Informatics and military student training.

New objectives in the area of basic information training arise before higher educational establishments run by the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation as they go over to new training curricula and programs designed to meet state educational standard requirements. The same process is laying down the foundations of so-called information culture which future Armed Forces specialists are expected to possess.

The reason is that servicemen in practically every specialty have to draw information from all possible information flows, to process it, to translate from one type to another, to accept the necessary decisions on the basis of information obtained and to put them into practice, while all the time keeping an eye on new incoming data.

The information flow tends to mount and double in amount every few years, a circumstance that in a number of cases makes a broad use of computer technology crucial where most different tasks are concerned. This is why one ought to recognize as profoundly justified that students should be given knowledge and skills in wielding state-of-the-art computer technology, an assignment aimed to improve education.

This assignment is seen as the most complicated and important one, since the majority of RF AF specialists are as yet insufficiently prepared, both professionally and psychologically, for working in an information environment. The science of informatics is what should lay down the foundation of information culture for future specialists. Its study starts at school and continues at higher educational establishments, where it becomes more purpose-oriented in character. However, a course in informatics should not only convey to students utilitarian knowledge on how to use modern computer technology and on its future prospects, as well as skills helping to wield it competently in dealing with most different military applied problems, but also teach them to operate different categories of information in many spheres of general scientific investigations.

But, as we see it, introduction of disciplines that are directly based on the use of computer technology in military university curricula should not be necessarily accompanied solely by the creation of computer classes and wholesale instruction in programming. As is to be regretted, it is this form of instruction in informatics that prevails so far. Once introduced in the teaching process, the computer requires that teaching technology be changed in practically all disciplines which are taught not only by separate departments but also universities as a whole. The educational process has to be organized in a new way, and that in turn poses these crucial questions. What educational program should be like? What kind of textbooks should we have under these circumstances? What knowledge and skills do teachers have a duty to possess?

For all the importance of programming in many specialties, it is hardly correct to substitute instruction in certain programming basics and computer-handling skills for instruction in informatics as a fundamental science. We must keep it in mind that the bulk of secondary school leavers and university graduates will handle computers only as nonprofessional users, if at all (like computer operators selling rail or air tickets, or the like). Thus, it is as wrong to teach programming to all military university students as it is, for example, to have them learn editing or book-printing for the sole reason that they will not only read books but also work with books. It should also be kept in mind that the trends in computer technology are toward facilitation of PC use, and that will inevitably depreciate many skills currently learned by students.

In our view, the aim in teaching informatics is not only to convey to all students the basic notions ("information," "algorithm," "computer") and computer handling skills but also to teach them to competently work with different information media in different spheres where information is generated and handled.

For example, the aim in teaching informatics to would-be RF AF Rear Services specialists is likely to be the following: to have students acquire theoretical knowledge and practical skills to enable their efficient use of computer technology in the educational process and in the interests of rear services C & C elements in accordance with their service function.

Following theoretical and practical training in the discipline, a student should:

* first, have some idea about the main objectives pursued by the informatization of the rear services at tactical and operational levels; about types of information processes in divisions of the rear services (storage, communication and handling of information); about the role of informatics in scientific research; about the main trends in and the role of new information technologies; about artificial intellect problems and knowledge presentation and manipulation methods;

* second, know the notion of information and forms of its presentation in the rear services; the general design, capacities, operational principles and procedure for using computer technology in one's specialty; the basics of algorithmization and programming of military rear services problems; main standard programs and applied packages (for food and clothing services) to address problems on a computer and the procedure for handling them; computerized methods to prepare solutions to military rear services problems; basics of mathematical, software and information support for automated rear services control systems;

* third, have command of a methodology to describe military rear services problems and their computerized solutions; a methodology to set problems to be addressed in the interests of the food (clothing) service chief in order to later make a computer program for the purpose; techniques for analyzing and estimating results of computerized handling of problems;

* fourth, have practical computer-handling skills in one's specialty; skills in developing mathematical descriptions of service problems and in making algorithms to solve them; skills in compiling in one or two algorithmic languages simple programs in one's specialty and in preparing them for computerized execution; skills in streamlining existing programs and obtaining experimental solutions to problems; computerization of military rear services problems and calculations on the basis of programs developed either independently or with the use of available software.

Analyzing the relationships between the informatics course and other educational disciplines taught by the higher educational establishments of the RF MOD is a substantial problem in its own right. The relationship with such disciplines as higher mathematics, study of control systems and others cannot be only limited to compilation of programs to address separate problems or cycles of problems with the help of a computer. As we see it, an overhaul is needed of all courses in the educational disciplines taught by MOD higher educational establishments to achieve real interconnection.

Lt. Col. Yu. V. DERGUNOV

Col. I.V. KASPAROV

Candidate of Technical Sciences

Lt. Col. E.A. CHASOVSKIKH (Res.)