White House Silence Seems To Confirm $4 Billion 'Computer Science For All' K-12 Initiative Is No More

theodp writes: "2016 as a year of action builds on a decade of national, state, and grassroots activity to revitalize K-12 computer science education," reads the upbeat White House blog post kicking off Computer Science Education Week. But conspicuous by its absence in the accompanying fact sheet for A Year of Action Supporting Computer Science for All is any mention of the status of President Obama's proposed $4 billion Computer Science For All initiative, which enjoyed support from the likes of Microsoft, Facebook, and Google. On Friday, tech-backed Code.org posted An Update on Computer Science Education and Federal Funding, which explained that Congress's passage of a 'continuing resolution' extending the current budget into 2017 spelled curtains for federal funding for the program in 2016 and beyond. "We don't have any direct feedback yet about the next administration's support for K-12 CS," wrote CEO Hadi Partovi and Govt. Affairs VP Cameron Wilson, "other than a promise to expand 'vocational and technical education' as part of Trump's 100-day plan which was published in late October. I am hopeful that this language may translate into support for funding K-12 computer science at a federal level. However, we should assume that it will not."

Comments

Re:Provide this at the state level

[arth1]

These sorts of programs should not be Federal.

Now I'd like to hear some logic behind that claim.

I can only see detriments. When states pick, the result will differ between them. That leads to unequal opportunities depending on where you were born, and as many gaps between haves and have-nots that divide further as gaps that close. Or more, because there seems to be a strong correlation between the overall poverty of a state and how reluctant it is to support science.

Now if there were evolution for states, I'd be all for it. Every year, force a random poor state to dissolve and be amalgamated with its neighbors, and a random rich state to split in two. Then, doing the right thing would be rewarded by survival over time.
But alas, the competition isn't between the states, which survive no matter what, but between humans, who too often lose because of their state not giving them as good opportunities as other states.