Welcome once again to ACM Inroads, the computing education publication of ACM. In this issue, we present some exciting and thought-provoking articles for your reading pleasure.

Let me begin by asking the question provoked by the article featured on the cover of this issue. Computing: An emerging Profession?

For reasons unclear, people who program radar systems, medical and dental equipment, flight control systems, and other safety critical software or work on related hardware seem to be immune from legal responsibility for the work they do. Barbers and hairdressers, plumbers and electricians, doctors and nurses, morticians, some engineers, and even auto mechanics in many and most societies must have a license to practice their trade. Yet, except for a handful (probably less than 1%) of professional computer engineers, professional electrical engineers, and professional software engineers, almost all computing people seem to have escaped the requirement of a legal responsibility to society. If these bold, perhaps even outrageous, statements have made you growl, then you must read Steve Seidman's critical perspective on this controversial topic. Thanks Steve! I am sure your article will raise a few questions and the brows of many.

This issue of ACM Inroads also contains a special section on early computing education. Deepak Kumar piloted this very interesting and enticing section. Please read Deepak's introduction to the section and then delve into the four articles that make this section an exciting read. The Kodu and Back Page articles appearing in this issue complement this special section. Thanks, Deepak for assembling this worthwhile addition to this issue of ACM Inroads.

In addition to its ongoing Insights (Featured Columns) and Features (EduBits, Spotlight, First Bytes, Back Page), this issue contains two interesting articles: one on a metaphor for objects and classes and the other on Kodu with manipulatives, which complements the special section on early computing education. As always, we are grateful to all authors who contribute to this publication. We thank them for their time that makes this publication a success.

People often ask me, what are the criteria by which reviewers pass judgment on author manuscript submissions and revisions? The seven criteria, not in priority order, are:

  • How original is the content?
  • How engaging is the submission?
  • How thought provoking is the submission?
  • How would you rate the quantity and quality of relevant images used to enhance the magazine article?
  • How focused is the submission towards the mission of ACM Inroads magazine?
  • How technically correct is the submission?
  • How would you rate the quality of the exposition (e.g., grammatical structure) of the submission?

We have published these criteria for two years now in a reviewer scorecard, which appears on the Manuscript Central website under Instructions & Forms.

Visit ScholarOne Manuscript Central site (mc.manuscriptcentral.com/inroads) to access some of the resources available to authors. They are also available through the website link at inroads.acm.org/. Again, if you have thoughts on any suggestions or enhancements to the publication, contact me at [email protected].

John Impagliazzo
Editor-in-Chief

Copryright held by author.

The Digital Library is published by the Association for Computing Machinery. Copyright © 2014 ACM, Inc.

Contents available in PDF
View Full Citation and Bibliometrics in the ACM DL.

Comments

There are no comments at this time.

 

To comment you must create or log in with your ACM account.