MuzBuzz: Is it really the jar for all those marbles?

I am a senior computer science major at Belmont University. The past four years of my college career have been fun, exciting, stressful, life changing, filled with music (which I love), and an all around amazing time in my life. Recently, I’ve begun developing iPhone Applications with the sole intent of making myself more skilled as a computer scientist so I can someday change the world. One of the best things I’ve come to realize while at Belmont is to invest in your life now, today, and use the product of your investments to make a positive impact on the world.

The following is a critical analysis of Belmont’s allocation of financial resources and focus (or lack thereof) on the futures of their students. In four years, we have invested well over $100,000 on the Belmont education and sadly to say, many students are not getting what they pay for. On a personal note: I’ve taken my time writing this because my heart aches for them.

Belmont does not invest even remotely close to enough money into the sciences. Students who excel in the sciences end up either transferring to another school or staying and working on privately funded undergraduate research projects off campus.

Money is a terrible thing and this paper crap we have is just plain dirty! Understandably, funding is a serious issue. From a business perspective, it is good for a corporation like Belmont to invest in, and grow, the programs that make the most money (i.e. Music Business). Additionally, it is common knowledge that most of the larger Belmont donors are music business elites. Therefore, much of the money coming into the school goes to specific areas outside the core-sciences. But isn’t it the goal of the US as a whole to focus more on the sciences, as to not be left behind in this mysterious race we run? Maybe the allocation of funding is outside the control of smart people with good intentions, but as a student of this institution, it is terribly sad to see and be a part of.

Let us consider the US economy in conjunction with Technology and the Music Industry. From an economic standpoint, the US is falling behind other world super powers. In fact, even some of the best economists predict that the final outcome will be “No Good.”

Technologies such as the personal computer and the Internet have greatly changed the way music is created and distributed. Within the next 10 years, we will see drastic changes in the way the music business works; indeed, this has already begun. Honestly, I see no way for corporations like BMI to sustain themselves in the years to come. No one can stop the flow of data on the Internet.

I meet music business students every day who lack even basic skills with a computer and the Internet. Experience in Belmont’s techno-centric classes (outside of computer science) has shown me that my institution does not adequately train students to use these two fundamental technologies. It is not just about the computer anymore. Without working knowledge of the Internet, there is no way to make it in the world we are entering.

So what happens when thousands of technology illiterate music business students enter a dying / evolving economy? They fall back on their business degrees. And what happens when they interview for a business-consulting job with terrible computer skills, little working knowledge of the Internet, and a degree focusing in “Music Business” from Belmont University? They get rejected because they do not have the necessary skills to be a productive member of the business workforce. Productivity is everything in the globalized economy we exist in.

Belmont needs to invest more effort, time, and money into merging CURRENT technologies with their Business and Music Business degree programs if there is to be any hope for these students’ careers. As a soon-to-be alum of my beloved Belmont University, I trust that these issues will not go unheard.

Spring CS Independent Study

I met with Dr. Hooper today to discuss my independent study for this semester. We’ve agreed to extend my research in WIFI Communication and the iPhone. This semester my goal is to create an iPhone application that probes networks and collects data about them. Then I will parse this data and create a dynamic “Coverage Map” of access points, locations, signal strengths, broadcast channels, and interference.

The purpose of this is: 1) Develop a sick nasty iPhone app for sale on iTunes. 2) Do something no one has used to iPhone specifically for yet. 3) Go a little deeper into both WIFI Communication and iPhone development. 4) Make something that uses what I’ve learned about WIFI to solve a problem.

The basic problem we can associate with my project is Belmont’s campus has it’s own wireless network access points scattered across campus. By pinpointing these AP’s and other rogue AP’s, I will be able to compute a coverage map as well as analyze the possibility of interference with the Belmont network. Using this, one can discover AP’s that interfere with Belmont communications and then work to fix this problem. Two suggestions to fix interference on campus would be to shut rogue AP’s down or (better) allow users to open networks to provide great/enhanced wireless coverage on campus.

Preparing for Grad School

Since the job market is tanked and I got dumped like a high school relationship by CAT Financial’s summer internship program, I’m starting to really consider going to grad school. I don’t know whether I should go for a master or doctorate degree but I guess I’m going to start reading more about applying for Computer Science Grad School

Dr. Hooper brought up a summer research experience that I could get some good experience and fair money working on. It’s a study in using Artificially Intelligent Agents in analyzing ecological phenomena. Sounds kinda interesting and apparently research experiences like this are a very good preparation and resume builder for grad school.