That’s right. I was rummaging through old schoolwork my grandparents sent to me last week, and I found this gem about my childhood cat Dude. Apparently this was my submission to the 1994 Oregon Statewide Assessment Program given to me when I was in the third grade. And I NAILED it! Well, I got 3′s and 4′s on a five point scale, and one reader had the gall to give me a 2… If I knew who that was!

But here it is for your enjoyment. Also attached is the cat in question. (Best cat in the world, that’s right.)

Complete personal plug, I must admit, but a recent interview with Rob Sabourin and I just made it to the web! Check it out:

http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/software-quality/cast-2009-test-gurus-sabourin-coulter-preview-keynotes/

The author and interviewer was Mike Kelly, a director for the Association for Software Testing and a “sometimes independent testing consultant” working from the midwest. He interviewed Rob and I about our upcoming speech titled, “Tim Bits: What I Learned About Software Testing at CAST 2009,″ which will likely be the most exciting thing for me since that time I went skydiving. I can’t wait for the speech — and in fact, the whole conference! — and I look forward to seeing you all there.

A friend sparked me onto this article, and it’s topic is what I’ve been saying colloquially since college though the author says it profoundly better.

The conclusion: Software Engineering is very different than Computer Science, and it involves a human component not found in the ideas of traditional computer science programs (e.g., algorithms, compilers, etc.). It’s a beautiful read, and well worth checking out:

http://www.ddj.com/architect/217701907

PS: The struggle between choosing Rensselaer Polytechnic or Florida Tech for my college career came down to Florida Tech offering a Software Engineering program where Rensselaer Polytechnic didn’t. Though I couldn’t articulate it then, it had already seemed as if there was a fundamental difference between the two disciplines.