Michigan Technological University – Women in Computing Sciences

COMPUTER SCIENCE

Why you should pay attention:

BECAUSE YOU LIKE MONEY…

Objective-C$101,500

Perl$90,500

C#$91,000

Java$95,500

Ruby on Rails$88,500

PHP$79,500

C$93,500

Pascal$82,000

Erlang$103,000

JavaScript$89,000

C++$98,000

R$74,000

Visual Basic$81,500

SQL$86,500

COBOL$88,500

CoffeeScript$118,000

Scala$103,500

Shell$94,500

Groovy$107,500

Python$94,500

Programming LanguageAverage Salary

Source: http://www.indeed.com/salary

BECAUSE YOU WANT A JOB…

Source: United States Department Of Labor – Bureau Of Labor Statistics

Occupation Median Salary Job Outlook

Computer and Information Systems Manager

$115,780 Good

Software Developer $90,530 Excellent

Database Administrator $73,490 Excellent

Computer Programmer $71,038 Okay

Professor $62,050 Good

BECAUSE YOU WANT TO WORK FOR ONE OF THESE COMPANIES SOMEDAY…

or nearly any other company really, as you’ll see in a minute

“Coding is the literacy of the future”- Evan Korth

CS Professor, New York University

BECAUSE

So what is computer science?

problem solving

com·put·er sci·ence Noun

“the scientific and practical approach to computation and its applications” - Wikipedia

“Learning and understanding the mathematical, scientific and engineering principles underlying every kind of computing system, from mobile phones and the internet, via systems that interpret natural language, to the supercomputers that forecast tomorrow’s weather or simulate the effects of disease on the human heart” - Oxford

learning

adaptation math

“If you like to solve puzzles, then computer science is for you! ” – Boston University

"COMPUTER SCIENCE IS NO MORE ABOUT COMPUTERS THAN ASTRONOMY IS ABOUT TELESCOPES" – Edsger Dijkstra

“a career in software can take you into any part of the world you want to know about” –Greg Leitheister, Michigan Tech Class of 2003

Having a CS degree allows you to “pick any field of interest” –Randy Berry, Michigan Tech Alumnus

“I see computer science as a tool for achieving other goals. Nobody ever just does computer science.” – Aubrey Baker, Michigan Tech Class of 2010

As a CS major you have so many options(and these are just a few)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN BUSINESS

CAREER IDEASInformation TechnologyEntrepreneurDatabase ManagementManager/Project LeadFinancial Analyst

TECH ALUMNIMark Carter (IT)Adil Shafi (Entrepreneur)Douglas MacKenzie (Entrepreneur)Kevin Dietz (Entrepreneur)Linda Wittbrodt (Vice President of Research and Development)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN RESEARCH

CAREER IDEASWork for an engineering companyWork for a science organizationCollege ProfessorResearcher

TECH ALUMNIStacey Keener (NASA)Brian VanVoorst (NASA)Harriet King (Research in Human Computer Interactions)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN TEACHING

CAREER IDEASCollege ProfessorHigh School TeacherSoftware Education/Trainer

TECH ALUMNIDr. Charles Heiden (Part time instructor)Dr. Kenneth Williams (Associate Professor of Computer Science)Harriet King (We Help You Use Tech founder)Dr. Janet E. Burge (Associate Professor of Computer Science)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN BIOLOGY / MEDICINE

CAREER IDEASBioinformaticsBiomedical Engineering (Robotic Prosthetics)ResearchHuman Genome ProjectImage Processing/Pattern RecognitionHealth Care Database Manager/Creator

TECH ALUMNIPaul Warnicke (Dynamic Software System Design, Pharmaceutical Company) James Mercer (Programmer in the Healthcare Industry)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN THE ARTS

CAREER IDEASWeb DesignerInterface DesignerAudio Production/TechnologyVideo Game DesignerSpecial Effects/CGI StuffData Visualization

TECH ALUMNIAubrey Baker (Interface Design)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN ENGINEERING

CAREER IDEASComputer EngineerSoftware Engineer (for engineering software)Modeling SoftwareComputer SimulationsAuto Industry (Autonomous Vehicles, etc.)Human Computer Interaction

TECH ALUMNIRobert Fjerstad (Senior Software Development Manager, AutoCAD)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN MATH

CAREER IDEASData AnalystAlgorithm DesignerStatistician3D ModelingGame PhysicsSimulation Designer

TECH ALUMNIDaniel P. Maki (Algorithms for speech recognition)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN NATURE/ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES

CAREER IDEASTracking Systems DesignerData Collection Instruments Engineer/ProgrammerGeographic Information Systems (GIS) Designer

TECH ALUMNIAshley DePottey (GIS software developer)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN ALL THAT COOL SCI-FI STUFF

CAREER IDEASRobotics/AIQuantum Computing

TECH ALUMNIAdil Shafi (SHAFI Inc, a robotics company)Douglas MacKenzie (Mobile Intelligence Corporation, a robotics company)

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN TRAVELING

CAREER IDEASWork for a big, international company

TECH ALUMNI (and places they’ve gone)Mark Carter (Germany)Larry Pieniazek (Weekly travel within the US)Dr. Janet E. Burge (15 months in Alaska, Switzerland)

So what’s your next step?

IF ANY OF THIS SOUNDS KIND OF COOL:

consider a CS degreethink about where your interests intersect, maybe that could be your niche

Stati

stics

Graphic Design

Computer Science

DataVisualization

(we know Venn diagrams are a bit corny…but they do illustrate our point nicely)