Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

New AP Course, "Computer Science Principles," Aims To Make CS More Accessible

Posted by Soulskill on from the broadening-the-base dept.

theodp writes: "CS Principles," explains the intro to a Microsoft Research talk on a new Computer Science Toolkit and Gaming Course, "is a new AP course being piloted across the country and by making it more accessible to students we can help increase diversity in computing." Towards this end, Microsoft has developed "a middle school computing toolkit, and a high school CS Principles & Games course." These two projects were "developed specifically for girls," explains Microsoft, and are part of the corporation's Big Dream Movement for girls, which is partnering with the UN, White House, NSF, EU Commission, and others. One of Microsoft's particular goals is to "reach every individual girl in her house." According to a document on its website, Microsoft Research's other plans for Bridging the Gender Gap in computing include a partnership with the University of Wisconsin "to create a girls-only computer science Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)."

15 of 208 comments (clear)

  1. Confused. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Isn't this the same crowd that says there ARE no differences between boys and girls and therefore girls should be in represented equally in STEM careers?

    Yet the way they intended to remedy the imbalance is to create curriculum specifically for girls, who are no different than boys.

    1. Re:Confused. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Isn't this the same crowd that says there ARE no differences between boys and girls and therefore girls should be in represented equally in STEM careers?

      Yet the way they intended to remedy the imbalance is to create curriculum specifically for girls, who are no different than boys.

      No, that only applies to sports. See, girls are dumb when it comes to computers so they need to be nurtured, like a flower. Next companies will have to have girls only IT sections with pink keyboards and ponies, you know, to keep them interested because girls don't like IT or business.

      I cannot believe this crap. Computer programming isn't so hard that you have to start learning in middle school. Just stop the social engineering and let kids be kids until they graduate high school. If it were up to me, kids wouldn't touch a computer until high school. What do you really need a computer for that wasn't achieved by teacher and books? Hell half of them don't know how to read. Let's concentrate on that.

    2. Re:Confused. by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 5, Insightful

      there ARE no differences between boys and girls

      If anyone is saying that, they are clearly idiots. The internet has copious data regarding the differences between boys and girls. Even after eliminating the porn sites, you end up with various physiological and psychological differences. We're very different in general, the extent to which and whether it's nature or nurture will no doubt rage on for the rest of our lives. There is absolutely no reason to think men and women are the same...

      The question of equality is where they are asserting men and women can perform the same. Until evidence exists to the contrary, we have to assume this is true. This is not to say that men and women will do the same things to establish this equality, or will acquire knowledge or even perform the function identically. Only that in the end they will produce the same results.

      to create curriculum specifically for girls, who are no different than boys

      Accepting the above, which I believe with conviction, this then falls apart. However, where I would direct my nerd rage is at the conclusion that lead to creating a gender specific curriculum as a solution. It must have been something like "CS education as it exists is incompatible with female psychology; a CS education program which can target both genders is impossible, ergo we need to fork a new curriculum". I can't imagine the kind of data that existed to justify this. If it did exist, it seems like a likely assumption than the genders will probably require dedicated education on other topics as well, and maybe we should go back to having boys and girls schools across the board.

      Personally I think the problem is entirely social and cultural, and we're wasting our time with this stuff.

    3. Re:Confused. by LordLimecat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why is the assumption made that it is a problem that women are underrepresented in CS? Are we specifically assuming that we are getting sub-standard cs majors because of that gap? Or are we making the fantastic leap of assuming that there are scores of women wanting to break into CS, but are held back by various factors?

    4. Re:Confused. by LordLimecat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The question of equality is where they are asserting men and women can perform the same. Until evidence exists to the contrary, we have to assume this is true.

      I would say the copious evidence that women seem to prefer some jobs, and not prefer others-- like comp sci and IT jobs-- and the general lack (so far as I am aware) of any particular barriers in those areas indicates that there are natural tendencies. Im really not convinced that such a natural tendency is a "problem" that needs to be fixed; if you can show instances of discrimination or barriers to women in the CS field, lets remove those-- but I dont see why we need to attempt to force the gender ratio to be 50:50 in CS because that is wholly unrealistic. Only someone living in an ivory tower could think that women are equally likely to enter computer fields to men, just like only someone living in an ivory tower could think that men and women have the exact same set of skills (statistically).

    5. Re:Confused. by h4ck7h3p14n37 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why is the assumption made that it is a problem that women are underrepresented in CS?

      Because there's money to be made and control to be gained by solving a made up problem?

  2. bummer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I wish my sons had access to such things. They have the interest but these classes tend to be awfully expensive, plus I no longer have "open" computers they can play with (tablets are great at what most people spend time with, but they are also limiting).

    1. Re:bummer by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It sucks that your sons don't have access to these educational resources (although if they are interested a Raspberry Pi is really cheap and well supported), but never the less it sucks more for girls. This sort of thing is trying to address a specific problem, which doesn't lessen yours but doesn't increase it either.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    2. Re:bummer by LordLimecat · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Can you clarify what the specific problem is? Im not aware of mobs of girls clamoring to enter CS who are being prevented. What im seeing is an addiction to political correctness and an outrage that in reality women tend not to enter computer fields as much.

  3. Computer careers and gender by TWX · · Score: 3, Insightful

    A lot of the boys that become interested in computers also have problems relating to other people, epecially to girls their own ages. Given that they probably also don't have 'the right stuff' from the perspectives of a lot of the girls around them, they might become slightly embittered towards girls due to a lack of relationship success with them, and when these boys are grouped together, as it is cheaper to educate several students at once, the environment is generally hostile towards girls, so those girls that are actually intersted in computers are driven away both by their notions of the boys and by the boys own actions.

    Unless you can find a way to break this cycle, I don't see anything else working as much more than a band-aid to the problem.

    I'm actually in favor of gender-segregated junior high. Give the kids a chance to learn how to deal with their new hormones when there's not really much option to showboat for the other gender.

    --
    Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    1. Re:Computer careers and gender by TWX · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Experience has taught me that capability and knowledge takes a back-seat to being liked by the people making the personnel decisions. Drinking buddies, flirts, camping cliques, fellow sports fans, all move up faster than those that have the best technical knowledge.

      --
      Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    2. Re:Computer careers and gender by MyNicknameSucks · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Experience has taught me that capability and knowledge takes a back-seat to being liked by the people making the personnel decisions. Drinking buddies, flirts, camping cliques, fellow sports fans, all move up faster than those that have the best technical knowledge.

      At the risk of being labelled "Troll", maybe that's not so bad. The folks with social skills move on to positions that require unscripted social interactions, the folks who are really good at the technical aspects of the job keep on doing their own thing.

  4. Plessy by Himmy32 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I am all for making any form of education more accessible to any group. But Separate but Equal seems short sighted. What's old is now new....

  5. *facepalm* by Gestahl · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So... when you *specifically* want to create a class *for girls*, your though is "Hey, let's take out the hard parts, and make it more of a course about all the stuff *around* the actual hard part". You just basically told girls "don't worry yourself about the really hard parts. This is what *you* need to know." Are you sure you don't just want to make it a typing class instead?

    Fuck that noise.

  6. Hmmm ... by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So, why all of a sudden are we taking input from Microsoft and Google on the education system?

    These are companies, with their own agendas, and who only see the world through their own myopic view of making money with technology.

    In what way do we consider either Google or Microsoft to be qualified to be involved in education?

    The same clowns who are driving usage of foreign workers are suddenly going to cure the world by making sure more girls know how to code? Why, so they can not get hired because they expect a higher wage than someone in Mumbai?

    Sorry, but taken as a whole, Microsoft is doing as much to undermine the point of getting an education in CS .. because they're actively part of the bits of using H1Bs, colluding to keep wages down, and making it more difficult for workers to be mobile.

    So you'll excuse me if I see this as little more than some self serving PR.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.