[circular_logic]

A Professor in 101 put it as: "Programming is just a tool, CS is a study that just so happens to use that tool now and then."

Without reading through every year's syllabus you will come across supprises (and very few students seem to do this)

Its expectation versus reality, CS seems to be taught very differently depending on where you go ie different levels of maths focus is a big one, another is if they teach "reality" like common industry tools, software development methodologies, software ethics etc

Often there can a problem with elitism "this course is for knowledge, not your career" that changes many students minds on if this huge amount of debt is worth it vs just finding a job right away.

[sky_rw]

As my professor put it: "Computer science is as much about computers as astronomy is about telescopes."

[paulryanrogers]

So it's science that happens to involve a computer? Maybe I misunderstood what CS truly is. I thought it was the science of computing. And while I used a lot of books and paper to study it, without the machines it would not have been of much use.

[sova]

So your professor was Dijkstra?

[OGWhales]

I think your point about different universities giving different focuses on math/real world tool, etc is a great point. I’ve heard of an incredibly broad range of “computer science” degrees from various universities.