Drew Hwangdhwang@csupomona.edu

 Louise Soe

llsoe@csupomona.edu Computer Information Systems, Cal Poly Pomona

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Background of study Literature Review Research methods Findings

Career Track CategoriesCareer Track Frequencies

Conclusions / RecommendationsNaming strategies & numbersCareer Track Structures

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Study began in 2006 when our department was reviewing and changing its curriculumWhat do other programs offer?How do we compare?What should we change?

Drew reviewed career tracks in 4-year schools with MIS/IS/CIS majors or programs“Career Track Design in IS Curriculum: A Case Study,”

Information Systems Education Journal, November 2007, 5(29), 1-18

Presented at ISECON 2007 Drew updated data for this paper in Feb-May

2009

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1. Normative – develop normative standards to ensure “body of knowledge” and skill sets are part of the curriculum

Model curriculaIS 2002IT 2004Working group on new model curriculum:

Topi, Valacich, Kaiser, Nunamaker, Sipior, de Vreede, and Wright. “”Revising the IS Model Curriculum: Rethinking the Approach and the Process.” Communications of the Association for Information Systems, Vol. 20, pp 728-740.

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2. Descriptive – describes what exists – our study fits here

What exists Longenecker & Feinstein (1989) Gill and Hu (1999) looked at changes

AACSB school curricula Chen, Danesh, Willhardt, 1991 Heinrichs and Banerjee (2002) Kung, Yang and Zhang (2006)

Comparisons to model curricula MacKinnon, 2003 Williams and Pomykalski (2006)

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Curriculum with diversityBroad spectrum of knowledge and skills –

Curriculum with specificityConcentrations in one or more subfields Career track model falls within this part of the

spectrumOther names for career tracks:

options, emphases, concentrations, specializations, specialties, paths, certificates, clusters, support areas

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“Generic IS curriculum is outdated” (Lee, Trauth and Farwell (1995, p. 333)

“Single career track” IS professional is “outdated” (Lightfoot, 1999)

Specialization occurs in graduate programs (Ehie, 2002)

No relationship between IS course specialization and initial full-time job placement and starting salary (Ross, et. al 2004)

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Between February and May, 2009, Drew reviewed curricula of 450 U.S. business schools with baccalaureate IS programs http://www.univsource.com/bus.htm

He looked at every school’s website to identify those with career tracks or specializationsBuilt a databaseAnalyzed his findings

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110 /450 (24.5%) had career tracks or specializations

No standardized way to name career tracks No standard way to define what courses

belong in a career track No standard way to define how many

courses make up a track• During our analysis, we clustered them into

categories based on names and what courses they included

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IS Fields: Information Systems, Information Technology, Computer Information Systems, Management Information Systems

IS subfields: Networking, Decision Support Systems

Referent disciplines: Accounting Information Systems

Job names: Business analyst

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Track curriculum varied in size: defined from beginning to endCould be 2 to 5 courses beyond a common coreCould be very similar to other tracks within the

same program (sometimes one class differentiated two tracks)

Could involve other programs (e.g., accounting)Could be defined by student and an advisor

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First, based on Track name Then looked at courses listed for career

tracks (since different schools defined this differently) if we were unsure

Then classified them into groups – tried to hit right granularity

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Category Number

IS Disciplines (CIS/CS/IT/MIS)

75

Web Technologies / E-commerce

44

Applications Development

42

Networking & Telecommunications

33

Information Assurance 28

Business Functional Applications (Accounting, Administration, ERP, Finance, Operations Management)

24

Category Number

Information Management –data + another word (warehousing, structures, mining, database management, etc.)

17

Business Systems Analysis

13

Specialized IS / Studies (education, human factors, consulting, spatial systems, etc.)

14

End user support /training

8

Decision Support 804/21/23 13

Number of Tracks Frequency of Programs

% of total

1 11 10.0%

2 55 50.0%

3 23 20.9%

5 5 4.5%

6 3 2.2%

7 2 1.8%

8 or 9 0 0

10 1 0.9%

TOTAL 110 100%

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Most schools (80.9%) with tracks have 1 to 3Probably due to resources and complexity

Track naming is idiosyncratic – we assume it is a faculty decision, probably influenced by:Subfields in which they specialize –

In older subfields, track names vary lessIn newer subfields, more variation for similar tracks

Names attractive to prospective employersRepresentation of faculty areas of expertiseSchools seem to update tracks in line with new

technologies and opportunities for jobs.

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No consistent track structure among these programsTracks with same name at 2 schools may vary widelyHighly structured (no choices) to highly flexible

(determined by student and advisor)May be interdisciplinary in nature or not2 tracks in same program may have courses that are

mutually exclusive or may vary by only one courseIS programs within business schools they may be

partnered with referent disciplines, which influences curriculum offerings.

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7 categories represent standards in IS field – well established Applications Development, IS Disciplines, Systems /

Business Analysis, Networking / Telecommunications, Information Management, Decision Support, End-user computing – note the last two are dwindling.

2 categories represent more recent IT areas Web Development / E-CommerceInformation Assurance

Business Functional Applications category stresses individual business functional areas

Specialized Information Systems / Studies a catchall category

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Programs reviewing their career tracks should continue to scan the environment and the career opportunities available to students

The newest model curriculum task force is working in the area of a career track model curriculum – their findings and recommendations may influence future career tracks.

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Longitudinal review in 2 years to see what is changing, especially in this period of uncertainty

Compare characteristics of schools with career tracks with those that do not

Compare existing tracks with model curricula, especially when new model with career specializations is in place

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Comments? Ideas?

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