The programming committee for the 77th Annual SAM International Business Conference is pleased to announce the acceptance of the presentation Status and Trends in Information Systems Graduate Education, authored by Yuan Gao, Timothy Burns, Cherie Sherman, and Fariba Nosrati of Ramapo College of New Jersey.
Presentation Abstract: This paper explores the current landscape of IT/IS education in the United States. The goal of this research is to understand how higher education institutions are responding to the growing job market demand for IT professionals.
To take a snapshot of the current state of IT/IS education, this study examines specialized graduate programs in IT, namely, the Master of Science (MS) degree programs, and searches through the official website of the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) with the following parameters: Master of Science (MS) in IT or IS, located in the US, full-time or part-time, on campus or online, for students with no more than 5 years of professional experience.
Review of search results of over 100 programs narrows the list to 39 programs that offer a general information technology major, after excluding programs that focus on a special area of IT like business analytics, cybersecurity, or cloud computing, etc. This sample seems pertinent to our task at hand.
At each program site, the number of required credits, elective credits, and total credits, along with class style and delivery mode are recorded. The number of required courses varies greatly from program to program. Two-thirds of the programs have required courses between 18 and 24 credits.
This study first examines the required courses of each program according to the IS 2020 – ACM/AIS Competency Model, which encompasses the six competency areas of foundation, data, technology, development, organizational domain, and integration (The Joint AIS/ACM IS2020 Task Force, 2020). It should be noted that the AIS/ACM model is for undergraduate IS programs but has been extrapolated to graduate programs for this research as its purpose here is to serve as a framework for analysis.
Courses in each competency area are required by 67% to 100% of programs reviewed. In particular, 67% of programs require a course or courses in foundation, 100% in data, 67% in technology, 79% in development, 77% in organizational domain, and 79% in integration.
Separately, to have a concrete view of the specific courses in each program, we looked into the frequencies of required courses in each representative IT/IS subject area. They do not necessarily have a straightforward mapping with the competency areas, but they represent the typical courses offered in the IT/IS programs reviewed.
A database management systems course is required by the most programs reviewed, at 85%. IT management/strategy (72%), systems analysis and design (59%), project management (59%), information security (49%), and business analytics or big data (49%) round out the top six subject areas most frequently (percentage in parentheses) required by programs reviewed.
Other courses or subject areas required by more than 25% of the programs include object-oriented design or application development, networking and telecommunications, enterprise systems or supply chain management, and decision support or knowledge management systems. It is also of interest to note that just 18% of all programs require a Master’s Project, indicating those programs are in a distinct minority.
Most programs require 9 to 12 credits in electives. Some programs require that electives be chosen from a set list of courses, while others may encourage or require students to take courses from a concentration or track. The most representative areas of concentration include business analytics, cybersecurity, project management, knowledge management, and enterprise systems and applications. These areas of focus seem to represent the current trend in IT graduate programs.
Join us online to see this great paper and many more March 31 – April 2, 2022. For registration information visit www.samnational.org/conference.