[TOS] CS certification for K12 - what is out there?

[Heidi Ellis]

Hi Folks,

As others have noted, the CSTA is working actively in the area of CS
curricula for high schools and promoting the CS Principles course. I think
that the larger issue is the current lack of computing within middle and
high schools, a problem that TOS is not likely to be able to solve.

I am a prof. at Western New England University and we hold an annual high
school programming contest. In addition, I have been working with a local
high school computer science teacher to see how we can improve computing in
the middle and high schools. I have done a few activities with her classes
and have brought my undergraduates into her class. The feedback from the
high school teachers is depressing. There are few resources to support CS
and those are typically cut in times of tight budgets. 

I think that the major hurdle for getting more programming and computing
(i.e., not Office) in the middle and high schools is that CS is not
recognized as a "real" discipline. By this, I mean that schools in most
states are not required to show that students have proficiency in any sort
of computing beyond basic word processing skills. There are no standardized
tests for CS in most states. Since there are no tests, there are little or
no resources devoted to computing. Many schools have no computing at all. In
others, computing programs are often treated like electives with no honors
courses and in some cases, guidance counselors put special education
students into computing courses. 

NSF has a push for new CS teachers (overview:
http://c2474712.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/ACM-Ed-Week-CS10K.pdf) :

"CS/10K Project Goal: To develop an effective new high school curriculum for
computing,
taught in 10,000 high schools by 10,000 well-qualified teachers by 2015."

I applaud this effort. However, the problem as I see it is that there is
little incentive for middle and high schools to create or expand computing
programs in this era of limited resources. I think that the root cause is a
systemic issue. Feedback from my high school teachers indicates that until
CS is a "real" discipline, it won't be given the emphasis and resources that
it needs. It may be that the government at the US or state level will have
to mandate that students need to achieve a certain level of competence in
computing before computing will be widely adopted in middle and high
schools. 

Just my thoughts on the matter.
Heidi

-----Original Message-----
From: tos-bounces at teachingopensource.org
[mailto:tos-bounces at teachingopensource.org] On Behalf Of Don Davis
Sent: Tuesday, July 31, 2012 3:12 PM
To: tos at teachingopensource.org
Subject: Re: [TOS] CS certification for K12 - what is out there?

I was certified in our state. The test was pretty simple pseudocode, some
big O, and technical (e.g. file format) type questions.

Let's say there was a national set of standards for CS teacher certification
- would that help more students get involved in CS or have a better CS
education?

Most of the 9-12 CS curriculum I've seen is all heavily Java centric based
on AP test standards. Only a small percentage of the schools in my state
have CS programs and the majority of the programs are near identical in
scope, sequence, and materials - as it's done all in preparation for the AP
CS test.

This approach does little to benefit CS matriculation and little to increase
diversity.

It's seems that more CS0 programs are needed but schools won't support them
as the only goal of a CS programming is to boost AP test taker numbers.

(Of course there are some very nice exceptions to this in my state but they
are the exception.)

How might raising the bar on an already marginalized subject increase CS
participation? (This isn't a strictly rhetorical question - perhaps there is
a connection I do not see.)

Oh and an appropriate question for this list - supposing there is a core
standard - who tests it? which language do they use? Test companies make
policy more often than educators - will we be locked into Java only for the
next 20 years? .net?



On 07/31/2012 01:50 PM, Karsten 'quaid' Wade wrote:
> I was just talking with Selena Deckelmann about computer science in 
> K12, a conversation partially spurred by this report:
> 
> http://www.acm.org/runningonempty/
> 
> We were talking about the advantage of having a national CS curriculum 
> definition and reference certification. (Recognizing that states set 
> their own standards, yet the vast majority haven't, so providing a 
> reference certification may have some value.)
> 
> I'm curious if anyone knows of an existing K12 teacher certification 
> for computer science?
> 
> In other words, does it exist and just needs promoting? Or does it 
> need creating?
> 
> - Karsten
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