Franklin Li | Penn should not enforce CIS course prerequisites

During advanced registration for fall 2024, Path@Penn started to enforce prerequisites for computer science classes.

A bolded line of words appeared at the bottom of the section details on the course description page stating the required prerequisite courses. For example, if you have not taken both CIS 1210 “Programming Languages and Techniques II” and CIS 2620 “Automata, Computability, and Complexity,” you cannot register for CIS 3200 “Introduction to Algorithms.”

Penn’s CIS department has always listed the prerequisites for its courses, but until last semester, these prerequisites were only recommended, not required. I've heard from quite a few upperclassmen have taken CIS 3200 before CIS 2620, as 3200 is often seen as more useful for finding internships and research. In retrospect, they felt that the content for 2620 is not really necessary for grasping 3200, and they recommended leaving 2620 for later semesters multiple times.

Penn should not enforce prerequisites for CIS courses during registration. Yes, the relationship between 2620 and 3200 may be an exception. Sometimes skipping prerequisites can lead to confusion. But this still does not justify blocking interested students without all the prerequisites from registering a class. If we realize during the first few weeks of classes that we need the prerequisite to understand, we will have the good sense to drop it now and come back after we complete the prerequisites. If not, we should have the right to complete the course. As adults, we should have the right to decide for ourselves.

Moreover, if we argue that prerequisites are necessary for understanding the course content, then why should it only be enforced for computer science courses? Currently, no other major in the four undergraduate schools strictly enforces the prerequisite requirements in Path@Penn. Does this mean that the progression of knowledge only exists in computer science? Definitely not.

Penn is not the only school that enforces prerequisites in its course registration system. Brown University, for example, also requires prerequisites to register. But at Brown, this restriction does not only apply to computer science courses. Certain math classes, such as MATH 1460 “Complex Analysis,” also require prerequisites to register. However, MATH 4100, which is Penn’s counterpart of this course, does not require any prerequisites. If Penn decides to enforce prerequisites, then it should do so in every discipline, or at least in the disciplines that have steep learning curves.

Enforcing prerequisites for CIS classes is at least partially motivated by high demand and the inability to satisfy this demand. In previous semesters, CIS classes often reach the registration cap during advanced registration, or reach it soon after open enrollment starts. As a result, the CIS department introduced the waitlist system, but this still does not discourage enough students from trying to get into certain courses.

Things changed for fall 2024 registration, though. As of Apr. 25, the majority of introductory CIS classes are not full. On the flip side, every student majoring in CIS with all the prerequisites, who urgently needs this course to graduate, has gotten it. This may not have been the case in previous semesters, when everyone could register for the courses. On the downside, some people who want the course may feel frustrated staring at the empty spots without being able to do anything.

Using prerequisites to impose restrictions on registration is not the right way to address students’ increasing interest in computer science courses. Instead, Penn should invest resources to accommodate more students in these classes. This is what Penn needs to do to create the inclusive academic environment that it takes pride in.

FRANKLIN LI is a College first-year from Beijing, China. His email is liyuzhou@sas.upenn.edu.