According to the recent CAO applications, students are staying away in droves from property and construction courses. While the various news reports all speculate that this is as a direct result of the poor showing in the construction industry of late, it has particular resonance for the IT industry.
As in the wake of the Dot.com crash, students also voted with their CAO applications on the future of the IT industry, it seems they are doing the same with construction. Yet, a few years later, IT bounced back and there was a shortage that meant that chap fixing your computer, designing your business systems or writing your new application might just as easily be from Eastern Europe, India or China as Ireland. While this is no bad thing from a cultural perspective, it was something of a knee jerk reaction from students that turned out to be a bad one.
Just as IT is an indispensible part of the modern world, so is construction. Why, if someone felt that they had a career interest in the area, would they not apply for a course in it that would not see them job seeking for several years? Even the harsh predictions for the economy forecast a slow year for 2009 and then something of a recovery from about 2010 on. It seem students either aren’t listening, or at least if they are, are listening to bad advice. Once again, echoing the IT situation a few years ago.
This might be in stark contrast to Microsoft, who appears to be learning the lesson about closed development and talking out of turn. The successor to Vista, known at the moment as Windows 7, is already being talked up with the company emphasising the input of users as essential. To that end a new blog has been set up to handle such communication. This may be partly based on the Windows 2008 Server experience. Based on the same kernel as Vista, Sever 2008 has been well received as “a good thing”. Its development was heavily based on actual requirements from a broad user base; as in the company listening to what people wanted. This seems to have been taken to heart and the bad press around Vista is being dispelled with the push on Windows 7 being developed under a more open, inclusive and transparent process, according to reports.
This must surely also be “a good thing”. It may well be, but one does not envy the marketing team that must continue to push the more sinned against than sinning Vista. Good luck there people!
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