CS Department announces course cancellations, changes for next academic year

In an email to concentrators last month, the Department of Computer Science announced cancellations and changes to course offerings for the next academic year.

Thirteen computer science courses have either been canceled or are at risk of being canceled for the 2025-26 year. The cancellations mean that this semester is the last chance for junior CS students to take any of the courses that will no longer be offered. The department has not announced immediate replacements for some of the canceled courses.

Other courses will now be taught every semester, or in a different semester next year than originally planned, according to the department website. The website also lists two new courses that will be offered next year.

In an email to The Herald, Kathi Fisler, co-director of the department’s undergraduate program, attributed the changes in part to faculty members being on “sabbatical or other forms of leave.”

“There’s nothing unusual about this,” she added. 

As the department hires more faculty, the course offerings are subject to change, Fisler wrote. Offerings will be finalized by fall semester pre-registration, which will take place in April.

Last year, the department eliminated the pathway requirement for the undergraduate concentration, a change that Fisler believes gives concentrators increased flexibility to select their upper-level courses. “We expect most students will be able to find courses that suit their needs” despite the changes to next year’s course offerings, Fisler wrote.

Some of the courses no longer offered next year include popular 1000-level technical courses, such as CSCI 1670: “Operating Systems.” CSCI 1670, an uncapped course, has typically been taught every spring by Tom Doeppner, vice chair of the department. This semester, 109 students are enrolled in the course, according to Courses@Brown. 

But Doeppner told The Herald that he will not be teaching at the University next year. According to the department website, the next time CSCI 1670 will be taught is in fall 2026.

Doeppner stated that all students who wished to take CSCI 1670 this semester were able to register for it. But some of the other canceled courses were capped, resulting in waitlists of students who were unable to take them this semester. Now, these students may need to wait until fall 2026 to register for these courses.

“There were still students on the waitlists for certain courses, but that’s always true, whether or not the courses will be offered the following year,” Fisler wrote.

CSCI 0112: “Computing Foundations: Program Organization” — the second course in a two-part introductory sequence — is being discontinued due to low enrollment. Last semester, only eight students were enrolled in CSCI 0112, according to Courses@Brown. 

In the past, students interested in computer science could take CSCI 0111: “Computing Foundations: Data,” followed by CSCI 0112. After completing CSCI 0112, students could then register for CSCI 0200: “Program Design with Data Structures and Algorithms.” But students looking to progress faster could instead complete bridgework assignments to skip CSCI 0112. 

Although CSCI 0112 is discontinued starting next fall, the bridgework option will still be available for students hoping to progress from CSCI 0111 to CSCI 0200.

The cancellations were “unfortunate,” wrote computer science student Nitin Sudarsanam ’28. 

Next year, Sudarsanam hoped to take CSCI 1460: “Computational Linguistics” and CSCI 1951A: “Data Science” — two courses that will no longer be offered next year due to faculty sabbatical and discontinuation, respectively.