We couldn’t find the exit to the parking structure. We were also afraid to arrive late to a conference on Exodus 2. I spotted a young woman who appeared to be a student. She was more than helpful in leading us out of the parking structure. On the way, I asked her what her major was. She was in electrical engineering. The hard side of computers, not software. Since I was writing this article on the decline in college enrollment related to artificial intelligence (AI), I wondered what she thought about her employment prospects. She said that the prospects are grim: “I’ll take anything I can find.”
This random encounter is a lovely anecdote when reflecting on the decline in college enrollment in computer science, even though she was in electrical engineering. There was no exact alignment between college majors, job prospects, or how past perceptions compare to current realities. And it is only an anecdote. Still, we ought to wonder about the topping off of the S-curve in AI’s trajectory. An article in the Atlantic suggests that the college enrollment bubble in computer science may be bursting:
The job of the future might already be past its prime. For years, young people seeking a lucrative career were urged to go all in on computer science. From 2005 to 2023, the number of comp-sci majors in the United States quadrupled.
All of which makes the latest batch of numbers so startling. This year, enrollment grew by only 0.2 percent nationally, and at many programs, it appears to already be in decline, according to interviews with professors and department chairs. At Stanford, widely considered one of the country’s top programs, the number of comp-sci majors has stalled after years of blistering growth.
And if we skip to the why of the decline, we find the seemingly ubiquitous AI:
Young people are responding to a grim job outlook for entry-level coders. In recent years, the tech industry has been roiled by layoffs and hiring freezes. The leading culprit for the slowdown is technology itself. Artificial intelligence has proved to be even more valuable as a writer of computer code than as a writer of words. This means it is ideally suited to replacing the very type of person who built it.
The experience of the newly graduated electrical engineer taking any job she could find suggests that the related AI factor in computer science may share several common elements. Selecting any college major in the hopes that it may lead to gainful employment years later is fraught with uncertainty. Both may face the outsourcing and alternative sourcing of jobs.
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Robotics, automation, and multinational manufacturing could be compared to the offshoring of programming and coding jobs; the importing of temporary foreign workers; the cyclic nature of tech boom and bust; as well as subjective factors that dwell on the choice of study for both. The AI factor is just one more complication. It is also likely at the early stage of its effect on the economy and the consequential difficulty in planning for a college career in computer science. It will also factor into engineering and other college degrees.
It might seem strange, but students ought to be told the story of tulipmania. Tulips became the high point of investment among the Dutch in the 1600s. It was based on the frenzy of exotic tulips. The speculative fever led to dreams of profit. Charles Mackay wrote about this and other popular delusions in Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. And in my lifetime, there was hula hoop mania, Cabbage Patch doll mania. And now AI mania. Mania gets in the way of planning, especially one that is typically four years away.
Students might well ask about alternatives.
The obvious answer is not limited to aligning college choices to academic majors, but looking beyond to the broader economy. There is a dearth of skilled workers in manufacturing. There is also demand for skilled workers in different trades. And the military.
None of these jobs may be appealing, given that many have grown up with the expectation and glamor of a college degree. And, oh by the way, many end up in jobs that do not require a college degree.
There is another story that could be told—a story about pragmatics rather than tulipmania.
My grandfather was an immigrant. He likely didn’t have a high school education, but he was adventurous, industrious, and successful. He gifted me $100 a month—that was in 1961—to supplement my college scholarships. He advised me to pursue a degree that would lead to a job. He didn’t care if I chose teaching or engineering. Unfortunately, from his perspective, my decision to major in philosophy was a mistake. He wrote, “You can get philosophy free at the public library.”
Of course, he was right about getting an immediate job. And he was also wrong.
I did not follow that straight line path from an intended career choice underscored by college study; instead, I backed my way into a life of different jobs, into different types of study and into a world that could not have been envisioned by parents, college advisors, those who have just preceded them, or AI.
Cover by Joe Nalven
