The Expanding Computing Education Pathways (ECEP) Alliance co-located its annual Summit in May with the Research on Equitable and Sustained Participation in Engineering, Computing, and Technology (RESPECT) Conference in Atlanta. ECEP leaders, in collaboration with RESPECT leads, developed this partnership to expand the mission of both organizations addressing systemic inequities in K-20 CS education (CSEd) pathways.

“We must promote computer science education reform to broaden participation in computing and welcome historically underrepresented students,” said Sarah Dunton, Alliance director and co-principal investigator. “The Alliance works hand in hand with state-level leaders and uses data to discover which students do not have access to computer science pathways and the reasons why.”

Some of the barriers to access and participation in CSEd include a scarcity of teachers in K-12 computer science education. The work continues to be challenged by a lack of consistent data regarding what counts as a CS course, and weak data systems for tracking participation and learning experiences in K-12 CS.

Session topics at this year’s Summit focused on the value of good data to drive state-level strategies to address barriers to CSEd. Action-oriented sessions included tangible ways to broaden participation in computing for students of all socioeconomic backgrounds and how to advocate for CSEd in schools or districts.

Computer Science Teachers Association Director of Education Shaina Glass lauded the quality of available sessions at the conference.

“Walking into sessions where participants were driving the conversation was exciting to experience,” Glass said. “Throughout the Summit, I learned strategies we could apply within our program offerings here at CSTA.”

Summit attendee and ECEP Illinois Leadership Team member Charity Freeman praises the ECEP Alliance as an expert source for equipping states with the necessary tools and support to navigate different contexts with clarity and strategy.

“In an ecosystem that’s become increasingly inundated with broadening participation initiatives that can be performative and ineffective at best, I know the ECEP Alliance will continue to operationalize ‘broadening participation’ in practical and transformative ways,” Freeman said. “ECEP’s proven frameworks and mechanisms for leading and implementing policy reform in K-20 computing education are adaptable enough to be applied in diverse contexts, yet specific enough to yield meaningful and sustainable outcomes.”

The 2023 State of CS Report identified that the majority of ECEP member-states have or are currently developing a state plan for K-12 computer science education. In addition, 75 percent of high schools in ECEP states offered at least one CS course, compared to 55 percent of high schools in non-ECEP states.

ECEP is actively investing in state teams within the Alliance to create change in CSEd through co-sponsorships. A total of 46 co-sponsorships totaling nearly $800,000 have enabled these teams to complete high-leverage activities for creating change in CSEd at the state level.

“In Texas, leaders are focusing on creating a new CSEd pipeline to train and equip the best teachers to provide the best education to communities historically excluded from these opportunities,” said Joshua Childs, Alliance co-principal investigator and assistant professor in Educational Policy and Leadership at UT Austin. “I support ECEP because it’s important to engage state-level leaders on effective, sustainable policy changes in CS education.”

The ECEP Alliance is supported by Google.org and the National Science Foundation (NSF) under Grant Nos. NSF-CNS-2137834 and NSF-CNS-1822011.