Giving Every Student an Opportunity to Learn Through Computer Science for All
whitehouse.gov
whitehouse.gov
I hope CS and programming is integrated into science and Math. I bet most students would love to solve real-world science problems instead of solving abstract puzzles. I wish I had exercises like:
1. Write a program to predict the trajectory of a free throw.
2. Collect Fitbit-like data from every student, find interesting correlations and perform qualitative analysis too.
3. Perform basic image processing tasks using matrix multiplications.
Instead of:
1. Integrate sqrt(tan(x)) [IIT 94] (Yeah, Indian text books highlight questions from previous years' exams).
2. Memorize a bunch of chemical equations without understanding how they work.
3. Find the determinant of this ridiculous matrix using an arcane trick.
There has been a strong trend of sexism in education for a long time now. Reading between the lines,
"Americans of all kinds – from the Spanish teacher in Queens who added programming to _her_ classes to the young _woman_ in New Orleans who worked with her Police Chief to learn code and share more data with the community – are getting involved to help young people learn these skills. And just today, states like Delaware and Hawaii, companies like Google and SalesForce, and organizations like Code.org have made commitments to help more of our kids learn these skills. "
Code.org makes no bones that it prioritises girls on its homepage. Obama gave two examples of women. Why are we driving gender into learning? It shouldn't even enter the equation, unless our goal is to encourage one gender at the expense of another, like code.org does so brazenly. With failing grades for boys over the last two decades, you think we'd be horrified for young boys, but the campaign to discriminate against them is strong.
Interestingly, there are very few articles willing to discuss why this non-subtle trend has occurred. It's usually explained that boys have become sexist or become slow learners in recent years. I found this article that seems to tackle the topic of "why" in an open and plausible way.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/eliminating-feminist-teach...
One such quote of many,
- In science and general knowledge, as in math skills, the data showed that kindergarten and first grade white boys’ grades “are lower by 0.11 and 0.06 standard deviations, even though their test scores are higher.” This disparity continues and grows through to the fifth grade, with white boys and girls being graded similarly, “but the disparity between their test performance and teacher assessment grows.” -
> Why are we driving gender into learning?
In this case (not necessarily others) it is simple economics. There is much more growth opportunity among women than among men, because
1. There are lower levels of interest in CS in women, currently. If that can be changed, it's a massive potential population.
2. Girls have higher grades than men - they do better at school. So teaching CS in schools likely means girls will do well at it.
Overall, if your goal is a maximal increase in the # of CS-trained people, focusing on women is rational to do.
I would agree it's important to do this in a non-sexist way, and I think that's how this is being done, from what I've read.