I received my undergraduate and master’s level education at Michigan
State University. Here is a synopsis of the “state of the art” from 50 years
ago and a few perspectives.
Computer Hardware at MSU
The first computer at MSU was the MISTIC (MIchigan STate Integrated Computer)
which was built in 1956-1957. It was based on vacuum tube technology (2000
vacuum tubes!) and used paper tape or cards for both input and output. It was
classified as a “supercomputer” at the time with a capacity of 1024 40-bit
words (about 5K). It weighed a ton, occupied an entire room, was supported by a
staff of 10 (on each shift), and consumed nearly 30 kilowatts of power.
In 1963 MISTIC was replaced by a transistor-based CDC 3600 which was in
turn replaced by a CDC 6500 in 1968. These were also classified as
supercomputers.
While the MISTIC was no longer operational when I arrived in 1966, it
was still talked about. I worked on the 3600 for the early part of my education
there, built a simulator of the 6500 before it arrived so we could get used to
programming it, watched the 6500 be loaded into the computer center (by taking
out a 2nd floor window and lifting the various components up with a
crane), then used the 6500 for the remainder of my education there.
Computer Science Degrees at
MSU
The first few courses were taught immediately after MISTIC became
operational. They were initially elective courses in the Electrical Engineering
department. The College of Engineering at the time just offered the five traditional
disciplines – Chemical Engineering, Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering,
Mechanical Engineering, and Metallurgy. Agricultural Engineering was also offered
as a joint program with the College of Agriculture.
In 1966, a sixth discipline, Engineering Science, was added to the
college’s offerings. This was a more applied engineering discipline. There were
three “flavors” – Computer Science, Materials Science, and Systems Science.
Computer Science became its own degree program in 1968, and in 1969 Computer
Science became a separate department in the College of Engineering and graduate
degrees were then offered. Systems Science became a separate degree program
shortly thereafter. Materials Science became a department in 1971.
My Educational Track at MSU
When I graduated from high school I had never heard of computers. Since
only government agencies, large research universities such as MSU, and large
corporations had their own computers, that was not surprising. Since my
strengths were both mathematics and science, I initially enrolled in the
College of Engineering for the fall of 1966. Since all first-year engineering
students had the same required courses, one did not select a specific
discipline until their second year. However, I was tending toward Electrical
Engineering as that was the most mathematical of the disciplines. One of the
first courses I took was an Intro to Computing which was FORTRAN programming. I
immediately fell in love with computers.
With a heavy course load and a few credits from having taken AP
Calculus in high school, I became a sophomore in the spring quarter (MSU was on
the quarter system back then). That fall, having completed the general
engineering requirements, I began taking EE courses, the first one being
semi-conductor design. I quickly decided that EE was a bit too technical to me
and not to my liking the way that computer science was. I changed majors to
Engineering Science (then just a year-old program), but taking courses that
were applicable to both the computer science and systems science variations in
that program. I was still taking a very heavy course load (18-22 credits a
quarter) and was on track to graduate in just three years in 1969.
In 1968, just being a year away from graduation, computer science
became an official degree program. I quickly changed my major to computer
science. There were only 7 BS in CS degrees awarded in 1968. In 1969 that
increased to 26 BS degrees of which I was awarded one. It was primarily a
male-dominated degree program (as were all the engineering disciplines) with
only one female graduate in 1968 and two in 1969. The engineer science
disciplines all required two minors in addition to the major – mine were in
mathematics and systems science – because I had kept my options open until my
final year I was only one course short of having a systems science degree as
well.
With the graduate program starting that fall, I decided to remain and work
on an MS in Computer Science as well. The graduate program was pretty small as
well in those early years and there were often only 3-5 students in a class. I
received my MS in CS in the winter of 1971 (the only graduate in that
discipline that quarter). By then I had also decided to get a second graduate
degree – an MBA. I was taking several courses that could apply to both degrees.
I received my MBA in the summer of 1971, having thus been awarded three degrees
in just five years.
Changes in the MSU Offerings
Since Then
The College of Engineering has expanded to offer degree programs in Applied
Engineering Science, Biosystems Engineering, Computer Engineering, and Environmental
Engineering.
The Computer Science Department awards roughly 150 BS, 20 MS, and 15
PhD degrees each year. The CS program is accredited by the Computing
Accreditation Commission of ABET. (As a side note, for 6 years in the late
1980s and early 1990s I was an accreditor for CSAC, the Computer Science
Accreditation Commission, and the forerunner of the CAC.)
Some Perspectives
When I received my BS degree in 1969, there were very few institutions
who had degree programs. None of my professors had CS degrees – they were
degreed in things like engineering, mathematics, social science, and other
disciplines.
While the growth in BS-CS degrees offered at MSU has increased from 7
in 1968, to 26 in 1969, to 150 today, that is not nearly sufficient to meet the
demand for those with computer science knowledge today.
CS degrees are still quite male-dominated, although perhaps less so
than other engineering disciplines. But they are also heavily dominated by
non-US citizens. Based on last names and pictures, the full-time faculty
appears to be 18 Asians, 6 from the Middle East, 3 from Germany, and only 4
from the US. There are also only 5 women out of 31 faculty (all but one of them
being Asian). The student body is also quite heavily Asian.
Although it was my CS background that got me my initial job, technology
is a constantly changing field and one has to keep getting retrained and
re-educated to keep up with these changes. But something that carried on all
throughout my career were the things that I learned in those Systems Science
courses, essentially the ability to look at the larger picture and envision how
technology can then be applied to help improve things. So I would advise those
looking at a CS education to not get too enamored with the more technical CS
courses, but to balance those with course that foster “systems thinking”.
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