US CS & IT Academia: Usually TAs/RAs Teach Programming

This post captures a slightly edited email exchange with a friend on the "CS & IT Academia: Inform Students About Software Contribution Record of Faculty" post.

Friend wrote: I too felt exactly the same way as --- that while it seems to be reasonable to ask this of faculty, it would not pan out. Most people don't have such background (to the tune of ~90% or more; most prof/faculty dont write software, their students do). And, most top universities here in the US call themselves 'Research Univ', including MIT, Stanford etc. For them, R&D is distinctly different from producing software - they realize that writing production code is very hard - and so as long as they can prove conclusively what they propose, that is enough.

Eklavya Sai responded: Thanks for the input, especially your numbers take. The Profs. may not like it but they cannot dictate terms to society. If students, parents & employers who are the key customers/stakeholders of the educational system feel that this performance parameter of faculty must be shared with them, the academic administrative authorities should impose it. Those profs. who have no software contribution record can omit it, but those who would like to have one can create their software contribution record and possibly enjoy more student enrollment & career growth benefits from it.

Friend wrote: And in India, I doubt if there is any significant % of faculty that can actually write even basic programs.

Eklavya Sai responded: In India it is absolutely vital that this changes.

Friend wrote: Even in the US, labs classes are handled by TAs/RAs (Teaching Assistants/Research Assistants) and not by professors/faculty.

Eklavya Sai responded: So sad, isn't it? Imagine a surgeon-professor never demonstrating surgery to his/her students and delegating it to interns!!! And then further imagine a surgeon-professor who has never even done surgery!!! Terrible state of affairs man.

Friend responded: I don't think it is sad that Profs don't teach lab courses. Infact, I'd rather they NOT teach lab courses. Reason? Simple - TAs USUALLY have a lot more experience with programming than most professors have. So, students are better off learning programming from the better experienced of the two in this particular case.

In my opinion, at least here at (a US university), most TAs/RAs have at least interned over summers at companies. Also, they are the people who routinely write software (even if not production quality code) as part of their research -- so they have a fair amount of experience with code.

Eklavya Sai responded: It is good that in (a US university) students get the benefit of teaching assistants with good programming experience. ... It is very good that most TAs/RAs at (a US university) are far better skilled at programming than most junior teachers in Indian engg. colleges.

....

I should also add that I understand possible management/economic realities of US universities (or Indian universities for that matter) which cannot allow them to have highly paid Professors handling all work. Division of labour is required and the natural division is perhaps to delegate programming lab. work to less expensive TAs/RAs. That's acceptable, I guess.
 
But that should not result in professors not knowing programming or becoming completely distant from it. That will be like a surgery-teacher focusing only on biological detail in the classroom and staying away from practical surgery. IMHO, students learning from such a surgery-teacher may not become safe and competent surgeons.