Next Door to Silicon Valley: A Researcher-Practitioner Partnership to Address Disparities in Access and Expectations for Computer Science Education

来自低社会经济家庭的学生，拉丁美洲/a学生和女学生有很大的差距，有质量的机会学习计算机科学（CS）或实践计算思维（CT）。该项目旨在促进如何建立研究实践伙伴关系，可以扩大在K-8计算参与的知识。该项目是教育、培训、研究（ETR）、圣克鲁斯城市学校（SCCS）和圣克鲁斯教育基金会（SCEF）之间的合作项目。该学区处于一个独特的位置，夹在硅谷之间，许多学生，教师和工作人员的家庭成员在高科技行业工作，该县南部的农业社区，主要城镇81%是拉丁美洲人/a，39%是外国出生的，几乎一半的成年人没有高中毕业。研究结果将解决重要的问题，什么样的支持不同的孩子需要学习CS，以及谁受益于CS教学，以及如何。研究结果将填补在了解如何创建系统的变化，可以导致所有学生的CS集成在学校和学区的差距。这些差距包括各地区确定优先事项和整合的过程，以及教师所需的支持和资源。这些发现也将有助于理解如何减少对谁感兴趣并擅长计算机科学的无意识偏见。最后，这些活动将填补一个重要的空白，即了解如何让所有社会经济层面的家长参与教育改革。该项目将制作教学材料，旨在加强小学和中学女孩、西班牙裔/拉丁裔学生和英语学习者的兴趣和优势。这些活动将提供学习计算机辅助教学和计算机辅助教学的机会，并将培养教育工作者的能力，以测试和修订将计算机辅助教学纳入课堂的战略，使一系列学习者充分参与。这些活动还旨在利用社区资源和增加公众参与，重点是传统上不参与教育改革的家长，为所有学生提供CS教育。该项目将解决一个高层次的研究问题：我们如何减少学生获得优质机会学习CS/CT和持续支持CS坚持的差距？这些活动将包括教师专业发展，创建教学材料和简短的干预措施，将包容性CS融入小学和中学课堂，一个地区性CS委员会，以确定需求和资源，建立一个支持网络，以提高所有学校将CS融入课堂的能力，开发一个系统，利用家长和社区资源支持和维持CS教育，以及数据收集和分析，以监测学习进度和系统的变化，从而加强为所有学生建立CS路径的努力。研究方法将涉及在研究人员-实践者伙伴关系中工作，以最终确定措施，收集定性和定量数据，并解释调查结果，并在迭代过程中使用它们来通知下一步。要衡量的结果包括教师的CS能力和行为，学生的CS知识和兴趣，教师和家长的无意识的偏见，网络化的改进社区，以利用资源和提供支持，家长和社区的参与，数据和研究驱动的决策，并扩大参与CS领域的贡献。外部顾问将监测该项目的变化理论，研究设计和方法的完整性，以及研究实践伙伴关系的发展。

There is great disparity for students from low socioeconomic households, Latino/a students, and female students to have quality opportunities to learn computer science (CS) or practice computational thinking (CT). This project seeks to advance knowledge of how to build research-practice partnerships that can broaden participation in computing in K-8. This project is a collaboration between Education, Training, Research (ETR), Santa Cruz City Schools (SCCS), and the Santa Cruz Education Foundation (SCEF). The school district is in a unique position, sandwiched between Silicon Valley where many family members of the students, teachers, and staff work in the high-tech industry, and the agricultural communities in the southern part of the county where the main town is 81% Latino/a, 39% are foreign-born, and almost half of the adults have not graduated from high school. The findings will address important questions about what kinds of supports different children need to learn CS, as well as who benefits from CS instruction, and how. The results will fill gaps in understanding how to create systems change in schools and school districts that can lead to CS integration for all students. These gaps include the process through which prioritization and integration occurs in districts and the kinds of support and resources that are needed for teachers. The findings will also contribute to an understanding of how to reduce unconscious bias about who is interested in and would be good at computer science. Finally, the activities will fill an important gap in understanding how to engage parents at all socioeconomic levels in educational reform. This project will produce instructional materials designed to build on the interests and strengths of girls, Hispanic/Latino students, and English language learners in elementary and middle school. The activities will offer opportunities to learn CS and CT, and will build the capacity of educators to test and revise strategies to integrate CS into classrooms in a way that fully engages a range of learners. The activities are also designed to leverage community resources and increase public engagement, with a focus on parents who are traditionally not involved in education reform, in CS education for all students. The project will address a high-level research question: How do we reduce the disparity in students' access to quality opportunities to learn CS/CT and ongoing support to persist in CS? The activities will include teacher professional development, the creation of instructional materials and brief interventions to integrate inclusive CS into elementary and middle school classrooms, a district wide CS committee to identify needs and resources to build a network of support to boost the capacity of all schools to integrate CS into classes, the development of a system to leverage parent and community resources to support and sustain CS education, and data collection and analysis to monitor learning progressions and systems change in order to strengthen the efforts to build a CS pathway for all students. The research methods will involve working in a researcher-practitioner partnership to finalize measures, collect qualitative and quantitative data, and interpret the findings and use them in an iterative process to inform next steps. Outcomes to be measured include teachers' CS capacity and behavior, students' CS knowledge and interest, teachers' and parents' unconscious bias, a networked improvement community to leverage resources and provide support, parent and community engagement, data- and research-driven decision making, and a contribution to the field of broadening participation in CS. An external advisor will monitor the project's Theory of Change, the integrity of the research design and methods, and the development of the research-practice partnership.