Search for: All records

Teacher shortages in K–12 computer science (CS) education negatively impact students’ access to CS courses, exposure to CS concepts, and interest in CS-related careers. To address CS teacher shortages, this study seeks to understand factors related to expressing a preference to teach CS among prospective teachers. The study team analyzed data from 27,700 prospective teacher applications accepted into the 2016–2020 Teach For America (TFA) corps (cohorts). The TFA corps is an alternative teacher development program that recruits and prepares participants to obtain their teaching certification while they work for at least two years in underserved communities on a temporary teaching license. Study results show that earning at least one postsecondary CS credit and majoring in CS are positively associated with these prospective teachers’ preference to teach CS. Findings indicate that among these accepted TFA applicants, a larger proportion of male applicants and racially minoritized applicants earned a postsecondary CS credit, majored in CS, and preferred to teach CS compared with female applicants and racially non-minoritized applicants. This study lays the foundation for future explorations of whether early exposure to CS could increase prospective teachers’ interest in teaching CS and reduce CS teacher shortages in K-12 settings. Findings from this study can also serve as a precursor to developing policies that result in a CS teacher workforce that is more representative of students enrolled in K-12 public schools. 

As high school computer science course offerings have expanded over the past decade, gaps in race and gender have remained. This study embraces the “All” in the “CS for All” movement by shifting beyond access and toward abolitionist computer science teaching. Using data from professional development observations and interviews, we lift the voices of BIPOC CS teachers and bring together tenets put forth by Love (2019) for abolitionist teaching along with how these tenets map onto the work occurring in CS classrooms. Our findings indicate the importance of BIPOC teacher representation in CS classrooms and ways abolitionist teaching tenets can inform educator’s efforts at moving beyond broadening participation and toward radical inclusion, educational freedom, and self-determination, for ALL.