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Computer Science (CS) is not introduced equitably across K-12 schools, yet it is increasingly a necessary skill regardless of vocational pathway. Co-curricular activities such as summer camps have become a popular way to introduce CS to K-12 students. Researchers at our institution, through partnerships with other educational institutions and practitioners, developed a transdisciplinary approach of teaching CS in K-12 informal learning environments. Building on positive results in the K-12 informal learning environment, researchers are exploring the applicability of the transdisciplinary modules in formal instruction for early college learners in CS0 and CS1 courses. This paper explores self-efficacy data collected from multiple CS0 and CS1 courses. Learners include freshmen in computing majors and in non-computing majors. We compare their self efficacy growth in computing across race and gender, considering their formal or informal CS education experiences prior to entering college. This work is a part of a larger effort to redesign CS0 and CS1 courses to introduce more complex concepts and important design concepts such as parallel and distributed computing earlier in the curriculum. The authors’ longer-term goal is to investigate active learning strategies that will introduce higher level computer science topics early in the curriculum to enable students to recognize content applicability earlier in their college pathway.
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A Reflexive Analysis of University-Community Partnership in Computer Science Research
Informal learning environments are an important part of the educational landscape for diverse learners, and do their best work when creating learning experiences that align with community interests, needs, and ways of knowing. While models exist for exploring design partnerships between schools and communities, fewer evidence-based models are available for these design collaborations between informal learning environments and communities. The overarching question of the proposed session is: How do informal learning environment designers, researchers, and practitioners work with communities to co-design and co-implement socially engaged and equitable educational programs in different sociocultural contexts across the world? As a part of this symposium we highlight projects from Asia, Africa, South and North America that vary both in partnership scale and duration.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1649224
- PAR ID:
- 10122659
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- American Educational Research Association
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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