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Computer Science About the Department Computer Science at Earlham is a growing and exciting department. Our diverse faculty and rich facilities provide an environment that fosters an interdisciplinary approach to theory and practice in the field. Computer Science works closely with Mathematics, Physics and most of the other Natural Sciences, and has ties to linguistics and logic. Our curriculum is built on the fundamental paradigms of the discipline: theory, abstraction and design. These three are woven throughout the Department, binding the sometimes disparate topics of Computer Science into a cohesive body of knowledge and experience. Because of the rapidly changing character of the field, we review the curriculum regularly. Our work is heavily influenced by the liberal arts mission of the College, in particular our interdisciplinary approach and our inclusion of the cultural, legal and ethical issues surrounding computing within the curriculum. We provide our graduates with the ability to make informed decisions about the appropriate use of technology in a variety of contexts. At a practical level we rely heavily on open source software, such as Linux, Postgres and FreeBSD, for both teaching and research. Many of our students, faculty and alums participate in open source software development projects. Earlham offers many opportunities for students to apply their studies in Computer Science to real-world problems, ranging from applied computer science to more research oriented work. All of the work we do involves close interaction between students and faculty. A variety of opportunities assist students in reinforcing and extending their classroom learning experiences. A group of students, known as the Pedagogical Support Group, is responsible for the care and maintenance of the labs, desktop machines and networks we use in our work. This same group manages the Computer Science ftp, http, database and dial-up services, and supports the various software tools we use in teaching Computer Science. Most recently, they have been working on mechanisms for distributing connections from X-servers running in the PC labs evenly across our Linux lab machines. A second group of students, the Content Administration Group, is responsible for the content of the Computer Science Department Web pages. HIP, the Hardware Interfacing Project, works on interfacing laboratory equipment to computers. One component of this work is our local weather station, installed on the roof of Dennis Hall, one of Earlham's science buildings. http://cs.earlham.edu/~hip The Database Interfacing Group (DBI) is responsible for the design, implementation and support of application interfaces to the College's academic database, including WebDB, a Web-based tool for managing courses, registration and advising. The DBI Group also performs database administration tasks for the College's central database servers. http://webdb.earlham.edu One of two research groups in the CS Department, the Cluster Computing Group works on a variety of projects in the areas of cluster computing, computational science, Grid computing, and education, outreach and training. We support three production clusters that are used for our own work, by Earlham faculty and students in their research and teaching, and by scientists and students at institutions across the country through our involvement in the Open Science Grid and TeraGrid Series Education Program steering committee. In this role we plan to develop curriculum modules for high performance computing and computational science. More detail can be found at http://cluster.earlham.edu . The Theory Group is a faculty-led collective of students ranging from first-years to seniors who are studying foundational issues in Computer Science. Currently we are exploring automata-theoretic approaches to problems in number theory, logic and linguistics. Our goals include both new theoretical results and implementation of practical systems based on them, so there is ample opportunity to engage all facets of one's individual strengths as well as to engage students with a wide range of skill levels. Our curriculum's strong mix of theory and practice, in conjunction with our applied and research activities, produces graduates prepared for a variety of careers in computer science. Students who major or minor in CS have gone on to advanced studies in computer science and other disciplines; software engineering positions; and system, network and database administration. Major technology companies who have employed our graduates include Lucent, Amazon.com, Oracle, Sybase, Microsoft, MCI/WorldCom and Ontrack. A number of successful technology companies have been started by Earlham graduates. These include: Organic Online (Web site design and hosting), Ray Ontko and Company (software development and consulting services), Summersault (Web site design and hosting) and Infocom (Internet service provider). Our majors have pursued graduate work in computer science at such institutions as Indiana University; University of California, Santa Cruz; and the universities of Central Florida, Delaware, Maryland, Oregon, Pittsburgh, Toronto and Washington. |
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Earlham College · 801 National Road West · Richmond,
Indiana 47374-4095 |