The demand for professionals with the skills to help create, deploy, and manage data solutions is growing. BCIT Computing has responded by expanding its full-time Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Applied Computer Science with the launch of a January cohort in the Database Option with refreshed curriculum.
We checked in with Database Option Head Dr. Tejinder Randhawa on the new offering.
Q: What can you tell us about the new B.Sc. Database Option?
Tejinder Randhawa (TR): Data is the foundation of computing science. Courses on “database systems” covering storage and management aspects of data, “data networks” covering transportation aspects of data, and “Artificial Intelligence” (AI) covering some of the processing aspects of data, are the cornerstones of any computer science curriculum.
BCIT Computing has had courses on database systems in its diploma and degree programs’ core curriculum since their inception, and has also offered “options” taken by a subset of students to gain further specialization. We’ve had a part-time offering of the BSc Database Option for some time, a model that is popular because students can work full time and then complete their degree nights and weekends.
But this January we’re launching a new two-year full-time Bachelor of Science in Applied Computer Science Database Option for students who have the Computer Systems Technology (CST) Diploma or equivalent two years of previous post-secondary. The curriculum has also been revised and expanded to align with industry.
“Data is fuelling a transformational change in society with the growth of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the massive data sets available across sectors.” – Dr. Tejinder Randhawa, BCIT Computing
Students will learn to develop data solutions that ensure the collection, storage, and processing phases of the data journey are flawless. BCIT’s unique proposition of five database systems specialty courses, capped with a data-centric final project, allows for the needed breadth and depth in this exciting area. We know how important it is for students to both master underlying concepts that often appear abstract, and also gain real hands-on experience as they step into industry.
Q: How strong is the need for data professionals?
TR: Data is fuelling a transformational change in society with the growth of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the massive data sets available across sectors. We still rely daily on systems that handle transactional data. But there are also increasingly large volumes of data arriving at high speeds from the Internet of Things (IoT), for instance: surveillance video, media content, and online devices. This data needs to be stored efficiently and be retrievable on-demand while remaining intact.
The skill set we’re offering is highly relevant locally and beyond. Tech giants such as Microsoft and Amazon are at the forefront of driving the data economy via their platforms, solutions, and services, and have a significant local presence in Vancouver. And we know how important data is in public sector spheres like health authorities that are required to collect and manage very sensitive data. Every organization you can think of is dealing with some kind of data and needs skilled professionals trained to handle it and to help gain insight from it.
Q: What makes the Database Option appealing to students?
TR: I think this kind of work really appeals to students with an analytical approach who enjoy problem solving.
Students start off by designing data models and developing applications and services that support transaction processing. This is followed by designing data warehouses and creating data engineering solutions to support descriptive analytics. The course “Data Center Design” covers deployment architectures to ensure that edge, fog, or cloud computing are supported with necessary fault tolerance and scalability. Students also take “Data Mining and Analytics” in which they expand their data engineering solutions using algorithms and AI solutions, including Neural Nets, to support predictive analytics. Finally, the “Database Systems Security” course adopts a holistic approach to data security: potential attack vectors are evaluated and preventative solutions are designed and implemented.
Step-by-step, students thus expand their horizons as they go through the sequence of courses.
Q: What kinds of students are likely to be interested in these courses?
A lot of our two-year diploma graduates return to ladder into a degree. Typically they end up landing a job right after their diploma, but they often plan to pursue a degree later. Sometimes they want to finish a degree when they are promoted to roles where a degree is helpful or required.
So I expect we have a lot of graduates from our Computer Systems Diploma who are interested in furthering their knowledge of design and implementation of database applications and services. They’re keen on roles in database administration, data warehouse architecture, data engineering, data devOps, and data security analysis. But of course as part of the degree, all students will also strengthen their programming, testing & Quality Assurance (QA), and distributed computing skills.
Besides students with a computing background, those with a background in statistics and math may find this option helps re-focus their expertise and enables them to enter the Data Economy with effective data engineering solutions. Students with background in business, finance, economics, health sciences, and engineering may also be interested, though most would require many bridging courses due to the prerequisite entry requirements of undergraduate credits in computer science.
The degree is based in small classes, a cohort model, so students have the same classmates in almost all their courses. This allows them to work through the program as a group and build those connections and ultimately a professional network for after graduation.
And students also now have the option to continue their education by applying to ladder to the BCIT Master of Science in Applied Computing.
Q: What led you to teach database systems?
Starting from my first job in industry as well as from early years of my academic career at BCIT, database systems have been central to my commercial product development as well as teaching. I find it rewarding to pass on my experience and skill set to students.
Conversely, I find teaching to be the best way to learn. Even if the students do not have any prior knowledge of the subject matter I am teaching, their curiosity alone lets me rethink, revise, or learn something new through them.
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