I attended a conference once several years ago where Alexander Stepanov - father of the C++ STL - spoke on math and CS. He recomended a personal indepth study of algebra and geometry, not because they were particularly related to computer science, but because the teach (resp) problem solving skills and architecture. I suspect the basic rationale behind requiring advanced math for a university degree in any field of science is to enhance your thinking muscles. Rather than fight against it because you don't understand the reasons why, try to embrace it and get more than you paid for from your education. Hire a part time tutor to help you understand the ellusive concepts. You can never learn too much in this life.

Too bad we can't get the USPTO to use the software development community for open peer review of patent applications before they're granted. The field is too complicated for a handful of people to make all the decisions anyway. We'd get the sort of results we get from IETF or other standards organizations then.

No one "knows how to program" when they graduate. Go get a job with IBM, HP, Sun, Novell or one of the other larger world-wide companies. They actively seek out new graduates. They fully understand that these graduates don't have a clue about writing proper code. They hire them as an investment. Both sides win. The new graduate gets a real education, with a reasonable ramp-up (in terms of months to years), and the company gets some employee loyalty (hopefully). I've been in the industry for 20 years. After 20 years, I know something about writing software. In retrospect, I knew NOTHING about writing software when I graduated.