Computer science for the artist

Computers are faster and cheaper than ever before and at the same time user interface advances make powerful applications more accessible to the non-computer scientist. In a diverse range of industries, it is now essential for non-computer scientists to create, modify and interact with sophisticated computer applications. Although improved interfaces like high-level scripting languages and visual programming environments, have changed the skill set needed to use the computer, a conceptual understanding of computing and computer interfaces is still required. The very advances allowing direct computer use by non-computer scientists have actually increased the need for computer literacy. Thus computer science departments should expand and enhance course offerings to give non-majors the conceptual understanding and skills they need to become sophisticated users/developers in their particular fields. This paper describes a series of courses developed at Ithaca College that are designed to provide multimedia programming skills and concepts to liberal arts majors.