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Arkansas Will Pay Up To $1,000 Cash To Kids Who Pass AP Computer Science A Exam
theodp writes: The State of Arkansas will be handing out cash to high school students who pass an Advanced Placement test in computer science. "The purpose of the incentive program is to increase the number of qualifying scores (3, 4, or 5) on Advanced Placement Computer Science A exams," explained a press release for the Arkansas Advanced Placement Computer Science A Incentive Program (only 87 Arkansas public school students passed the AP CS A exam in 2016, according to College Board data). Gov. Asa Hutchinson added, "The Arkansas Department of Education's incentive for high scores on the AP Computer Science A exam is a terrific way to reward our students for their hard work in school. The real payoff for their hard work, of course, is when they show their excellent transcripts to potential employers who offer good salaries for their skills." The tiered monetary awards call for public school students receiving a top score of 5 on the AP CS A exam to receive $1,000, with another $250 going to their schools. Scores of 4 will earn students $750 and schools $150, while a score of 3 will result in a $250 payday for students and $50 for their schools. The program evokes memories of the College Board's Google-funded AP STEM Access program, which rewarded AP STEM teachers with a $100 DonorsChoose.org gift card for each student who received a 3, 4, or 5 on an AP exam. DonorsChoose.org credits were also offered later by tech-bankrolled Code.org and Google to teachers who got their students coding.
Translation we want our kids to move to California.
you could just fucking pay the teachers to teach and not pass a fucking test.
for both students, and schools. #wcpgw
bring back the jobs and us parents will bring back our kids. End the H1-B program for a start and we'll talk. Until then all my kids are going into medical. Not that they're not trying to bring in cheap labor there too, but the Doctor's Union (aka the AMA, yes, it's a Union) knows better than too allow too much of that crap.
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A thousand dollars is enough money to cover one year of textbooks at a college.
the schools will pushed to cheat to get more funds
Did anyone involved in this from the Arkansas side ever stop to ask the simple question -
Why?
...when the man wants to round up everybody who understands enough about computers to circumvent mechanisms designed to prevent all forms of social change. Good move.
Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
A) Live in Arkansas?
B) Be 18 our younger?
Cuz I could sure use a grand right before the holidaze.
Well, the students in Arkansas who can pass this exam will be well-prepared to proudly train their H1-B replacements in the not too distant future.
We can’t employ the CS professionals we have in the field today. If nothing is done to clamp down on guest worker visas, this effort by Arkansas is nothing more than a waste of taxpayer dollars.
It sounds to me like kids who were already interested in computing are going to pocket the cash, but additional kids who would have been on the fence are unlikely to just show up and pass the exam. Instead, I think research has shown you have to incentivise the work. Like pay kids to turn in their programming homework. Then you will find them all passing the exams with ease.
The plan as stated in TFS would only work on students who knew exactly how to plan for their education and work appropriately toward a goal. They are not ready for that level of management. Most people never are.
Take off every 'sig' !!
If Wisconsin is willing to pay subsidies of $10,000+ per year to employ old factory workers, Arkansas should pony up on the order of $100k each to educate these kids -- whose future and value with such skills is way more than someone who assembles pieces of things on an assembly line.
Cheap tech workers brought here on H1-B visas are massively driving down wages in the tech sector. Yes, they're mostly Indian, but it would be the same thing if they were Chinese, African, or whatever nationality. They're only supposed to be brought here for jobs there are no Americans for, but I've seen numerous companies post adverts for H1-Bs specifically.
Given this trend I discouraged my kid from studying IT and encouraged them to go into medicine. This is a better route for them because the medical industry has a workers advocacy group (The American Medical Association) that functions as a Union and lobbies for policies that help keep their wages high.
Now, if my kid was a natural mathematical genius this wouldn't be an issue. But then my kid wouldn't really be going into IT, it'd really be a Math job that happens to use computers as tools to do the math. But that's a moot point. My kid isn't a math wiz and would have had to work really, really hard to make it in IT. So I encourage my kid to put that effort into something that's going to be more stable and pay better in the long run.
I've never understood why it is that when the rich do things in their economic best interests it's smart business but if the working class do it they're being petty, racists or nationalistic. I mean, I know why it happens (ruling elite own the media and they're pushing an anti-worker, pro-corporate right wing agenda) but I don't know why the working class falls for it so much. My grandpappy knew when he was getting screwed by his boss and he and his Union didn't take that shit.
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being a teacher is fucking hard work. I know teachers and they put in 10-12 hour days. Those lesson plans don't write themselves. Even if your handed one you need to adapt it to the realities of your class. And those papers don't grade themselves. And summers off? Bullshit. The higher up teachers are busy getting more education and certs to try and get a raise so they can keep pace with inflation. The lower tier ones are working jobs over the summer to make ends meet. There's a few bums that take summers off but they're also the kinds of teachers that have high schoolers coloring in maps instead of learning.
Being a real teacher is fucking hard and it pays like shit. Good teachers do it because they like doing it, not because it's easy.
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The main issue is just not many schools offer that course in the South. For example only 60 students in Louisiana received a score of 3 or better. Louisiana has a significantly higher population than Arkansas but is culturally similar.
Here is an example of some of the questions.
The test is based on Java, and you need to know Java fairly well to pass the test. The questions are reasonably challenging. A score of 5 is impressive, and should help a kid get into a good college, and maybe land an internship.
How is knowledge of Java relevant to computer science? Not at all.
Java, specifically, is not necessary for computer science. But a programming language is needed for the course and test, and Java is a reasonable choice.
It's "An Exam" not "A Exam".
It's "An Incentive" not "A Incentive"
I wouldn't really call the test challenging (maybe the course, but I never took it). Sat it in 10th grade, and it was the easiest 5 I ever got. This is coming from someone who doesn't use Java that often and only did one practice test before the actual thing.
You could get your college books with just 1k? What did you study? 1k wouldn't even last a year in CS and statistics.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Posting URLs on /., the cheap way to a DDoS stresstest...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
How is Java, of all languages, a reasonable choice? Is there some kind of problem there isn't some standard class for that you throw the values at to get the results needed without even remotely understanding what you do?
Bubble sort? Throw your array at the relevant class. Binary tree? Inherit the relevant class. Linked list? See binary tree. Vector arithmetic? See java.math documentation (not to understand it but to know what classes and methods to use).
Please present a problem where you could actually see whether a student understood an elementary concept of computer science that cannot be solved in Java by throwing the parameters at some class without even having the foggiest idea what the problem is about, let alone knowing how to solve it yourself.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You're speaking about two different types of paths :
What you mention the US having done right in1950-1980 with math education is creating computer scientist :
student with a strong core knowledge in hard sciences (e.g.: maths, as you mention), that then went on in academics with computer as their main scientific domain.
This is what gives you the big brains behind some of the top computing revolutions.
What the current spreading of resources on as many student as possible, over an entire generation, is trying to do is completely different. The point is not to force them to be the next computer big brains. Let them be doctory, lawyers, mucisian, artists, sportsmen or graduate of vocational schools.
The point is to bring in some basic computing literacy. The idea is that now in 2017, no matter what your actual job is, being able to work with computers is becoming as important as being able to read and write. There is virtually no job where sooner or later you'll have to deal with computers.
Also another important point, that is not currently considered in the US but is very seriously considered in some European countries like France : *media eduction*. Most of said computers that every one will have to deal eventual with, are connected to the internet. From a very young age, the student will be exposed to tons of bullshit, hoaxes, fake news, conspiracy theories, etc. Theaching some critical thinking, and how to react when exposed to information coming online on the computer should also be something as basic as read and writing skills.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
How is Java, of all languages, a reasonable choice?
Why not?
What do you suggest as an alternative?
C++ is too complicated for most high schoolers.
Python does not have explicit types.
Javascript is weakly typed, has a goofy object system, and many design flaws.
Rust is still too niche.
Java is strongly and explicitly typed, has a clean object system, and is widely used, with plenty of demand from employers.
Disclaimer: I haven't used Java in years. I use C++ for projects that are big or need to be fast. I use Perl for one-liners and small throw-away scripts. I use Python for larger scripts. I use JavaScript for web programming. But none of these are right for college bound CS students.
If you're an IT worker living in a good neighborhood with good property values (read: your schools are fully funded by property tax) then yeah, some of this might not be true. Your kid's Teachers have assistants to grade papers. Their class sizes are under 30 and like one of the thread parents said they'll get paid to get certs (meaning they can do them in the summer instead of working to make ends meet).
That's maybe 20% of districts if I'm being really, really fucking charitable. The rest are everything I described above and more.
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Just because some people are worse off doesn't make their lot in life any better. The fact that teachers make more than the median (this is what you mean) family income show just how bad things have gotten for the working class.
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Again, I think you didn't follow my point above.
That's two entirely different phenomenons.
Trying to put expensive computers in front on generations of very average students.
Did the UK become a computing exporting super power?
The average students who wanted "computers" enjoyed using and supporting brands like Apple, Intel, Microsoft, Cyrix and the later more powerful console games.
Putting computers in front of a generation of students won't suddenly make a country a "computing exporting super power".
On the other hand, putting computers in front of a generation of students will make them more comfortable to *use* computers.
To take your preceding post's example : if one of those student decides to become a musician, he's more likely to use software to do their edits in a garage band as opposed to needing to go to a more professional studio, more likely to leverage online platforms and apps for distribution rather needing to sign with a label, etc.
That student won't be designing the Apple laptop, the Cubase software, the Spotify ecosystem. But he'll be more likely to leverage them in his artistic career.
All that effort and educational funding, projections of UK production lines exporting to the world resulted in US imports. US products and service and hardware from very low cost nations.
...which is a completely different problem.
You raised a generation of average student who know that computer are useful.
That the UK wasn't able to provide them with what hardware/software they needed is due to the *other* career, the "Computer Scientist" career.
(And by the way, it is false. UK did produce computer-careers in the late 80s and 90s, as can be attested by small software companies and a few not-small-at-all and rather successful companies : game companies such as Bitmap Brothers, Psygnosis, Bullfrog, etc.
But again those have nothing to do with "put a computer in front of every one" policies)
Computing literacy now needs math.
"Computer literacy" and "maths" are two different things, and that's the whole point I'm trying to make.
To take a book metaphor :
- You're confusing all the engineers and artisans that developed and built presses since the original by Gutemberg, with the need for the general population to be able to read and write.
They help each other (a population that can read and write makes a public to target with printed media. And easier access to printed media makes it much simpler to have material on which to learn to read and write, as opposed to back when it needed to be painstakingly manually copied by monks), but they are two distinct things.
Or to make a much-loved by /. *car* analogy :
- You're confusing "holding a drivers' license" and "building the actual car".
General population needs to be able to drive in order to be part of a mobile society (though it's a lot less important on our side of the Atlantic pond with big cities and good public transportation, as opposed to the widely spread structure that the US is seeing. But still, being mobile in the modern world helps. Even if you don't own the car but use a shared car).
And engineers and other scientists, and designers, and manufacturing jobs are important to produce the cars.
Your rant would be like complaining that generations of average people having easy access to a drivers' license (even if yours happens to be on the wrong side of the road :-D ) didn't make Bentley, Rolls-Royce, Mini, Asron-Martin, Jaguar, the world dominant exporters, and only increased the import of current car-king nations (US, DE, etc.)
Nope, it's two things.
Same here: putting kids in front of a computer is one thing (general computer litteracy)
spending resource to train an elite of scientists is another (computer scientist careers).
The later will build the computer and the software that the former will use in t
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Government paid you to study.
55 roubles per month if you are A and B student in college. 72 roubles per month if straight A student.
At that time the salary of a junior stuff acientist was 120 roubles per month.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.