Curriculum's Stakeholders:

• Parents
• students
• faculty
• administration
• local communities
• employers

Why Stakeholders are Important:

• the rate of change in Information Systems
• the breadth of emphasis available in Information Systems

Which changes are substantial and which are just fashion?

Steps:

1. Identify current employers.
2. Produce a survey that inquires about the current curriculum and investigates those changes the employers see likely in the future.
3. Administer the survey.
4. Compile the results
5. Analyze them with a "committee" of employers.

Undergraduate Curriculum:

IT 120 Personal Security in the Digital Age Introduces students to the field of information security. Students will examine security and privacy issues that affect their personal use of computers and the Internet. It covers how to protect personal computers from outside threats and how to protect oneself from potential problems such as viruses, phishing, identity theft, and other computer crimes.

	Now	Five Years From Now
Very Important	25%	57%
Somewhat Important	50%	14.3%

IT 205 Computer Technology Examines how computers work, including the components of technology: hardware, operating systems, storage, and networking, and how these components work together to support information technology applications. Students troubleshoot, repair, configure, and upgrade computer systems in a hands-on environment. It includes the application of Boolean algebra to basic digital circuits. The course is designed to prepare students with the knowledge necessary to pass the CompTia A+ certification, a prerequisite for preparing for a career in computer support and maintenance.

IT 210 Software Engineering Studies the entire system life cycle, including requirements analysis, system analysis and design, software development, software acquisition, system integration, and system maintenance. Software quality and software assurance are also covered. Students get experience with techniques used in commercial environments, such as UML.

IT 350 Computer Security Provides an overview for the computer security risks facing enterprises today and covers the many options available for mitigation of these risks. Topics include security concepts, controls and security techniques; standards; designing, monitoring, and securing operating systems; hardware; applications; databases; networks (wired and wireless); and the controls used to enforce various levels of availability, confidentiality and integrity. Computer security is taught in the context of the increasingly global and distributed environment of today?s enterprise. Business continuity and disaster recovery planning are also discussed.

IT 305 Computer Networking Examines how data gets from one computer to another, including through local area networks (LANs), wide area networks (WANs), and the Internet. Networks are discussed in terms of the Open Systems Interconnect (OSI) seven-layer model. Network operating systems and network middleware are examined. The course is designed to prepare students with the knowledge necessary to pass the CompTia Net+ certification, a prerequisite for preparing for a career in network administration. Prerequisite: IT 205

IT 310 Database Technology Studies the design and implementation of relational databases. Entity-relationship (E-R) diagrams and other design techniques are covered and students get practical experience with their use. SQL programming techniques are also used to build, update, query, and generate reports from databases. Application tools such as JDBC are also examined.

IT 335 Computer Security Provides students with a broad understanding of corporate information security and the tools and techniques used to implement it. It provides a framework for addressing security problems and provides hands-on experience with security products. Specific topics covered include firewalls, host security, cryptography, privacy, application, security, and incident and disaster response. The course is designed to prepare students with the knowledge necessary to pass the CompTia Security+ Certification, a prerequisite for preparing for a career in information security. Prerequisite: IT 305.

IT 355 Software Testing, Documentation, and Quality Assurance Focuses on documentation and quality assurance in the system development process in general, and software testing in particular. It includes practical experiences with preparing documentation in each phase of the system life cycle and the use of this documentation to ensure the quality of the final product. Software testing methodologies and strategies are addressed. Prerequisite: IT 210.

How important are each of the following specializations?

• Computer Science
  • Important: 87.5%
  • Somewhat Important 12.5%
• Forensic Computing
  • Important 25.0%
  • Somewhat Important 62.5%
  • Neutral 12.5%
• Web Design
  • Important 62.5%
  • Somewhat Important 12.5%
  • Neutral 12.5%
  • Somewhat Unimportant 12.5%

Graduate Curriculum:

IT 510 Systems Engineering Examines system and software engineering and takes a systematic and disciplined approach to the entire system life cycle. The course includes planning, requirements definition, modeling, estimating, analysis and design, coding, integration, testing, quality assurance, and maintenance. The course focuses on object-oriented techniques and students get practical experience with the Unified Modeling Language (UML) to produce high-quality software.

IT 515 Decision Making for IT Presents the quantitative tools and techniques necessary to ensure IT professionals can support the complex decisions necessary in today?s business environment. Techniques will support estimation and resource allocation, return-on-investment calculations, make-or-buy decisions, sampling in requirements gathering, cost-benefit analysis, annualized loss expectancy (ALE) calculations, and other quantitative requirements. It provides practical experience in a wide range of decision-making methods and tools, including classical decision analysis, decision trees, influence diagrams, group decision making, and simulation. The course also examines several emerging technologies, such as expert systems and intelligent systems.

IT 520 Enterprise Infrastructure and Networks Covers the technology and management of the various components of today?s enterprise IT infrastructure, including hardware, software, and networks. The course examines network architectures, network protocols, network management, IT support models, performance metrics, and operating systems. It also considers data communication and messaging in a global context.

IT 530 Computer Security Provides an overview for the computer security risks facing enterprises today and covers the many options available for mitigation of these risks. Topics include security concepts, controls and security techniques; standards; designing, monitoring, and securing operating systems; hardware; applications; databases; networks (wired and wireless); and the controls used to enforce various levels of availability, confidentiality and integrity. Computer security is taught in the context of the increasingly global and distributed environment of today?s enterprise. Business continuity and disaster recovery planning are also discussed.

IT 540 Enterprise Data Management and Analysis Recognizing the increasing dependence on data to manage today?s enterprises, this course covers the design, development, management, and use of today?s transaction-based databases and data warehouses. The course covers the entire life cycle from planning; physical and logical design; extract, transfer, and load (ETL) applications; and data querying and reporting. The course provides practical experience with a relational database and with the Extensible Markup Language (XML) and the XML Stylesheet Language (XSL) for data transfer.

IT 550 Ethics, Law, and Policy in the Information Age Introduces students to the ethical, legal, and policy issues raised by designing, developing, and using information technology. Issues that are researched and debated in the course include subjects such as information privacy, environmental conservation, effective energy use, limits on the use of technology, the digital divide, customer profiling, open source, copyright violation, globalization, and outsourcing. Students are expected to independently research the issues, make presentations to the class, and support their case.

IT 610 IT Governance and Strategy Examines methodologies and techniques to govern the large and rapidly evolving set of information technology (IT) activities and initiatives that take place in a large enterprise. The course includes the processes, including best practices, that govern decision making around investment decisions, staffing levels, outsourcing decisions, client relationships, project management, and other important IT operational areas. Internet governance is also discussed. The course includes practical experience in the development of an IT strategic plan.

IT 680 IT Master?s Project Requires the student to integrate and apply knowledge acquired in the degree program to a particular project. The student works individually to complete the project for a sponsor and under the direction of a full-time faculty member of his or her choice. The results are presented orally and communicated in writing. The project outcomes are critiqued by the faculty. Prerequisite: completion of at least 27 credits in the program.

How important are each of the following specializations?

• Computer Security and Information Assurance
  • Very Important 100%
• Health Care Informatics
  • Very important 62.5%
  • Somewhat Important 12.5%
  • Neutral 25%
• Information Technology
  • Very important 37.5%
  • Somewhat Important 50%
  • Neutral 12.5%
• IT Project Management and Technology Leadership
  • Very important 62.5%
  • Somewhat Important 37.5%

Trying to be realistic in how much of the effort for cloud-based computing will be reality 3-5 years down the pike. System security will be important either way, but the focus of some tech fields could change dramatically if the client-side gives way to more cloud-based resources. Also, the growth of mobile computing adds complexities across the range of tech fields (i.e. network management, software testing, security, platform support)

Maybe as a component of IT305, it would be nice to see information on Wimax, or Internet service as a utility, which is being deployed in main metropolitan areas.

The fundementals need to be supported with how it relates to present practices.

the content will change for all these courses over the next few years and adjustments will need to be made.

In debriefings, we became aware of the need for soft skills and the importance of writing and communication.