Using Flow-Based Music Programming to Engage Children in Computer Science

2023 - 2027

Achieving the goal of broadening participation in the computer science (CS) workforce will require that children have access to early opportunities to engage with CS. However, the reality is that most underrepresented children in elementary schools do not have access to CS at all. To remediate that lack of access, this project seeks to create a deeply engaging music-based CS education program and curriculum, M-Flow, that can be easily adopted by elementary schools.

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Embodied Interactive Environment for Advancing Data Sensing and Computational Thinking Skills in the Built Environment

2023 - 2027

As the construction industry gears toward adopting data sensing technologies, there is a demand for creating and sustaining a workforce with skills for implementing the technologies and analyzing the resulting data to support decision-making. It is also essential to improve awareness of this Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) career option among all K-12 students, develop their understanding of the applications of data sensing technologies and improve their computational thinking skills in manipulating and using data.

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Partnership to provide technology and cyber-security experiences to Alabama Black Belt through mobile application development

Poster

This ITEST-Alabama (Developing and Testing Innovations: DTI) project aims to advance efforts to better understand and promote practices that increase minority high school students' motivations and capacities to pursue STEM careers. This project engages students in hands-on field experience, laboratory/project-based entrepreneurship tasks and mentorship experiences in fields of computing, specifically in cybersecurity.

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Mixed Reality Based Interactive Cybersecurity Education for Middle School Students

Poster

The project is guided by three goals: (1) iteratively design a set of concrete and interactive MR activities addressing key cybersecurity concepts (e.g., steganography, phishing, and firewalls) with teacher and student input throughout the design process; (2) increase student knowledge of key cybersecurity concepts, understanding of the importance of cybersecurity, and interest in cybersecurity careers; and (3) produce a set of design principles for MR activities in computing.

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Engaging Young Black and Latino Students in Data Science Through Water Security

Poster

Communities of color across the nation face increasing challenges with affordable access to safe drinking water. Using data science to explore why, where and how this is happening, and what is being done about it, provides a powerful vehicle for the engagement of students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), and to help develop a digital work force with appropriate representation from the affected communities.

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CS Frontiers: Beyond CS Principles: Engaging Female High School Students in New Frontiers of Computing

Poster

Building on the foundations set by the AP Computer Science (CS) Principles course, this project seeks to dramatically expand access, especially for high school girls, to the most exciting and emerging frontiers of computing, such as distributed computation, the internet of things (IoT), cybersecurity, and machine learning, as well as other 21st century skills required to productively leverage computational methods and tools in virtually every profession.

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