The Fund for the Advancement of the State System of Higher Education Inc., working with International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), has established the COBOL College to help train programmers to address the looming “Year 2000 Problem.”

The COBOL College will offer a standardized non-credit program designed by IBM to be delivered in an intensive, two-week format. Participants in the program will take four entry-level courses designed for people with no previous COBOL experience.

Topics and materials have been especially designed to prepare employees to work with applications for the year 2000. It is feared that many computers will “shut down” and important data will be lost on Jan. 1, 2000, because computers won’t recognize the date. The computers must be reprogrammed to avoid the potential serious problems that could result.

Industry estimates indicate a need for more than 900,000 new programmers nationwide, including as many as 50,000 in Pennsylvania, who know the fundamentals of COBOL and understand the principles of code correction and modification.

The COBOL programming courses will be offered initially at the Dixon University Center of the State System of Higher Education. Eventually, they also could be made available at each of the 14 State System universities.

The first session of the COBOL College will be offered June 15-26, with a maximum number of 22 participants being enrolled. Additional sessions will be scheduled as needed. The courses to be offered will be programming fundamentals, COBOL programming, COBOL editor and COBOL in the year 2000.

A nationally recognized examination will be administered at the end of the program, and a certificate of completion will be awarded.

The cost of the program will be $3,200, including all fees and materials.