CSP4Hawaii: Deployment of Computer Science Principles Courses within Secondary Schools in Hawaii

University Of Hawaii, Honolulu

Investigators

Abstract

The University of Hawaii (UH), in collaboration with the Hawaii Department of Education (HIDoE), will conduct a 3-year study - Computer Science Principles (CSP) for All in Hawaii (CSP4Hawaii) - aimed at improving state-level initiatives to address diversity in computer science education. The project, structured as research-practitioner partnership (RPP), will replicate and study curriculum and teacher professional development for a CSP course, based on previous work by UTeach. It will identify and remediate barriers to participation of underrepresented groups. The project will collaborate with the University of Texas and their UTeach Professional Development (PD) program to utilize its curated CSP curriculum, best practices, and resources. It will expand teacher knowledge of, and practices with, computer science principles, creating a more diverse pool of classroom teachers who can comfortably integrate CSP coursework into their classrooms to broaden participation. It will use UH faculty, HIDoE high school teachers, UTeach support technicians and industry/business mentors to provide high school teachers with the skills and strategies to improve recruitment and engagement of underrepresented students in CSP and computational problem solving; and it will create Networked Improvement communities (NIC) throughout the State of Hawaii to gather and use meaningful student and teacher demographic information to monitor strategic decision-making for achieving equity of opportunity for computer science learning.