> I tried (again) to study Computer Science at the local technical university, but my joy of programming was (and still is) sadly not accompanied by a joy for converting numbers from the binary to the decimal system and back (much to the dismay of my parents).
As a teacher on a local technical university, I completely understand what you're talking about here. However, the purpose of technical universities is to teach broads concepts on computer science (or computer engineering). Therefore, we have to start somewhere, building from basic concepts such as the need for digital "codification" up to the dozens or hundreds of concepts which will provide students with a better understanding of the field.
In your case, you pretty much decided that you would want to do frontend web development, so you made a choice. Where I teach, students only have one course which they will ever learn about html/css/js, and on a very basic level (there's a lot of information to fit into 3 years!). Assuming that most technical universities are like this, I think you made a good choice for you. However, if someday you decide to switch to backend development, making your way down the stack for DBs, or eventually up the stack for higher-level things, such as data analysis, ML, etc., you may probably find difficulties related to the lack of breadth on your understanding of the field.
All in all, just to say that you made a good choice for you, but that technical universities can provide students with a breadth of information which allows students someday, after some years of experience, to grok the similarities between most CS subfields..
"the purpose of technical universities is to teach broads concepts on computer science"
Which might be a fine way to teach in those nations where college is free, but even there, ignoring the interests of the student, and sticking with a standard canon of course work, undercuts the uniqueness of each student.
And in those nations where college is not free, then the cost of spending time on broad topics needs to be balanced with the student's ability to pay for it.
The style of teaching that you describe is criticized by Paulo Freire in his book "Pedagogy of the Oppressed".
"In the book Freire calls traditional pedagogy the "banking model" because it treats the student as an empty vessel to be filled with knowledge, like a piggy bank. However, he argues for pedagogy to treat the learner as a co-creator of knowledge."
This is a model of teaching that can work well if the student is affluent enough that they don't have to worry about money for several years, but it is a style of teaching that really breaks down for 2 important groups:
1.) adults who need to learn a new skill
2.) just about everyone who lives in a poor country
Freire developed his ideas while he was teaching adults to read and write.
There is a teaching style that caters more to the full circumstances of the students, taking into account their age and their economic situation and their interests, so that the teaching empowers them with knowledge, without also disempowering them in other ways (such as crushing them with debt).
> Which might be a fine way to teach in those nations where college is free, but even there, ignoring the interests of the student, and sticking with a standard canon of course work, undercuts the uniqueness of each student.
Public college here and throughout most Europe is almost free and most students attenting public universities do not incur much debt (if any at all). That is a trap that you have set up for yourselves (assuming you're from the US).
Nevertheless, every student (computer engineering, that is) can chose is own courses, so, they can follow their own interests. We just make sure that each student starts from a good technical point so he can be a "true" engineer (as in having an engineering degree).
> There is a teaching style that caters more to the full circumstances of the students, taking into account their age and their economic situation and their interests, so that the teaching empowers them with knowledge, without also disempowering them in other ways (such as crushing them with debt).
1 to 1 teaching, although desirable, would not come cheap in any place in the world!
As a teacher on a local technical university, I completely understand what you're talking about here. However, the purpose of technical universities is to teach broads concepts on computer science (or computer engineering). Therefore, we have to start somewhere, building from basic concepts such as the need for digital "codification" up to the dozens or hundreds of concepts which will provide students with a better understanding of the field.
In your case, you pretty much decided that you would want to do frontend web development, so you made a choice. Where I teach, students only have one course which they will ever learn about html/css/js, and on a very basic level (there's a lot of information to fit into 3 years!). Assuming that most technical universities are like this, I think you made a good choice for you. However, if someday you decide to switch to backend development, making your way down the stack for DBs, or eventually up the stack for higher-level things, such as data analysis, ML, etc., you may probably find difficulties related to the lack of breadth on your understanding of the field.
All in all, just to say that you made a good choice for you, but that technical universities can provide students with a breadth of information which allows students someday, after some years of experience, to grok the similarities between most CS subfields..