Work in progress - exposing the Cool Stuff in C. S.

We report on the goals, activities, and some early results related to a new course that has been implemented in our Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) department. The course is developed to expose students to curricular and career related options available in our department, and to provide them with hands-on experiences in a broad variety of Computer Science areas. To this end, we have provided Computer Science experiences such as problem solving, group and team work, and multiple interactions with the hardware and software components of computers and other technologies. In addition, we have had Professors bring their leading-edge research to the class to show incoming students the exciting activities they could pursue as juniors and seniors, and in their future careers. The course also accepts non-CS students who are exposed to this same ldquoCool Stuffrdquo with the result that some of them decide to change their major, while all of them come away with a better understanding of what Computer Science really is. Finally, virtually every class activity incorporates some cognitive or metacognitive component that supports student thinking with the intention that they have exercised their higher-level thinking skills by the time they step up to future coursework.