EECS 16B removed from computer science major requirements

The UC Berkeley department of electrical engineering and laptop sciences, or EECS, and the School of Letters and Science government committee announced in a assertion May well 26 that EECS 16B will no more time be a course prerequisite for the pc science important.

The assertion mentioned this change will be powerful drop 2022 for incoming and continuing pupils with graduation conditions of slide 2022 or afterwards. As of this summer months, the number of units for the higher division technical elective necessity is lessened from 7 models to four units.

“EECS 16B no for a longer time becoming a requirement for CS is a significant phase ahead for the software,” claimed growing senior Cyrus Bugwadia in an e mail. “The content and ideas included are only tangentially associated to specified precise subfields of CS that not absolutely everyone is fascinated in, such as device learning and reduced-stage programs.”

The assertion additional that even though pupils admitted spring 2022 or previously are capable to fulfill the technical elective with a laptop or computer science class, incoming pupils will not be equipped to do so.

Bugwadia, who took EECS 16B in spring 2020, also stated it is a system that is “structured inadequately,” noting the very low overall performance of many college students.

“As of Tumble 2021, scholar surveys level the system only a 3.8/7 in terms of worthwhileness, and the regular GPA has fallen to 2.89, both of those currently being the lowest in the EECS office for lower-division programs,” Bugwadia reported in the electronic mail.

Likewise, campus junior Jay Kudva, who took EECS 16B in fall 2021, mentioned in an e-mail that the content taught in this class is “unrelated” to laptop science majors. Kudva additional that dropping it as a necessity would let learners to acquire other programs linked to their interests.

Whilst Kudva mentioned the issue-resolving skills and broad vary of matters covered in EECS 16B are important, the “constant grade pressure” can make the program tough to manage.

“EECS 16B pushed me in an exceptionally unhealthy way, and forced me to continuously get rid of slumber,” Kudva stated in an electronic mail. “It prevented me from learning my other core courses, all since the homeworks had been exceptionally rigorous and associated, to the level of total irrelevance in the scope of the class.”

Kudva reported it is “frustrating” that this modify came into impact just after 3rd-yr laptop or computer science pupils ended up “pressured” by the section to consider the program past fall.

He mentioned that it prompted him to rearrange his program, protecting against him from having other classes he needed to choose that semester, these types of as CS 169A.

“Removing EECS 16B as a necessity for L&S CS will most likely guide to a re-evaluation and re-structuring of the training course as a complete, which has been very long overdue,” Bugwadia mentioned in the e mail.

Make contact with Dhoha Bareche at [email protected].