Help me give my students an experience coding with Makey Makey circuits so we can encourage greater diversity and gender equity in our computer science classrooms.
In a town under 2,000 surrounded by seven glaciers, our pre-K through eighth grade school is the hub of our local community. Nearly 200 students attend our school, and the doors are open before and after school as well as on the weekends for community gatherings, classes, and activities for all ages. Approximately 15% of our students receive Special Education services and 20% are economically disadvantaged. Most students do not have access to needed services if they are not offered through our public school. Donations to our school have a positive impact not only on our students but also in our whole community.
My Project
Before you can do, you must imagine. Before you can achieve, you must dream. Despite a predicted tripling of computer industry jobs in the next five years, the number of women in computer science fields has dropped by half. One of the biggest challenges Computer Science educators face is getting girls to take computer science classes.
Help us crack the code and bring better gender equity to our computer science classrooms.
New research from Girls Who Code shows that Middle School coding experiences and female mentorship are key to closing the computer science gender gap. Offering computer courses rooted in community problem-solving and healthcare help young women identify and aspire to computer science-related careers.
With a classroom set of imaginative Makey-Makey programmable circuit boards, all genders can get excited about making and coding. Fun and creative, Makey-Makey circuits will add a needed arsenal of tools to our Inventor's Workshop and help us better implement our Project Invent Making and Coding for Social Good curriculum by helping students build accessible computer programmed prototypes to help solve problems for our special needs community partners.
With your support, we can help close the gender gap in computing and foster a stronger generation of innovative community problem solvers.
DonorsChoose is the most trusted classroom funding site for teachers.
As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Rutherford and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
