Yet another businessman who thinks that the goal of academia is to churn out app developers. It's not.
The goal of academic science is to advance research, in this case on fields such as machine learning, computer vision, image processing, pattern recognition, data mining, natural language processing, cryptography, quantum computation, signal processing, artificial intelligence, information theory, network/graph theory, optimization algorithms and so on.
If you just want to code and make apps and you're not interested on applied mathematics, algorithms and research then I would argue computer science is not for you, but maybe in the US the curriculum is different?
The problem is that even if you understand those concepts well, you're not necessarily able to apply them after most programs. If your startup is in the business of crating new algorithms to solve various problems, that's one thing, but what most want is someone who knows what existing algorithm should be used to solve a problem in the best (or at least an acceptable) way, and do so in a manner that's both expandable and maintainable. Ideally, they're looking for a craftsman, not a scientist. These roles can occasionally be found in the same person, but it's extremely rare in my experience.
You are 100% right, but that's not an issue with academic departments, as the article suggest, that's a feature. Academic research and science are one thing and developing apps is another, very distinct profession.
I'm finishing a PhD in aerospace engineering, but that doesn't mean I'm any good at welding 7075 aluminium in an aircraft shop, nor is this an issue with my department.
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The goal of academic science is to advance research, in this case on fields such as machine learning, computer vision, image processing, pattern recognition, data mining, natural language processing, cryptography, quantum computation, signal processing, artificial intelligence, information theory, network/graph theory, optimization algorithms and so on.
If you just want to code and make apps and you're not interested on applied mathematics, algorithms and research then I would argue computer science is not for you, but maybe in the US the curriculum is different?
I'm finishing a PhD in aerospace engineering, but that doesn't mean I'm any good at welding 7075 aluminium in an aircraft shop, nor is this an issue with my department.