AI changing the calculus for Canadian students interested in comp sci
Artificial intelligence is influencing Canadian high school students to reconsider traditional computer science degrees in favor of foundational fields like mathematics. Applications to undergraduate computer and information systems programs in Ontario have dropped by 44 percent from their 2023 peak. This decline reflects a broader global trend where students fear that AI will automate entry-level coding roles, making specialized technical skills less valuable than general problem-solving abilities.
- ▪Applications to computer and information systems programs in Ontario fell to 45,260, a 44 percent decrease from the 2023 high of over 80,000.
- ▪Student Mahimn Patel, who graduated with a 97 average, chose to study applied mathematics at the University of Toronto instead of computer science to develop stronger creative and rigorous thinking skills.
- ▪Approximately 2,500 fewer students accepted offers for undergraduate computer science degrees in Ontario this fall compared to two years ago.
- ▪University officials note that the decline in CS applications is a global phenomenon driven by concerns that AI can perform many junior software engineering tasks.
- ▪Major technology companies including Meta, Google, and Amazon have laid off tens of thousands of employees, further impacting the perceived job market for new graduates.
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| Original publisher | The Globe and Mail |
| Canonical URL | https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-ai-computer-science-students-and-schools-that-hope-to-teach-them/ |
| Publication time | Sat, 12 Sep 2026 11:59:43 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-09-12T12:12:50.861Z |
| Last seen | 2026-09-12T12:12:50.861Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | if5zJeopb0eg · 1 stories |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
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| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
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Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Just a few years ago, applying to a prestigious university computer science program might have been a no-brainer for a student like Mahimn Patel.Mr. Patel, 18, built software for fun in high school, including an app that helped his classmates track their volunteer hours, and an artificial intelligence agent for realtors in Texas. During a recent video interview, he had multiple AI agents running in the background debugging his latest hobby horse, an AI-enabled app for stock trading. Getting into computer science, a notoriously competitive program at top Canadian schools, wouldn’t have been a problem for Mr. Patel. He graduated from Central Peel Secondary School in Brampton, Ont., in June with a 97 average. But Mr. Patel decided not to apply for a computer science program.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at The Globe and Mail.
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