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Do you need a higher education of math such as APs inorder to apply for Computer Science field jobs?
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Fred’s Answer
I would say yes and no. But bear with me, I have a different opinion of what "math" is that many others.
Higher math is not about adding up larger and larger numbers. It's not about being faster and faster at calculating stuff. It's about problem solving. You're given a problem, a set of things you know are true, and then how do you assemble those smaller things into a larger thing. At the same time, how do you break down that large problem into smaller and smaller pieces that (hopefully) become solvable.
That's what programming is. You know loops and conditionals. You want to write a menu/ordering system for a coffee shop. You work the problem from both ends, coming up with a solution/final code.
So...back to what you think of as math. Do you need to know calculus? Probably not (unless that is part of the domain you are coding). Statistics? Again, it might help, but maybe not.
But ANY of those will help you be a better problem solver. It's the sort of thing that gets easier the more you do it, regardless of it being an integral, a logic puzzle, or something else.
There are some specific math classes that most likely would help. Any kind of formal logic is beneficial. Linear algebra might help. Certainly an algorithms class. However, many of these are not taught until college, based on what I recall of AP high school classes.
Higher math is not about adding up larger and larger numbers. It's not about being faster and faster at calculating stuff. It's about problem solving. You're given a problem, a set of things you know are true, and then how do you assemble those smaller things into a larger thing. At the same time, how do you break down that large problem into smaller and smaller pieces that (hopefully) become solvable.
That's what programming is. You know loops and conditionals. You want to write a menu/ordering system for a coffee shop. You work the problem from both ends, coming up with a solution/final code.
So...back to what you think of as math. Do you need to know calculus? Probably not (unless that is part of the domain you are coding). Statistics? Again, it might help, but maybe not.
But ANY of those will help you be a better problem solver. It's the sort of thing that gets easier the more you do it, regardless of it being an integral, a logic puzzle, or something else.
There are some specific math classes that most likely would help. Any kind of formal logic is beneficial. Linear algebra might help. Certainly an algorithms class. However, many of these are not taught until college, based on what I recall of AP high school classes.
Updated
Daniel’s Answer
It really, really depends on the type of job you do. In some types of programming math is absolutely essential because your job is basically to implement mathematical formulae (or physics equations expressed mathematically) in code so they can be used to process data points. In others jobs you may not use as much actual higher math directly. I still think it's good practice though because computers are fundamentally machines that do things to numbers. Very clever people have already figured out some of the hard problems, like how to take a machine that only understands numbers and use it to process words and letters, but the way they did that was to boil down everything to some kind of math. Everything a computer does, from spellcheck to machine learning questions like "Is there a bird in this picture?" to a complex application task like "take this recording of an instrument being played and remove all the sounds other than the instrument itself," are done by reducing words, pictures, sound recordings, videos and everything else into systems of numbers and then applying mathematical comparisons and operations to those systems of numbers.
Being able to understand some fundamental mathematical concepts can crop up in a lot of programming tasks. Even if you don't end up using a specific formula one day, learning more about "the world of numbers" and the properties of mathematical functions can help you understand what you are looking at when handed a task. Advanced math courses are also where you learn about things like formal logic, boolean math, mathematical matrices and other things a programmer might encounter fairly frequently.
Depending on the exact type of programming you do, you might use more or less math every day. Some fields of professional programming use statistics a great deal, in others you might be working with a lot of physics-based math (robotics and industrial systems, for instance, often use various mechanical formulae to do things like make sure they're not being so rough on parts they might break). If you do work in one of those fields you'll probably be able to look up the actual formulae, so memorizing them is less valuable than knowing they're out there and knowing when to reach for which mathematical "tool" so to speak.
And on top of all of that, most universities require a certain measure of math, both for the computer science degree itself and because that degree is part of the college of letters and sciences which has its own department-wide math requirements. If you plan on a CS degree some level of higher math is in your future, AP credits can help bypass some of your grunt-work general requirements. A degree isn't necessarily absolutely required for CS jobs but it will make it easier to go further and raise the limit on how far you can go, as well as start you further along in your career.
If Math isn't easy for you, I wouldn't overly stress going as far as possible, but it's going to help you satisfy degree requirements (my computer engineering program required calculus II and calc-based physics, but that school's computer science program did not go as far) and understand what you are working with on a deeper level to at least be exposed. If you can get as far as statistics you're going to really benefit from it in my opinion.
Being able to understand some fundamental mathematical concepts can crop up in a lot of programming tasks. Even if you don't end up using a specific formula one day, learning more about "the world of numbers" and the properties of mathematical functions can help you understand what you are looking at when handed a task. Advanced math courses are also where you learn about things like formal logic, boolean math, mathematical matrices and other things a programmer might encounter fairly frequently.
Depending on the exact type of programming you do, you might use more or less math every day. Some fields of professional programming use statistics a great deal, in others you might be working with a lot of physics-based math (robotics and industrial systems, for instance, often use various mechanical formulae to do things like make sure they're not being so rough on parts they might break). If you do work in one of those fields you'll probably be able to look up the actual formulae, so memorizing them is less valuable than knowing they're out there and knowing when to reach for which mathematical "tool" so to speak.
And on top of all of that, most universities require a certain measure of math, both for the computer science degree itself and because that degree is part of the college of letters and sciences which has its own department-wide math requirements. If you plan on a CS degree some level of higher math is in your future, AP credits can help bypass some of your grunt-work general requirements. A degree isn't necessarily absolutely required for CS jobs but it will make it easier to go further and raise the limit on how far you can go, as well as start you further along in your career.
If Math isn't easy for you, I wouldn't overly stress going as far as possible, but it's going to help you satisfy degree requirements (my computer engineering program required calculus II and calc-based physics, but that school's computer science program did not go as far) and understand what you are working with on a deeper level to at least be exposed. If you can get as far as statistics you're going to really benefit from it in my opinion.
Updated
Zahid’s Answer
All are good answers here. It really does depend on WHERE in CS do you want to go. Web development? not so much, data scientists or AI then definitely know your math. Here's an example of different kinds of math used in CS:
Binary Math
College Algebra
Statistics
Calculus
Discrete Math
Regardless of which aspect of CS you explore, knowing math to a certain level for all of them is important and good to know. With that said, if you are interested in learning more math that is specific to CS then check out this link:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWKjhJtqVAbndUuYBE5sVViMIvyzp_dB1
Binary Math
College Algebra
Statistics
Calculus
Discrete Math
Regardless of which aspect of CS you explore, knowing math to a certain level for all of them is important and good to know. With that said, if you are interested in learning more math that is specific to CS then check out this link:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWKjhJtqVAbndUuYBE5sVViMIvyzp_dB1
Updated
Jezreel’s Answer
Coming from a background in higher level math and experience with programming languages, no, it’s not entirely true that you need higher level math to program. In the AP sense, at least in college, usually calculus 1 and 2 are required for a computer science degree. Nothing too far beyond that. It does however, help with your problem solving skills and that skill is transferable when programming. For example, when coding, it’s almost like writing instructions from scratch, manually. You need to have the fundamental skills of being able to use what you know as tools to build what’s desired when it comes to programming. I wish you the best!
Updated
Angelo’s Answer
I highly agree with Fred's answer here - in high school most of the math you learn is mainly learning how to calculate things, and later on, you use those "tools" to solve problems or prove things (math can actually be creative work, as much as it is technical!)
To answer your question, the amount of math you'll need really depends on where you want to work. All programming is based off of math like Formal Logic, so taking math courses specifically related to computing (they often have a unit related to real-world applications in computing) will help. But not all math is applicable (e.x., you probably will not use calculus when writing software).
As some practical advice, internships and personal projects can often be worth more than what courses you take. If I were to hire someone, their 90% score in Formal Logic probably wouldn't matter to me as much as another candidate's experience writing software in the real world.
But keep in mind that some fields need specific knowledge - for example, if I were hiring a data scientist I may expect them to know Numerical Computation or Linear Algebra - so if you know where you want to work, make sure you take those related courses (or take them to learn where you want to work)
To answer your question, the amount of math you'll need really depends on where you want to work. All programming is based off of math like Formal Logic, so taking math courses specifically related to computing (they often have a unit related to real-world applications in computing) will help. But not all math is applicable (e.x., you probably will not use calculus when writing software).
As some practical advice, internships and personal projects can often be worth more than what courses you take. If I were to hire someone, their 90% score in Formal Logic probably wouldn't matter to me as much as another candidate's experience writing software in the real world.
But keep in mind that some fields need specific knowledge - for example, if I were hiring a data scientist I may expect them to know Numerical Computation or Linear Algebra - so if you know where you want to work, make sure you take those related courses (or take them to learn where you want to work)
Updated
Samuel’s Answer
As some of the others have stated, it is a bit of both and varies greatly depending on the field.
I'll speak a little bit more into the university aspect of pursuing a degree in Computer Science to eventually have a job applying that degree.
Yes, you should look into taking AP Calculus if you can, as most universities will probably require you to take at least single variable Calculus. How often have I used calculus in college or even as a professional? Almost never. As it is a requirement generally, it is best to get it out of the way if possible.
With regards to some of the other math courses you'll need to take pursuing a job in the Computer Science field, I did have to take some of the following courses (at least from what I can remember):
-Statistics
-Boolean Algebra
-Linear Algebra
-Discrete Mathematics
Often times my professors in college would state that the vast majority of programming does not require a math level above Algebra.
I'll speak a little bit more into the university aspect of pursuing a degree in Computer Science to eventually have a job applying that degree.
Yes, you should look into taking AP Calculus if you can, as most universities will probably require you to take at least single variable Calculus. How often have I used calculus in college or even as a professional? Almost never. As it is a requirement generally, it is best to get it out of the way if possible.
With regards to some of the other math courses you'll need to take pursuing a job in the Computer Science field, I did have to take some of the following courses (at least from what I can remember):
-Statistics
-Boolean Algebra
-Linear Algebra
-Discrete Mathematics
Often times my professors in college would state that the vast majority of programming does not require a math level above Algebra.
Updated
Dave’s Answer
As others have said it really depends on the type of career you'd like and what you're interested in. For context, I did not take the advanced math courses at my university. I pursued a Bachelor of Arts in Computer Science, which meant I only had to take a few math courses to get my degree. It has not hampered my career. As more context, I've worked with brilliant engineers who had no college degree or college degrees in other fields.
Ultimately, if you enjoy programming, but not the math portions there are options for you. I've felt that I could always go back to school to learn the math I skipped if I needed to. I haven't seen a need in my 14 years of being software engineer.
Ultimately, if you enjoy programming, but not the math portions there are options for you. I've felt that I could always go back to school to learn the math I skipped if I needed to. I haven't seen a need in my 14 years of being software engineer.