220 Introductory Mainframe Education Notes From the Field
Project and Program:
Soft Skills
Tags:
Proceedings,
2025,
SHARE Cleveland 2025
The mainframe skills shortage is a major problem effecting almost every aspect
of the enterprise computing space, making it more difficult to find, hire, and
retain systems specialists. A major contributing factor to this issue is the
perceived difficulty of teaching new students fundamental mainframe skills. This
session, intended for those involved in the education of those with a strong
computer science background, but no mainframe experience, will cover an overview
of lessons learned through the development and instruction of an introductory
class to the mainframe platform for computer science undergraduates. This
presentation will start by covering major obstacles for students who are first
on-boarding to the mainframe platform, along with major successes and areas
where existing computer science coursework can be applied to mainframe
applications. After this, the presentation will move into possible mitigation
for these issues, discussing how the process of getting new users up to speed
can be streamlined, and how major obstacles can be avoided. Finally, this
presentation will discuss the prevailing viewpoints about the mainframe platform
among young computer science students and professionals, and conclude with a
guide for getting more young learners interested in the mainframe platform. By
the end of the session, listeners will have a keen understanding of the largest
barriers to training new mainframe talent, practical mitigation strategies for
these issues, and insights on the views of the mainframe platform among young
computer science professionals.
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