I also think there's a lot of people who feel protective about "pure" computer science, in the same way a philosophy major might feel about their degree, and look down on people like me as mere technicians. They don't seem to realize that we need technicians, and they have to be trained somehow.
Ah, yeah, this totally comes down to the age-old (or at least, decades-old) debate about what universities should be for: higher education or job training? The "job training" forces seem to be starting to win most of the mindshare, which I think is a bit of a shame, but c'est la vie.
Personally, I think splitting the two roles into different kinds of institutions with different goals makes a lot of sense, and we already have this with universities vs. trade schools and community colleges, but (unfortunately, IMO) employers have consistently shown that they prefer to hire people from places that at least make a show of being more of the "higher education" persuasion than the "job training" persuasion. Sooo, yeah, you're probably right that in the current world, universities should just do a better job of teaching job skills.
