If you spent time looking at how much time students spent (in and out of class) on CS and math topics, it's way less than you'd assume.
It's also known in layman terms as practice. 9 months of cramming is not good enough. Neither is 4 years of tests without actually using the taught things in practice and laboratory exercises. And preferably also homework.
Source: SuperMemo research, Piotr Woźniak and his citations. No reason why it wouldn't apply to CS or programming.
The amount of information useful requires essentially lifelong interleaved focused learning at least hour a day. You can also maybe pick some things up in a job, but these have stricter limits.
This isn’t true. People forget the most advanced skills they learned unless they use them regularly but they don’t forget the ones that are necessary for that last skill. If you ever knew calculus you’ll remember algebra after decades without using it. I haven’t spoken German in most of a decade but I can still read it fine. Spaced repetition is the most efficient way to durably learn something but it’s not necessary.
People tend to forget unpracticed skills, not oldest, and most complex parts (least compressible, biggest) first, not necessarily hardest. And the forgetting is exponential, depends on how well the material is presented (cohesion specifically).
Exponentials flatten a whole lot.
You do forget a little still over time. Ask a 40 year old who knew algebra and calculus really well and does not use it often if at all. (I do sometimes, so I don't count.)
Stability and accuracy are also separate variables.
Algebra is not one thing, it's thousands of memory chunks. As a probe, think if you remember Fundamental Theorem of Algebra which is a keystone, but slightly tricky. Compare to whether you can solve ordinary differential equations of second kind, and whether you can solve an equation involving logarithms of rational non-negative numbers. (I picked random not absolute basics from high school, 101 and 202. Bonus points if you spot the stinker.)
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I always thought of even latest versions of SuperMemo like Antikythera mechanism for learning. It's a great model even if principle is not yet properly researched.
Harry P Bahrick, Lynda K Hall Journal of experimental psychology: general 120 (1), 20, 1991 An analysis of life span memory identifies those variables that affect losses in recall and recognition of the content of high school algebra and geometry courses. Even in the absence of further rehearsal activities, individuals who take college-level mathematics courses at or above the level of calculus have minimal losses of high school algebra for half a century. Individuals who performed equally well in the high school course but took no college math courses reduce performance to near-chance levels during the same period. In contrast, the best predictors of test performance (eg, Scholastic Aptitude Test scores, grades) have trivial effects on the rate of performance decline. Pedagogical implications for life span maintenance of knowledge are derived and discussed.
So my question is what level of calculus is retained, and if students who take calculus then advanced calculus or introductory analysis or whatever you’d call it retain more.
Related knowledge strengthens already known things, and once critical maximum stability/retrievability is reached (optimally 7 or so precisely spaced rehearsals) it is pretty much cemented. Without optimal spacing, probably quite a few more repeats. At maximum stability/retrievability the exponential maintains "flat" form for a very long time. A refresher may be needed to get facile again, otherwise it may take a short while to remember and there may be mistakes. Even a trivial refresher will work though, chances to use basic algebra are many.
Principles SuperMemo SM-17 algorithm puts in quantification. Here's a link with all the history and references to some other research: https://www.supermemo.com/en/articles/history
Thanks for the paper, though it's slightly wish washy, but still useful.
The introduction of the ECTS was however highly controversial at least in Germany. Before the Bologna Process German universities had the "Diplom" taking no less then 4,5 years for CS. The introduction of the bachelor with down to only 180ects, so only 3 years, was seen as cheapening the education severely. Universities generally dont see themselves as preparing you for the job market, but instead provide you with the prerequisites to enable you to contribute novel ideas to your field in form of a doctoral degree. That almost every CS job requires at least a bachelor degree is just an side effect from the point of view of the university. An often mentioned criticism was the government selling out the education system so companies could quicker get new employees. Quantity over quality. As a result, you still find a high percentage of students automatically adding a masters to get the equivalent of a "real degree", with some universities not changing much in the structure of their diplom curriculum, awarding you a bachelors degree after 3 years but expecting you to finish the rest.
There is however also the opposite in the form of an (payed, but badly payed) 3 year apprenticeship training after school. You can become an "IT specialist" without going to university and even without the prerequisite school years to start university (normally successfully finishing grade 13 and thus getting your "Abitur"). You can start the training once you successfully finished your 10th schoolyear and thus getting your "Realschulabschluss". The 3 years are 50/50 professional school and working in a company. Looking at the curriculum of one of the first schools in google, they have in total between 880 and 960 school hours. Depending on your focus, 300-400 hours of "Information and telecommunication systems", 200-300 hours of application development, 200 hours of econ and business processes and ,due to accepting people who finished with 10th grade, 60-100 hours of English lessons. IT specialist here means either becoming a sysadmin or a coder.
FWIW, I assume little. I have a degree and know the effort that went into it, and am well versed in how courses are distributed in and out of your major over 4 years of study. I'm not engaging in this discussion to say one is better than the other... I'm saying they are different. Different schools, for different purposes, serving different people.