The CRA Bulletin frequently shares news, timely information about CRA initiatives, and items of interest to the general community.
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Information on educational initiatives.
Computer science and education researchers from North Carolina State University and the University of Florida, both CRA member institutions, are launching an initiative that will use a custom-designed video game to boost both computational thinking in middle school science classrooms and foster both gender and racial diversity in computing.
Today, CRA Executive Director, Andrew Bernat was a speaker at the White House Summit on Computer Science for All. The audience heard from students and leaders of CS education efforts as part of the CS for All initiative. The initiative aims to ensure CS education is available to all K-12 students across the U.S.
Bernat expressed his excitement about the incredible success of the initiative and explained CRA’s commitment to strengthening the computing research community by supporting the development of strong, diverse talent. He announced that so far more than 75 university and college computing departments from across the country have agreed on behalf of their departments to take action to support the goals of the CS for All Initiative through a variety of concrete actions. And he is confident many more will sign up. CRA member institutions’ support will include faculty expertise and effort, the development of innovative computing education products, and teacher development.
The Computing Research Association (CRA) and its education committee (CRA-E) are excited to announce the creation of five short videos entitled “Choosing a PhD in Computer Science.” These videos were designed in conjunction with award-winning producer Patrick Sammon (co-producer of “Codebreaker”) to explain the benefits of pursuing a PhD in CS. The videos showcase young researchers with PhDs who are now working in industry as they talk about what compelled them to pursue a doctorate and how they are using their advanced training in their work. While many undergraduates understand that a PhD is needed for a position in academia, these videos demonstrate how a PhD can be useful in industry as well.
How can a CS Department benefit from hiring tenure-track faculty in the field of Computing Education Research (CER)? What are some of the major research questions in CER? How can CER enhance existing research in a CS department? A panel at the CRA Conference at Snowbird Meeting in July 2016 addressed these and other questions. The panelists included Diana Franklin (University of Chicago), Mark Guzdial (Georgia Tech), Scott Klemmer (UC San Diego), Amy Ko (University of Washington) and Ben Shapiro (University of Colorado-Boulder) in a session moderated by Ran Libeskind-Hadas (Harvey Mudd College).
The Computing Research Association is pleased to announce the annual CRA Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Researchers, which recognizes undergraduate students in North American colleges and universities who show outstanding research potential in an area of computing research. The award is a terrific way to recognize your best student researchers and your department.
The NSF-wide Graduate Research Fellowship Program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees at accredited United States institutions.
The second annual Congressional App Challenge is a nationwide event that allows U.S. students in high school and below to create and exhibit their software application, or “app,” on mobile, tablet, or computer devices. The Challenge opened for submissions on 7/18, and submissions are due by 11/2. The Challenge is open to all high school students, and the winners get to meet their Member of Congress and have their app displayed in the US Capitol Building! Please spread the word!
During this Virtual Undergraduate Town Hall event, students will learn about cutting edge research in the field of computing and have the opportunity to ask distinguished computer scientists questions. The state of the art in cloth simulation can produce highly realistic cloth, but requires extremely high computation time, on the order of hours or even days.
In recent decades, there have been many Women In Science and Engineering (WISE) initiatives aimed at increasing the participation of women in these fields. In computer science and engineering, the percentage of women pursuing degrees and careers has remained relatively low. According to CRA’s annual Taulbee Survey of Ph.D. granting institutions, less than 15 percent of undergraduate computer science degrees were awarded to women in the 2013-14 academic year [1]. Given the significant increases of women in other traditionally male dominated fields such as law and medicine in the past 50 years [2], computing’s persistent low representation of women is rather disappointing, to say the least. Women’s low participation is also alarming when we consider the increasing number of jobs in computing, as well as the positive impact of improving gender diversity on innovation in research settings [3] and on collective intelligence [4]. So the question becomes, how do we change things?
On January 8-10, 2106, NSF sponsored the Inaugural summit of Black Women in Computing community leaders. This workshop is part of an effort to build a robust community to support Black women in computing and by extension, all those who are persisting in the field, either through their education or careers.
This video narrative showcases the positive experiences of women in this community who were workshop participants. Please share the video with your students – https://youtu.be/2terTfzuLxA.
Click here to view the final workshop report, Black Women in Computing: A Research Agenda.
America’s top CEOs, state governors, and education leaders joined forces this morning to ask Congress to support computer science in K-12 schools. In an open letter, the leaders called on Congress to increase support for local school districts and jurisdictions for K-12 computer science education.
Today, Google launched a new website that outlines all of its computer science (CS) education tools, content, and programs for K-12 through career opportunities. Computer science education is a pathway to innovation, to creativity and to exciting career opportunities. Google is committed to developing programs, resources, tools and community partnerships which make CS engaging and accessible for all students.
The CRA Education Committee (CRA-E) has recently selected two Ph.D. students, Keith Feldman and Max Grossman, to serve as CRA-E Graduate Fellows. The Graduate Fellows Program was established last year to give graduate students the opportunity to contribute to CRA-E projects, engage in advocacy for mentoring undergraduate students and promote computer science research and undergraduate education at the national level.
The CRA’s Center for Evaluating the Research Pipeline (CERP) made several contributions to the 2016 SIGCSE conference. Using data collected through the Data Buddies Project, the CERP team presented three talks during the event.
The Computing Research Association had an action packed weekend engaging the public with science at AAAS Family Science Days. There was a high turnout of families from the Washington, D.C. area who were eager to learn more about science and have some fun with hands on activities.
President Obama used his weekly radio address today to announce a new Computer Science Education initiative that would allow states to take the lead in increasing access to CS in K-12 classrooms. The initiative, which will be included in the President’s FY 2017 Budget Request to Congress on February 9th, will designate $4 billion for states available over 3 years, and $100 million directly for districts, to increase access to K-12 computer science education “by training teachers, expanding access to high-quality instructional materials, and building effective regional partnerships.” He will also direct NSF to spend more than $120 million over the next five years to support and train CS teachers.
This year the AAAS annual meeting will be held at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, D.C., close to CRA headquarters. To help engage the public with fun hands on science activities, CRA was invited to participate in AAAS’s Family Science Days on Saturday and Sunday, February 13–14, 2016 from 11:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m.
The Computing Community Consortium (CCC) will also have a panel at the conference on the Friday, February 12, at 3 p.m. titled, “The Confluence of Computing and Society: Emerging Themes in Socio-Technical Systems.” CCC Chair Greg Hager, CCC Vice Chair Elizabeth Mynatt, and an additional speaker will offer perspectives on future ideas and challenges for technology innovations at global societal scales.
The following is a post from the CRA Policy Blog by Brian Mosley.
A new initiative for crafting a framework for K-12 computer science education was announced today. Lead by the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA), the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and Code.org, the plan is to answer a complicated question: “What is the appropriate scope and sequence for CS instruction to guide high-quality computer science?”
Check out this great article on booming enrollments in computer science by Jim Kurose, current Assistant Director for NSF CISE and former CRA Board Member: In many colleges and universities across the country, computer science classes are bursting at the seams! According to the Computing Research Association (CRA)’s Taulbee Survey, the number of newly declared computer science […]
FY16 Budget Update: Still Waiting on Congress
When we last talked about the FY16 budget, it was early October and it was looking like the next Speaker of the House would be Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). As we now know, in early December, the Speakership is very different but we still don’t have a passed-into-law budget. Congress has until this Friday, December 11th, to either pass a budget into law or to pass a stopgap continuing resolution (CR). Or let the government shutdown.
Could it be? ESEA Nears Final Passage!
As our readers will have noticed of late, Congress has a well-earned reputation for doing little-to-nothing, legislatively speaking. So when the newly installed Republican House and Senate majorities promised in January to move on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), a bill that had not been reauthorized since No Child Left Behind was passed into law in 2001, and had expired eight years ago, most people (myself included) thought it would go nowhere. Over the last year Congress has proved the naysayers wrong.
The Computing Research Association’s Education Committee (CRA-E) seeks up to two Ph.D. students to serve as Fellows. This is an opportunity for graduate students in computing-related fields to gain experience serving on a national committee that serves the field.
If you remember your very first line of code, you know it shaped the rest of your life.
That’s what the Hour of Code is all about. In the last two years, the movement has shattered stereotypes of what it’s like to code and helped more than 100 million students in 180 countries try computer science for the first time.
The Computer Research Association (CRA) has recently released a cumulative report from two workshops held by CRA and supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) on big data in education. Chris Dede, the Timothy E. Wirth Professor in Learning Technologies at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, was the intellectual lead for this effort.
Earlier this week, the House STEM Education Caucus sponsored a briefing for Congressional staff titled, “Building a STEM Education Pipeline Aligned with Industry Needs: Perspectives from the Field.” The briefing was moderated by the Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) and partnered with CRA, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), and the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM). The briefing focused on ways […]
