One of the narrow corridors of Kemper Hall's basement, dedicated to computer science majors.
from https://theaggie.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/kemper_ca_Jero_Real.jpg
Hello fans of UC Berkeley Memes for Edgy Teens! My name is Valerie Tu, and I’m a Computer Science major. I know what a lot of you may be thinking after hearing that. “She’s probably anti-social and kinda weird.” How did that belief become common anyways? When you search up “computer science student” on Google Images, all the first 20 results are photos of students being happy and collaborating with one another. Despite this, why are so many posts about CS kids on our meme site, UC Berkeley Memes for Edgy Teens, about how CS kids don’t go out, and are too busy being alone, debugging their own code to help others? So many posts are dedicated to putting down computer science majors as antisocial, mean, and just outright weird and disgusting guys.[i] Well, after my time in the Kemper Hall basement, I’m here to prove to you all that not all computer science majors have the mentality of “every man for himself.” In fact, we are quite the opposite! Hopefully by the end of this podcast, we will all have a better insight on our fellow CS majors and wipe out the mean prejudice against them that is plaguing our meme page!
Let’s enter the maze of hallways within the Kemper basement that lead us to the CSIF rooms. CSIF stands for Computer Science Instructional Facility. According to the official CSIF website rooms here are open 8:30 AM to 12 AM weekdays, and 12 PM to 8 PM weekends.[ii] Us CS majors tend to work here instead of in our dorm rooms. Therefore, I don’t even see how the stereotype of “the loner CS kid holed up in his room” still stands.
Enter at 2 PM. My friend from class, Mary abruptly cries out “DUDE, I don’t know why my code isn’t working I’m freaking the heck out man.” Our homework is due tonight at 11:59 PM. We’re both in the same class together, ECS 36B. It’s notorious among the CS students that ECS 36B and ECS 36C are the weed-out courses here. They are even rumored throughout the halls that they outrank Organic Chemistry in terms of difficulty. Her friend, Sarah looks at her with sympathy in her eyes and calls a tutor for her dear friend that’s barely holding on to sanity. Ryan, the tutor says he’s ready to help… after he finishes with 10 other kids waiting in line to be tutored. Mary looks desperate for help. Standing up, she calls out to the room, “Does anyone here have ECS 36B with Professor Roger??!” Almost immediately, three students stand up and head to her computer. They all rally around her code, figuring out ways to debug it. One of the students, Tyler, suggests using the gdb app which is used for debugging code, another student Amanda, suggests writing different print statements everywhere to figure out where the code stops working. Already, we can see CS students willing to help each other.
Gradually, more students flock toward their table. Everyone worked together in silence before they all sigh in defeat, not knowing where the error lies. When it seemed like all hope was lost, Jerry stepped in. He found out that the reason why her function wasn’t working was because the variables weren’t initialized accordingly with their prospective classes. However, he doesn’t know how to solve the problem. Despite Jerry not being able to fix her problem, Mary and many of the kids there thanked Jerry for his help. After all, he was able to pinpoint what many of the kids had trouble dealing with for the past two hours. Several minutes go by with no avail. Mary goes over to Ryan to ask for help, but unfortunately, he is still swamped with tutees from other classes who were there before her. It wasn’t until Harry came to the rescue! He already finished that part of the assignment and was able to fix the problem that was bugging everyone. Harry managed to help Mary, but turns out, he had problems of his own. He was having trouble on a previous part of the assignment, and he hasn’t been able to figure it out. Mary’s eyes brightened up hearing about his tribulations. Luckily for him, Mary happened to finish that part the day before! They spend the next few minutes fixing his part of the code.
The room gets pretty calm for a while after the whole ECS 36B fiasco. At around 4:38, Mary, along with all the friends she just made, pack up and leave room 75, on their way out, they wish those staying behind “good luck” on their assignments, and “thank you’s” to those who helped them.
Events like this happen all the time, where kids band up together to fight the common enemy, a.k.a. Professor Roger’s homework. It’s amazing to see the amount of progress they’re able to make when working together. As such, it makes no sense for the belief that computer science majors only work on their own. Why spend 10+ hours on your own with no avail when you can collaborate in a group and be much more productive?
Working in groups may also lead to something even more valuable than just finishing homework. At 5 PM, a group of dejected ECS 36C students crowd inside room 75. I asked one of my friends who happened to be in the group, Jenny, what was going on. She said that the group is currently “getting wrecked by Professor Lee.” They were in the room today to figure out what’s going on in lecture and how to go about doing the homework. They are working on binary trees, a new concept in the class they are taking. They’re all huddled up together in front of the whiteboard, mumbling to each other about what to do. They ask my friend, who is a tutor for their class for help. He goes over and explains to them the logic for about 20 minutes. I don’t understand much of what they are saying, but I can tell whatever my friend is telling them, is helping.
My friend returns to his seat next to me and reminisces about his time in ECS 36C. He told me how he and his group-mates also huddled together like penguins in this very room trying to figure out binary trees. He noted that through their trials and tribulations from the class, they all grew to become great friends today. It’s been 2 years since he’s taken the class, but like before, they still help each other through thick and thin. Not only did working in groups lead to a better homework grade, it led to a lasting friendship with people he never thought he would be friends with. This anecdote doesn’t seem at all anti-social to you all, does it? We can see here that not only are CS majors willing to work in groups, but they were able to form genuine friendships with each other.
All in all, there is so much camaraderie displayed in the CSIF rooms. Despite what many people think, CS students aren’t what many people call “anti-social.” They are willing to help one another in what is known to be the hardest classes of all time at UC Davis, and they are down to form great friendships that will last throughout their college career. Hopefully all of you guys will take the next step in turning that prejudice against computer science majors around by letting others know about this podcast. If you want more great examples of what being a good peer is like, make a visit to the basement of John D. Kemper Hall. The connections you’d make there are lasting. Thank you for listening guys. See you soon.
References:
[i] Lee, A. UC Berkeley Memes For Edgy Teens. Retrieved December 02, 2018, from https://www.facebook.com/groups/UCBMFET/permalink/2265621270382558/
[ii] CS-CSIF. Retrieved December 02, 2018, from http://csifdocs.cs.ucdavis.edu/