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Code.org Is Crowdsourcing Database of US K-12 Schools That Teach, Or Don't Teach CS
Longtime reader theodp writes: Nonprofit Code.org, which is bankrolled by the likes of Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon, Google, and Infosys, has teamed up with the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) and is "calling on all educators and parents" to "help us build a database of all schools that teach (or don't teach) computer science" (via direct responses and email advocacy tools). Called the K-12 Computer Science Access Report, Code.org says "the database will be a resource that everyone in the CS community can use." For what purposes, however, is not entirely clear, although the Code.org Medium post indicates the database will be used by the nonprofit and the CS community to "make our shared vision [for every school to teach computer science] a reality." The post cites a 2016 study conducted by Google and Gallup -- which took principals to task for being clueless about what constituted "computer science" and misgauging parental and student demand for CS -- and goes on to add that the new database will allow the organization to "be able to report more precisely which schools do or don't offer this opportunity to their students." As far as a timeframe for the naughty-or-nice K-12 CS school database goes, Code.org reports, "our goal is to gather data for 100% of US schools by the end of 2018." In earlier posts, Code.org has thanked its partners for their help in "changing [K-12 CS] education policies in forty states" (make that 43 states!) and claimed credit for "pressing lawmakers" into unlocking Federal funding for K-12 CS with the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act.
But what about Hillary's emails and multiple cell phones? Oh, Trump is a traitor with the same issues, only add Vlad Putin's cock in his bitch traitor ass? Oh right. Carry on then.
So, it will be amusing when they get results that are all over the map.
I'm not sure how well this will work. If there's already a belief that administrators and parents don't have a good understanding of what constitutes computer science, then what indication is there that they'll be able to reliably report it. I suppose it's better than no data, but I'm uncertain how accurate it will actually be, or how well it will be maintained. There may even be misreporting of information if this database is somehow tied to funding opportunities.
Like the idea of shaming schools/districts into offering CS classes. And I say that as someone who opposes making CS a required elective and/or graduation requirement. While not everybody should take CS in high school, it seems criminal that some kids are attending schools that don't even offer it.
I think it's better to not teach coding in K-12 at all rather than have it taught by the likes of Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon, and Google. These companies have shown that they are willing to destroy privacy, wage psychological warfare, and condition/control large groups of people if they think it will make them a dollar.
Has anyone started a crowd sourced list for teaching plumbing or welding yet?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
In related news, "Forty-seven percent of the school leaders surveyed by Education Week said they feel mild or strong pressure to expand computer science from vendors and the technology industry. That's compared with 28 percent who said they feel such pressure from parents and 23 percent from teachers."
Most people (including most CS majors) have no native talent for programming, and never become employable as programmers. Programming isn't a mass-employment program.
It should however be taught at a basic, Hello World/Logo-Robot level to everyone. Computers already dominate our world, and control how information is gathered and how machines operate. This is going to be even more so in the future, with huge ramifications for our society. Everyone needs to have some sense of what they can do, and how they are made to do it (it's not magic/miraculous). Being able to constructively engage with the world humans have made is what Civics is for, so programming should be made part of it. Civics may need to be stretched out to a couple of years, not just one semester.
We don't need more computer scientists and software engineers. We need more people capable of doing trades like electricity, plumbing, and auto and truck repair. Let's shame the schools into bringing back shop classes.
Crush nazi children's heads with baseball bats, anything that's handy. Kill them all, the nazi faggot scourge must be wiped like Hitler's bovine-semen injected ass from the world.
Why is the government education people anyway?
The government should just be a referee; it is the business of The People to allocate resources.
Get unaccountable governmental bureaucrats out of the business of playing with our children's futures based on fantastical whims and special interests groups.
When I RFTA, I have to wonder if the only result of this is going to primarily highlight schools in areas that cannot afford sufficient computers for training students or teachers with the skills in order to teach programming.
Even if the money is allocated, who's going to benefit the most? Microsoft and Google will probably be the biggest beneficiaries of monies allocated out to "rectify" the problem as well as give CS teachers priorities over other teacher classifications.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
You don't need to understand a lick of programming to know how to use a computer anymore, much like you don't need to be an engineer or mechanic to operate an automobile and in another decade or so you won't even need to know how to drive one as that will have been abstracted away.
What you're proposing is just basic computer literacy, which is a wholly different animal than computer science. I'd argue that such a class is probably more beneficial than trying to teach everyone to program. Perhaps people might take better steps to protect their privacy online, be better at finding information, or be less vulnerable to phishing scams.
fag.
You don't need to understand a lick of programming to know how to use a computer anymore, much like you don't need to be an engineer or mechanic to operate an automobile and in another decade or so you won't even need to know how to drive one as that will have been abstracted away. What you're proposing is just basic computer literacy, which is a wholly different animal than computer science. I'd argue that such a class is probably more beneficial than trying to teach everyone to program. Perhaps people might take better steps to protect their privacy online, be better at finding information, or be less vulnerable to phishing scams.
Exactly. Years ago, I took a course called "Chemistry, Society and Man" which looked at the impact, positive and negative, of chemistry on history. It showed how chemistry enables us to feed more people economically while simultaneously making it easier to manufacturer more and more powerful weapons to kill them (the Haber - Bosch process). Science is neutral, it's how it is used that matters. Courses that challenge students to consider the possibilities, and limitations, of computers on society would be more valuable than learning how to define a variable or pipe operations so as to save lines of code.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Without CS at all schools, where will we get all the coders needed to maintain the exponentially growing catalog of pointless, shitty, Electron apps? We need more apps! AI can't be expected to do it all!
This will only make my humanities major more valuable in the long run as STEM wages begin to stagnate and the number of people who have the ability to write more than a Slashdot comment decreases.
If they have chosen to be slaves at Microsoft, then what horror were they escaping in their "home" countries?
They can always go back to their supposed paradise.
Thanks, Obama.
zero.
Number of trades programs in IT and Software, all of the rest of them.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
I've been a professional software developer for 30 years, and while there certainly are many cases where I've worked with or interviewed people who were lacking in computer-science skills, very little of that was because they weren't getting enough CS teaching in primary and secondary school. I mean, if you've spent 4 years in college getting a CS degree and a few years in industry working and you STILL can't keep up, adding a semester in 11th grade isn't going to help.
On the other hand, raising English communications proficiency across the board by a single grade level would have HUGE benefits for the industry. Communicating better would likely result in better technical results, too.
In this age, surely it would be trivial to have a national database of all schools, the subjects they teach, and the results they get, (normalised for factors such as budget, intake literacy level etc. If desired), but hey I guess both the teachers unions and the management would be in rare agreement about how that would somehow not in parent and student interest, right?
let's see, facebook, google, and ms want to build yet another tracking database? maybe they can host it unsecured on amazon's cloud?
schools in areas that cannot afford sufficient computers for training students
A Raspberry Pi Zero costs $5.
For a poor school, a Raspberry Pi Zero is a bookmark that cost $5.
For it to be usable, you have to add:
- Power Supply
- SD Card for File System
- Keyboard
- Display
- Network infrastructure for school to support a classroom of Raspberry Pis
- Network and programmingTechnical support
- Trained teacher that has curriculum
When you have a poor school, the suggestion of a $5 processor card isn't all that helpful when they see the investments that must be made to be able to actually get it to first power up and then set up a class and then find somebody who can teacher with it.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
First, ensure there is a solid foundation like basic logic, algebra (great for problem-solving), and basic English skills (so they can read/understand technical references). Until you've mastered those basic skills, any CS class is simply wasted...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Strongly disagree with this. Learning to program will be a complete waste of time for many/most people. If it's one or the other, there are a great many classes I'd prioritize over C.S.
Hillary isn't President, so isn't the top priority right now. Having a Russian spy as the Commander in Chief is the greatest issue we face today.
Grow up theodp. You aren't going to lose your job if you are competent. I know you are scared of competition, but grow the F up.
Power Supply - $2 each in bulk. Or the students can use their cell phone chargers.
SD Card for File System - $2 each in bulk for 2GB SD cards.
Keyboard - $2 each at Goodwill
Display - $5 at Goodwill, or free from Craigslist if you carry them away
Network infrastructure - How many schools don't have Wifi?
curriculum - Free from Khan Academy
When you have a poor school ...
This is mostly a myth. School spending in America is far more progressive than you think. There are state and federal programs to level funding disparities, and in most states poorer students get more funding than richer students. Schools in poor communities have big problems, but money isn't the root cause.
E-rate subsidies can offset up to 95% of the cost of IT programs, depending on the ability of a school to pay. A small school can get gigabit fiber and pay for it with bake sales (I've seen this in southwest Montana.)
There are many programs and methods to jerry rig good educational IT infrastructure.
As a teacher I have about a dozen Arduino learning kits. The trouble is in getting the curriculum committee to agree to allow me to add them into my robotics course (the only class I teach that they slide into).
I would really like to add them into computer II (I teach one semester courses of Computer i and Computer II, each being a full semester). However, the curriculum committee. Requires that I teach the same topics in both classes, "so that if a student is only able to take one of the classes, they won't miss much." It should be no surprise that computer II is not a popular class; after all, the student does, essentially, the same things. Adding Arduinos' would be great. . . of course, adding pretty much anything would be great.
I think more good could be done by instituting common testing for computer classes. Yes, I am a teacher and I said more standardized testing, not less. The reason is that it would establish a common expectation and force the districts to actually allow the teachers to teach. Really the best that it would do is that it would tell the districts what to teach. As it is, even after all these years of teaching "computers" there is little real guidance given, to the districts, of what should be taught in a "computer" class.
I'm all for computer literacy. But most kids figure that out by themselves. Parents seem to be the ones having trouble adapting to newer technology, perhaps fearing that the children will be equally inept unless they take special classes. But nevertheless, computer literacy classes are fine. But teaching CS goes a bit far, make sure that they have the appropriate levels of mathematics and science first, and writing of course, too many programmers out there who can't write or communicate effectively.
Guess what? It's not the case that only the rich can afford education. Rather, it's the case that only the rich seek education.
You can't make a person taller by putting him on a basketball team.
We all choose to work in order to eat, "fuckwit".
Why are you being flogged? That is, your argument is circular, "fuckwit".
Your anger is misdirected.
Don't be angry at the factory owner for offering you a way to eat; instead, be angry at your parents for conjuring your existence in this dismal world.
I sure as hell don't want someone that gets paid a k-12 salary and who knows how to program (poorly obviously) to teach my kids how to program. I'll do it my own damn self.
A site I work at tried code.org and the day of coding. Students figured out they could find porn and explicit rap through saved "projects" on code.org.
Code.org wasn't terribly responsive, and it ended up being more whack-a-mole than it was worth