Information Systems Programs become Accredited - COBOL in Crisis

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Information Systems Programs become Accredited -
COBOL in Crisis

• Bob Roggio University of North Florida
• James Comer - Texas Christian University
• Pam Brauda University of North Florida

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Outline

• 1. Background COBOL Dominance in the
• Corporate IT World
• 2. COBOL Problems and Trends in Academe
• 3. IS Accreditation and COBOL Instruction
• 4. Facts and Inferences from Accreditation
• The Real Future of COBOL
• 5. Conclusions

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1. COBOL Dominance in the Corporate IT World

• IT successfully transitioned billions of LOC to
  be Y2K compliant
• Faculty/IT managers must now reconcile COBOLs
  role for at least 10-15 years
• Unimaginable dependence on COBOL was clearly
  revealed in 300 - 600 billion spent on Y2K
  issues.
• Insights gained into pervasiveness of COBOL and
  to corporate bottom line.

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COBOL Dominance in the Corporate IT World - Today

• Stern, Stern and Ley (2003)
• 150-250 billion lines of code.
• In DOD 59 of all IS applications using COBOL
• 85 of worlds business data systems written in
  COBOL
• Estimate that 35 of all new business application
  development in COBOL
• Legacy Reserve (2003)
• CICS volume (e.g. COBOL-based ATM transactions)
  grew 50 in four years from 20 billion (1998) to
  30 billion (2003)

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COBOL Dominance in the Corporate IT World -
Today and Tomorrow

• Research by Legacy Reserves (2003)
• Integration of object-oriented and web-based
  features with Legacies is the number one concern
  of IT managers in 2003
• The most highly paid programmers in the next ten
  years are going to be COBOL programmers who know
  the Internet.
• Stern, Stern, and Ley (2003)
• Annual growth of COBOL code over the next four
  years is projected to be five billion lines.

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2. COBOL Problems and Language Trends in
Academe - Yesterday

• 1995 C offered in 60
• 53 in
  1998 (largely C)
• 1995 COBOL offered in 90
• 53 in 1998
• 1995 - COBOL OO 0
• 7 in 1998.
• 1995 Java 0
• 43 in 1998
• 1995 Visual Basic 59
• 70 in 1998.
  (especially MIS)

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COBOL Problems and Language Trends in Academe
Today

• Numbers are getting worse as programs clamor to
  espouse the latest techniques, methodologies, and
  development tools.
• Network programming security database
• Client-server web-based applications
• Reusability and component-based software
  development
• Rapid Application Development

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COBOL Problems and Language Trends in Academe
Today

• We are in an era when COBOL programming is
  about as uncool as a graduate can get.
  (Newing, 2003)
• An interesting theory contributing to the demise
  of COBOL and rise of languages such as Java is
• is simply because languages like C and Java
  are so convoluted that they require lots of books
  and magazines and web sites dedicated to
  explaining and supporting them, so they have a
  high perceived use, where COBOL just runs and
  doesnt really need that kind of infrastructure
  associated with it. (Gordon, 2003)

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COBOL Problems and Language Trends in Academe
Today Summary

• Cause for alarm for many world-wide is apparent.
• Trends for COBOL instruction rapidly diminishing
• Modern features of COBOL 2002 rarely taught
• Leveraging COBOL for internet applications are
  minimally (if at all) communicated
• Faculty and student interest in teaching COBOL
  continues to wane, generally in favor of
  instruction in the more exciting and newer
  technologies
• Little evidence that this trend for
  reduced/eliminated COBOL instruction in most
  programs will slow down.

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3. IS Accreditation and COBOL Instruction

• 2001 2002 ABET/CAC Accreditation Cycle
• One pilot program Pace University (New York
  City)
• 2002 2003 ABET/CAC Accreditation Cycle
• Full cycle six additional programs accredited
• Robert Morris University (Moon Township, PA)
• University of South Alabama (Mobile, AL)
• University of North Florida (Jacksonville, FL)
• Illinois State University (Bloomington-Normal,
  IL)
• Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) (Richmond,
  VA)
• Drexel University (Philadelphia, PA)

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Brief Background Drafts of IS Criteria

• Presented at many conferences and included
• SIGCSE, FIE, AMCIS, IAIM, ICIS, ISECON, ICIS, and
  IACIS which include several, if not all of the IS
  organizations.
• Web surveys - with over 300 respondents -
  undertaken to gain additional buy-in and
  feedback.
• Comprehensive efforts undertaken to create the
  current IS Criteria and to gather agreement
  within the IS community.  
• For our study, every attempt to gain access to
  correct data was made
• Web sites, email, phone calls, catalogs, and
  more
• Many programs are in a state of flux and there is
  lag time between implementation of changes and
  course catalogs.

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Robert Morris University University of South Alabama University of North Florida
School / College Communications and Information Systems Computer and Information Sciences Computing Sciences and Engineering
Department Computer and Information Systems No department Computer and Information Sciences
Program(s) Accredited Information Systems Management Information Sciences Information Systems Information Systems
Degree BS in Computer and Information Sciences BS in Computer and Information Sciences BS in Computer and Information Sciences
Other tracks/ programs/ specialties No other undergraduate tracks in department Computer science (accredited by ABET), Information technology, Computer engineering (joint with College of Engineering Computer science (accredited by ABET), information sciences
COBOL Elective within both programs Recently removed from curriculum (remains as an elective). Taught with Micro-focus - Web Express. Change due to small numbers of interested student. Intro to COBOL (3 hrs), File Structures (4 hrs)
Other languages A two course sequence in COBOL, C, Visual Basic or M is required Java Java, Intro. to Object Oriented Programming. Data Structures using OOP
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Illinois State University Virginia Common-wealth Univ. Pace University Drexel University
School College of Applied Science and Technology Business Computer Science and Information Systems Information Science and Technology
Department School of Information Technology Information Systems No department No department
Program(s) Accredited Information Systems Information Systems Information Systems Information Systems
Degree BS in Information Systems BS in Business with major in Info Systems BS in Information Systems BS in Information Systems
Other tracks/ programs/ specialties Bachelors degree in Applied Computer Science (accredited by ABET), Bachelors degree in Telecom Mgmt. BS in Computer Science in School of Engineering (accredited by ABET) BS in Computer Science, BA in Computer Science, BS in Technology Systems, BS in Professional Computer Studies BS in Software Engineering (also offered through the College of Engineering (BS in CS accredited by ABET)
COBOL Advanced Cobol (four hrs) is required Never Required. One elective course in curriculum being deleted. No longer offered as of Fall 2003 Not offered
Other languages JCL- required for Systems Development Analyst sequence and one of four 3 hr. courses (3 required) for Web Development Sequence. Other programming languages required. Students program almost exclusively in Java. C was required until 2000. C for procedural Java for object oriented. C Java
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4. Facts and Inferences from Accreditation and
the Real Future of COBOL

• Two (of seven) require COBOL
• University of North Florida and Illinois State
  Univ.
• COBOL optional
• Robert Morris University may take COBOL as a
  language option, but others are available
• COBOL unavailable or being eliminated
• University of South Alabama
• (used to offer contact person lamented its
  demise)
• Virginia Commonwealth
• Pace University, and
• Drexel University

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More Facts and Inferences from Accreditation
The Real Future of COBOL

• Main language
• Java and C - actually rather close.
• All programs have a strong database component
  SQL, etc.
• A couple of programs offer Artificial
  Intelligence (electives) so perhaps Lisp, Prolog
• Some include courses in Internet Programming and
  to a lesser extent VB

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Interesting Observations

• Programs housed in diverse academic units
• One in a college with engineering (UNF)
• One in a school of business (VCU)
• Two IS programs offered in same unit as computer
  science (all others offered computer science in a
  different academic unit)
• Also noticeable Trend for separate colleges of
  schools for IS and IS related programs
• University of South Alabama
• Pace University
• Drexel University
• University of North Florida (formerly)

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Accreditation and COBOLWhat Accreditation Does
Not Do

• There is NO CASUAL RELATIONSHIP between
  accreditation and the decline of COBOL
  instruction
• Neither ABET/CAC accreditation process nor the
  information systems Criteria cause programs to
  directly reorient their curricula.

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Accreditation and COBOLWhat Accreditation Can Do

• BUT for the many programs seeking
  accreditation, accredited programs will serve as
  models of successful accreditation efforts.
• Many inferences can be drawn from these.
• Specific inferences on programming languages can
  be made.
• Everything about these programs will be viewed by
  many schools planning to seek IS accreditation.
• Two of seven accredited programs require COBOL
• Programs on the bubble re COBOL have more
  fuel.
• Authors feel the continuing spiral in COBOL will
  continue and seem to be codified by these
  accreditation actions.

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5. Conclusions

• COBOL will continue to underpin much of business
  data processing for a number of years to come
• Academe is not heeding the words of large
  sections of the corporate community
• Programs recently accredited by ABET appear to be
  codifying academic trends
• Future Accreditation Cycles will provide more
  data
• On the horizon Accreditation of Information
  Technology (IT) programs by ABET/CAC
• Criteria? In general, more applied, less
  theoretical, but NOT KNOWN at this time.
• The new crisis not Y2K, but Post Y2K.

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Thank you!

• I will send a copy of these overheads to you if
  you email me at broggio_at_unf.edu