Two events this week on Capitol Hill that CRA will be involved in. First, there will be a Congressional STEM Education Caucus and Congressional Black Caucus briefing on CS education called Bringing Innovative Computing Curriculum across the Digital Divide that CRA is co-sponsoring with ACM, CSTA, NCWIT, SWE, IEEE-USA, and Microsoft. The briefing will cover the current state of CS education at the K-12 level and discuss new curriculum and teacher preparation developed by NSF and Microsoft. The briefing will take place on Wednesday, May 20 at noon in B339 Rayburn.
The second event will unveil the first CCC funded initiative in robotics this Thursday, May 21. The Congressional Robotics Caucus is hosting this briefing to showcase the Robotics Roadmap and the potential for growth and roadblocks for the use of robotics in various industries. Speakers at the briefing will include Henrik Christensen who led the CCC robotics effort, Rodney Brooks of Heartland Robotics, Dan Jones of Intuitive Surgical, Eric Close of RedZone Robotics, and Jared Cohen of Carnegie Mellon University. The briefing will take place beginning at 11:45 at the Capitol Visitor Center HVC 201 A-B. Lunch will be served and it will be a widely attended event. RSVP to Patti Rote at pattir at techcollaborative.org.
Voters ballots may be more partisan than ever, but the vast majority of Americans can agree that we need to invest in science and technology, according to a recent poll.
71 percent of polled voters said they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who is committed to making sure the federal budget invests in scientific research. And a whopping 86 percent said they would be more likely to vote for a candidate committed to public investments in science and technology education.
Such investments have majority support among democrats as well as republicans (and independents, too), demonstrating the broad bipartisan consensus behind funding for science.
Hat tip: Gene Spafford
Today’s Washington Post article on the College Board’s decision to stop administering certain Advanced Placement tests has been widely circulated — with some reasonable concern within the computing community. The article appears to suggest that computer science advanced placement tests are on the chopping block. However, that’s not quite an accurate picture. Fortunately, Cameron Wilson at CRA-affiliate ACM — which has become quite involved in the computing education space — has a more complete explanation on the Tech Policy Blog of what’s really going on and why it ultimately could/should be beneficial for the field.
From the CCC Blog
- MIT’s Subra Suresh reportedly to be nominated as new Director of NSF Ran Libeskind-Hadas
- Eric Brewer wins ACM – Infosys Foundation Award Ed Lazowska
- Chuck Thacker wins Turing Award Ed Lazowska
- FOCUS identifies “The Best Jobs in America� Ed Lazowska