Not many years later, the curriculum required use of a personal computer. Makes sense, since that's the tool of choice. One thing about working with slide rule, the "order of magnitude" has to be kept someplace other than on the "calculator," and one developed a sense of order of magnitude of many attributes.
I like the idea of not being allowed calculators for freshman year. And the slide rule magnitude too. All that lets you learn to be intuitive to whether an answer is right or not.
You’d be appalled by what’s happening in our high schools these days. Students have to use fancy graphing calculators - and spend a large percentage of their time just learning the calculator. Less time is spent on the actual math or physics now because of that. Many students have no clue what the outcome of an equation is for, for example the quadratic formula, and all they care about is how to plug in A, B, and C because of this shift in priorities.
No wonder we are at the bottom of the international math and science tests!