The University of California Los Angeles, in partnership with the University of Oregon and the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), propose an extension to the Into the Loop Alliance. The goal is to build and support the capacity of the LAUSD to offer high-quality, college preparatory computer science classes, especially in high schools with high numbers of African-American and Latino students, and to develop a model and repository of best practices that can help spread and inform similar efforts to other school districts nationwide. The project is committed to affecting the depth and scale of change that is necessary to integrate the teaching and learning of computer science into the national education enterprise with the intent of engaging all students. Their focus is on the secondary school level because this is when students are being prepared for pursuing their careers and interests in college. Into the Loop proposal builds upon five previous years of accomplishments, most notably the creation of the Exploring Computer Science (ECS) curriculum and the ECS teacher professional development program. The scope of work for years 6-10 is focused on:
-- Deepening, institutionalizing, and sustaining the reforms in the LAUSD; -- Expanding the research base and designing authentic assessment measures for student engagement with and learning of computational thinking practices; -- Creating and evaluating resources for best and promising practices around ECS curriculum and pedagogy, teachers professional development and learning community, and ECS assessments; and -- Studying the scalability and replicability of ECS curriculum and PD.
In years 6-10, the partnership will serve as a national resource for others pursuing CS education/broadening participation in computing initiatives.
