Abstract
Seven years ago (2016), we began integrating Robotics into our Com- puter Science curriculum. This paper explores the mission, initial goals and ob- jectives, specific choices we made along the way, and why and outcomes. Of course, we were not the first to do so. Our contribution in this paper is to describe a seven-year experience in the hope that others going down this road will benefit, perhaps avoiding some missteps and dead-ends. We offer our answers to many questions that anyone undertaking bootstrapping a new robotics program may have to deal with. At the end of the paper, we discuss a set of lessons learned, including striking the right balance between depth and breadth in syllabus design and material organization, the significance of utilizing physical robots and crite- ria for selecting a suitable robotics platform, insights into the scope and design of a robotics lab, the necessity of standardizing hardware and software configu- rations, along with implementation methods, and strategies for preparing students for the steep learning curve.