues.

This article excludes the very similar (and probably more abundant, though I don't have any evidence to back that up) programs which award a Bachelor of science degree in Computer science. There isn't really any difference between a B.CS. and a B.S. in Computer Science, is there?

Also, lists of "things with property P" can never be complete, and could therefore be considered non-NPOV. The list of schools in this article really ought to be a category rather than an article section, especially since there are hundreds (probably thousands) of schools offering computer science degrees. --bmills 17:04, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

I totally disagree. When I was appling to Universities within Canada, it was observed that schools that offer Bachelor of science or even Bachelor of arts with specialty in Computer science has much less strict requirnments in regards to what courses the undergraduate must take. By definition of Computer Science, there should be a mathematical foundation attached to the degree, however, most Bachelor of science or even Bachelor of arts degrees with specialty in Computer science lacks this component, most likely requiring only one or two basic Algebra course. This is why I suggested that Bachelor of Computer Science is more of an offshoot of Bachelor of Mathematics. The reason why most schools list Computer science under Bachelor of science or even Bachelor of arts is because it was a niche field back when most University started including such a program, and had no nice place to put it (It's not Engineering enough, argues the engineer, and they are right. But then again, CS does not have any "experiemental"/"theory" that is in Science, right?)

As for thousands of schools with CS Degrees? I can only think of a handful, as most are either listed as Bachelor of science or even Bachelor of arts with specialty in Computer science. In some cases, like MIT or University of Waterloo offers Bachelor of Mathematics with specialty in Computer science instead. B.CS. is a relatively rare degree as most schools do not consider Computer science big enough to offer a department dedicated to the area.--AlphaTwo 23:12, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

My point is that while the name of the degree depends largely on the school, the content is essentially the same for any bachelor's degree in computer science. My own alma mater, the Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science, is consistently ranked among the top computer science programs in the world; it provides a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. That's with an entire school of computer science within the university, not just a department. Most universities in the U.S. teach Computer Science with a B.S.; very few avoid the strong mathematical foundations one expects in a serious CS curriculum. Since there are hundreds of universities in the U.S., it stands to reason that there are hundreds of universities with bachelor's programs in CS. --bmills 00:15, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

The article ignores B.S., B.A., B.Math, and other bachelor's programs in CS, and lists only a tiny fraction of those CS programs.

WOAH. Hold it. I don't disagree that the article does not include B.S., B.A., B.Math. But then again, the title of the page is Bachelor of Computer Science. I throw in a paragraph stating that other schools offer a similar degree under different Degree titles, but frankly I don't believe there's any Neutrality being disturbed here.--AlphaTwo 01:49, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Leaving out references to other equivalent degrees with slightly different names would be a clear NPOV violation — omitting the fact that many other programs teach exactly the same thing would potentially lead a reader to erroneously conclude that most baccalaureate CS programs result in a B.CS. degree. While that may be true in some countries (I can't say for certain one way or the other at the moment), it's certainly not true in all countries. Really, a description of a computer science curriculum would probably be best included in the Computer science article, which has seen a number of major revisions over the past month. A well-referenced description of CS curricula would be a welcome addition.

Also, I still feel that the list of schools with the degree is wholly inappropriate. A comprehensive list would be too large to be useful, and any non-comprehensive list carries a clear POV in favor of the organizations listed. A better solution would be to use the category system (see WP:CG) already in place; in fact, Category:Computer science departments seems an excellent fit. --bmills 03:06, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Regards to leaving them out: I think the whole Bachelor of xxx is all really backwards anyways. Look at the Category and you'll see what I mean. It's a bloody mess where everything overlaps with every degree under the sun listed. This page had it's content added when I created the User Infobox and decided to look this page up. Not including such information in the Bachelor's Degree page would make the degree seem non-existent. Linking all possible "CS" Degrees to this page is no better either.

As for CS curricula, I'll look in to helping out over at the Computer Science page in that regard.

Yes, I think your assessment of Category:Bachelor's degrees is quite accurate. I'm hoping that Wikipedia:WikiProject Categories will sort that out at some point soon, but we'll see. Probably the best idea would be to merge all the "Bachelor of X" articles into a single "Bachelor's degree" article that describes them all, but that's beyond my capabilities at this point. Your help with Computer science will be appreciated! --bmills 03:37, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

I think the BCS is the exact same thing as a BSc in CS. My degree is called a BCS, and from discussion with friends who have CS degrees from other universities, I know it is no different than CS degrees offered by other universities. Whether the degree is called a BCS or a BSc in CS or a BA in CS is irrelevent, it's entirely up to the university what to call it. Also, my university did not have a seperate CS department (CS was part of the science department), so the idea that a BCS is only offered by universities with an indepenent CS department isn't true. Edrigu 15:03, 1 April 2006 (UTC)