Many computer science students report feeling under-prepared for interviews and entry-level jobs, and colleges have been working to address this problem, but are we putting effort into teaching the right skills? This poster reports initial results from a survey of both CS professors and the industry representatives who hire and work day-to-day with our graduates. We find that, when asked what skills are most important and most lacking in today’s graduates, industry and academia disagree.

Tyler Menezes is the Executive Director at CodeDay, where he works to provide welcoming and diverse opportunities for under-served students to explore a future in tech and beyond.

Born in Canada but raised in the Pacific Northwest, he briefly attended the University of Washington before dropping out to start a Y Combinator and venture-backed social video startup in 2011. This, combined with stints working in machine learning at Microsoft Research and as a programmer at several Seattle startups, led to his work finding data-driven solutions to increasing CS diversity and enrollment since 2014.