This should make CIOs and HR professionals in our industry shudder: The population of potential IT workers is shrinking before our very eyes.

By virtually every measure, the number of young people interested in computer science is growing smaller: There are fewer college students declaring it as a major, fewer high school students taking Advanced Placement courses, and fewer teachers able or willing to impart anything beyond basic word processing skills.

All this in the generation that learned to utter the word "computer" right after "mom" and "dad"--and sometimes before. These kids grew up knowing how to program VCRs and cell-phones, they play amazingly sophisticated computer games, and they keep in touch with their friends via Instant Messenger, complete with its own language and social mores. I don’t believe it's overly dramatic to say that computers and technology figure in virtually every aspect of their lives, whether they know it or not.

The lack of interest isn't due to an extreme shortage of jobs in the field. Economy notwithstanding, programmers and networking experts continue to be among the most sought-after of all knowledge workers, and that trend is expected to continue for quite some time.

So, what's happening here? I think the problem has many aspects, some longstanding and some of more recent vintage. At the moment, we're facing a shrinking number of women in the IT field. This involves a longstanding issue of trying to keep girls interested in science beyond junior high (also called middle school). At around the age of 12 or 13, most studies agree, many girls "drop out" of science and math for a myriad of social reasons, unless they have a solid role model and/or have been encouraged to keep their interest alive by a favorite teacher.

But there are even bigger issues, too. IT is losing its "cool" rep among workers both young and old. For those with experience, there are just too many late nights, weekends, and 2 a.m. beepers--and too few benefits. Sure, most IT people make much more than a decent salary, especially when compared to the workforce as a whole, and they're not (usually) complaining about that. But money's only part of the equation; ITers are dealing with competing problems for multiple users (all of them equally critical), the inability to take the vacation and/or comp time they've accrued because of the aforementioned critical problems, and fewer corporate dollars for training and new technology.

It's the exploding-head syndrome of too many things going on at once and an inability to focus and fix the things they really need to. (And to keep learning along the way because, after all, most ITers join the party because they love the tech.) And so to many established IT pros, it's become just another job and not something they actually look forward to getting up and doing every day like they used to.

Meanwhile, many young IT workers are becoming disillusioned before they really start. In the words of another recent story, many young workers see IT jobs as "monotonous, uncreative, and easily farmed out--the equivalent of 1980s manufacturing jobs." Gartner predicts as many as 15 percent of IT workers will drop out of the profession by 2010.

And so it seems that the notion of computer jobs, once so exciting, has become just another way to earn a living. It's not terrible, but it's not necessarily great and/or joyful, either.

And now the question: what, if anything, can be done? Or are things just too broken to fix? Please add your thoughts; there might be some great ideas for how to rejuvenate a once thriving career field.