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I don't know about your course in particular, but the "look how badly current students fail old exams" technique is deeply flawed. When a course is changed it almost always adds some parts while removing others.
If the previous version covered points ABCD but the new course is now ADEF then it's only natural that today's students would be confused by points B and C. It's not a fair comparison unless you also consider how well the original group would have done on E and F.
Right, that's fair, but it has been long enough since I took those courses for me that I can also look at present ones (including ones that I didn't teach or practice in the meantime) and convince myself that I find them easier than the ones I took 10-15 years ago.
There might be some sources of error in that comparison. Hopefully 10-15 years of practical experience makes many of the types of questions you'd see simpler to solve. It's like trying to remember the mental/emotional state of not understanding the solution to a puzzle that seems obvious/straightforward in hindsight. I'd still agree things are probably simpler. In my own academic career I had the misfortune to having to take two versions of a foundational course; the first time as a non-program student taking it as a prereq to continue taking interesting higher level courses as electives, the second time several years later as a program student to meet degree requirements. The first was a notorious weed-out course, while the second one was significantly less difficult although more practically applicable for modern software.
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