What would happen if a typical computer programming course were submitted for peer review by a research journal? Using a format inspired by typical peer reviews, issues relating to rigor, relevance and course design are raised. In these fictional reviews, weaknesses of the traditional “lecture and test” approach to teaching are identified in all three areas and it is argued that such weaknesses may be inherent to that design—particularly in teaching skill based courses. An alternative approach, whose inspiration is the techniques employed in U.S. submarine qualification, is the proposed and some initial results of teaching such a course are presented.