Computer Science is an academic area, not an elective.
Everyone must listen to the #CSK8 podcast by Melissa Rasberry. She is an Education Consultant at the American Institutes for Research where she manages the CS@AIR portfolio of projects focused on K-12 computer science education. Yes! I want better for our country.
Melissa shared about focusing on a bug crawling on the ground. Mentioned NCWIT Aspirations as a tribe 
to connect with and find a place to start. I am totally emerged in that tribe and would jump for joy if you joined me. My biggest take-away is that we need community ambassadors. Ambassadors who are the event planners, the project managers, lead outdoor education, build school gardens, bring the materials and teach hands-on activities. Businesses please fund staff in schools with master teachers. Instead of letting experience retire due to fear and stress of COVID, hire them to work remotely with teachers. Instead of giving teachers 7 bell-ringing classes, let them teach 3 and use other time being an ambassadors.
Ambassadors like Annie and Shirley Zhu, two of our NCWIT Aspirations in Computing winners. Without their programming skills they would not have been able to design the apps and webpages that were the backbone of their Health Hub. This is the stock in their soup. Businesses, will you add stock to create more bowls of learning? To get involved in our Houston AiC community please let us know what you would like to do on the survey on this link.
Mia Bella says all we need is kindness with positive reinforcement and action. She said I only jump on you and nip when you are not paying attention to me and understand what I need. The solution: Solve the communication problem! And scale entrepreneurship with other MiaBellas like the our West Houston (Katy) champion baker.
Here are my previous posts on the need to teach data science – love the search tool on my site – please use to find more posts that connect to your interests:
- knorth.edublogs.org/2018/01/09/data-scientist-2
- knorth.edublogs.org/2015/12/20/data-scientist
- knorth.edublogs.org/2010/11/23/computer-science-week-2010
- knorth.edublogs.org/2009/01/18/computer-science-education
- knorth.edublogs.org/research/flu
Until you as a school district consider computer science to be an academic area you will continue to leave your students in the 20th century unprepared for jobs in the 21st century.