Foundation Exam
Students need to pass this Foundation Exam before they can officially be a Computer Science major and before they can take the following required 4000-level computer science courses: COT 4210, COP 4331, COP 4934, and COP 4935.
The exam was created in 1998 to address a difficulty that professors of some 4000-level Computer Science courses were facing: that their students weren’t prepared for their courses. Thus, the goal of the exam was to ensure that every student entering 4000-level Computer Science courses had shown a reasonable level of proficiency in a timed exam setting in fundamental computing topics so that the professors of those courses could teach their courses as planned without needing todo any remediation on topics they expected students to have learned in their earlier course work. The exam succeeded in its goal, which is why the exam has been retained.
The exam was created in 1998 to address a difficulty that professors of some 4000-level Computer Science courses were facing: that their students weren’t prepared for their courses. Thus, the goal of the exam was to ensure that every student entering 4000-level Computer Science courses had shown a reasonable level of proficiency in a timed exam setting in fundamental computing topics so that the professors of those courses could teach their courses as planned without needing todo any remediation on topics they expected students to have learned in their earlier course work. The exam succeeded in its goal, which is why the exam has been retained.