BPC-A: Data Alliance on Persistence and Perception in Computing (DAPPIC)

Northeastern University, Boston MA

Investigators

Abstract

Northeastern University’s Center for Inclusive Computing (the CIC), the Computing Research Association’s (CRA) Center for Evaluating the Research Pipeline (CERP) and 28 individual universities collaborate to improve the availability and use of quantitative and qualitative data to support the efforts of individual schools and the sector overall in broadening participation inundergraduate computing education. University leaders are highly motivated to increase the representation of populations historically minoritized in computing. However, while best practices for broadening participation in computing (BPC) have been developed and evaluated, it is not always clear which practices align with an institution’s particular challenges. To accurately diagnose barriers to inclusion and to assess the impact of interventions, leaders need reliable access to detailed enrollment, retention and graduation data as well as qualitative data on the experience of students of different identities. The collaboration addresses the need to improve the availability and use of quantitative and qualitative data to support individual schools and the sector as a whole. The CIC collects term by term, class by class data on student enrollment, retention, and graduation, disaggregated by demographics. At present the CIC does this work with 57 schools. This data is then visualized in dashboards that allow the user to compare between different intersections of identities, compare changes and trends across terms, and benchmark against an average of the 57 partner schools. CRA’s CERP collects and disseminates data from 150+ computing departments that participate in the Data Buddies Survey (DBS). At the undergraduate level, DBS gathers information about the academic and demographic background of learners, career pathways, as well as various indicators related to the recruitment, retention, and persistence in computing. The Alliance will integrate the two datasets and set a new standard for the usage of data in BPC. Additionally, the Alliance will work with the National Student Clearinghouse’s (NCS) Post-secondary Data Partnership (PDP), which offers in-depth dashboards that allow institutions to visualize student outcomes in aggregated and disaggregated forms. We see a point-in-time opportunity with the PDP’s priority in 2022 to develop discipline-specific dashboards to bring our collective experience working with BPC data as well as a robust “voice of the client” perspective. The specific activities are: 1) add new functionality to CIC dashboards (ability to compare across intersectional identities, to benchmark against different peer groups, and to connect to outside data sources such as NCES’ IPEDS); 2) integrate CIC/DBS data; 3) evaluate the integration and disseminate learnings; 4) explore potential integration with NSC; and 5) plan for achieving a model that provides long-term sustainability and scale. We will evaluate the efficacy of the approach with 28 schools, all of which participate in both the CIC’s data collection and CERP’s DBS. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.