This is a programming course.
AI is eating programming jobs. The amount of programming being done is the same, maybe more than ever. AI helps people be more efficient, getting more done in the same amount of time. If you want to be a professional programmer, you must learn to use AI in your work.
MIS doesn't make professional programmers, though. Go to computer science for that.
We're about using IT for business. Improving business processes and making better decisions. For us, AI is a good thing, overall. There are risks. AIs get things wrong. They misunderstand tasks. But used well, AI helps MIS people be even more effective.
MIS 3050 is about how software works at a very basic level.
Programs are behind everything computers do.
Take the text you're reading. This webpage doesn't really exist. A program reads the text from a database, puts it in a template with the menus and stuff, and customizes it to you. Shows the exercises you've completed (on the right), a smiley face showing your progress, much else.
The program makes it easier and cheaper for me to make this textbook, and keep it up-to-date. The program serves business goals. That's what MIS is about, and software is behind it all.
You learn how software works by writing programs. Very simple programs in this course. We could use any programming language, but we'll use Python. It's easy to learn (easy is good!), and is widely used for business data crunching. Future MIS courses build on your Python knowledge. So you get a three-fer.
Is it still worth learning how software works, with AI writing more and more code? Nobody knows for sure, but a lot of people think so. If you want, ask an AI "is it still worth knowing programming basics?".
When you're automating business processes with AI, it helps to know what the AI is trying to do. Especially when things go wrong. Dealing with ARGH-IT'S-BROKEN makes you a more valuable employee.
When you're telling an AI to analyze data, it helps to know what sort of mistakes the AI could make. Will it validate your data correctly? Not if you don't know exactly what to tell it, and how to check that it did. Validation is a big topic in this course.
No one knows what MIS work will look like in ten years. However, it's a good bet that knowing how software works will still be useful.