MY CASS TECH EXPERIENCE by Jerry Augustine

I began teaching mathematics at Cass Tech in January 1965. I had taught for several years at other schools prior and was also employed for a time at the General Motors Tech Center. I was hired at the tech center to help develop programs for converting automotive design, drafting, and manufacturing from manual methods to computer-oriented systems. That is where I learned computer programming. I was exposed to several languages that were in use at the time, FORTRAN being the primary one used in engineering applications.

In the fall of 1964, while enrolled in a Master's degree program at Wayne State University, I met Dr. Fred Shippert, one of the assistant superintendents in charge of mathematics for Detroit Public Schools. Upon learning of my background in computers, he asked me to write an outline of what I thought would be an appropriate introduction to computers. Of course, I agreed. He wanted to have a course designed that could be taught at Cass Tech in the Math Department. The school had recently been fortunate to be the first high school in Michigan to have an IBM computer installed on site. After reviewing my outline, he asked me if I would be willing to come to Cass to develop and teach a course in computers for the Math Department.

The following summer, I was accepted into an 8-week program at the State University of New York, under the direction of the National Science Foundation, where I gained valuable knowledge relating to the teaching of Computer Science. That, along with my professional background, provided an excellent foundation for the course I developed and taught for the next 15 years, which began in the fall of 1965. At that time, the course was only open to seniors, and during those years, I had the pleasure and honor to have some of the best and brightest students enroll in that class, some of whom went on to careers in the computer field. When personal computers came into use, computer programming was no longer a focus, my course was eliminated, and the mainframe computer was removed from the school. From that point on, I remained in the math department until I retired in 1986. Teaching at Cass Tech was an honor and I was very fortunate to have spent the majority of my teaching career there, one of the premier high schools in the country.