William Owen
ABSTRACT
This paper presents our curriculum solution for handling some of the breadth in Information Technology (IT) education. Major topics like networking, web development, data management, and programming must be covered in a curriculum. Within each of these topics are many areas of specialization. The current trend in technical education is to begin with a breadth first approach and then specialize. This approach works to some extent for IT education but as the number of areas of specialization grow, curriculum design becomes more difficult. When combined with the student's individual desires for their own education, this problem could become unmanageable.Our solution developed a series of focus tracks that include specified courses and sets of specialization supporting courses that students can choose to refine their own educational path. The focus tracks reflect the major areas of IT training and industry need. The support electives are organized into themes that further refine training/skills within a focus track. Many of the support electives are taken from other allied disciplines within the university. This solution provides one method of covering the breadth of IT in a manageable manner.
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Index Terms
- Focus tracks: specializing in IT education
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