State leaders pushing to add more computer-science classes in schools
When Kyle Dencker started teaching computer science at Timber Creek High School in east Orange County, he had just 10 students in that class and spent most of his day teaching math.
Six years later, he teaches computer science all day long, with more than 200 teenagers enrolled, including nearly 70 in Advanced Placement.
Student interest in the field has soared in recent years across the region and state.
But state leaders are pushing for more, citing recent statistics from Code.org that reveal nearly 24,000 open computing jobs in Florida and fewer than 1,900 students earning computer-science degrees from state universities each year.
Experts say high-school students need to learn coding — essentially how to write computer instructions — to be ready to study computer science in college and then to take advantage of the field’s burgeoning job market.
One lawmaker has proposed making high-school computer-science classes a requirement for the state’s popular Bright Futures college scholarship. Others just want to see more students in such
classes.
Because despite an enrollment surge, the numbers, particularly in AP computer science, remain relatively small. In 2013, 1,521 Florida students took that AP exam. This year, 2,528 did. And while enrollment is high in some school districts, it is nonexistent in others.
The difficulty schools face finding computer-science teachers and student unease with the subject can make expanding computer-science enrollment challenging.
Cassidy Wood, 17, a senior in Dencker’s AP class, said she’s heard classmates knock the course.
“Oh, programming,” she said. “It’s a guys’ thing, it’s a nerdy thing.”
But Cassidy has another take: “There’s so many cool things. Your iPhone is all programming.”
Seminole County schools led Central Florida in AP computer-science enrollment last school year, the most recent for which statewide data are available. The district was second statewide only to Hillsborough County.
Still, Seminole did not offer the class at four of its nine high schools. Lake County schools had no students enrolled last year, while Osceola County schools had one class, at one school, with an enrollment of 21, according to data from the Florida Department of Education.
The Orange County school district, which had about 170 enrolled last year, added the course at two high schools this year. It now offers AP computer science at eight of 19 traditional high schools, for a total enrollment of about 300 students, district officials said. That compares with fewer than 40 enrolled three years ago.
But those 300 students represent just a fraction of the more than 54,500 highschool students in the district.
Dencker said he constantly markets his class to students and parents.
“I do not stop recruiting,” he said.
He fights stereotypes — such as that only boys who love video games take computer-programming classes — and the fears about computer science, telling anyone who will listen that programming is fun, worthwhile and doable, not some “magical art” that only an elite few can understand.
“Every kid is 100 percent capable of doing computer science,” he said.
With internship, scholarship and job opportunities, he added, it’s also a class that can open doors for teenagers.
Last month, state Sen. Jeremy Ring, D-Parkland, filed a bill that aims to boost enrollment by making two computer-coding classes a requirement for Bright Futures. It also would allow students to substitute those classes for the two required foreign-language classes.
The bill, which will be taken up when the Legislature convenes early next year, already has generated complaints, both from foreignlanguage advocates and from those who dislike the state creating what would be another graduation require- ment for many Florida students.
The bill’s fate is unclear, but state educators and lawmakers, who last year passed a law allowing computer science to count as a math or science requirement, definitely want enrollment to jump.
“Coding and programming … that’s where we’re behind,” said John Padget, a member of the State Board of Education, at a recent meeting. “Florida should be sure to move pretty quickly so we’re in no way left behind.”
Districts are trying to introduce the subject to more youngsters.
Seminole schools this year started teaching coding to kindergartners. In Orange, educators hope most schools take part in the upcoming “hour of code,” Code.org’s national effort to introduce students to the basics of computer science.
“We’re trying to build a pipeline of interest,” said Hilary Buckridge, Orange’s senior director for advanced programs.
But more student interest means more demand for teachers, and finding them is a challenge.
“People who know how to code do very well in private industry,” Buckridge said. “So to find people with that talent who like to work with highschool kids for a high-schoolteacher salary, it takes a special person.”
Tim Gallagher, a former software engineer who now teaches AP computer science at Winter Springs High School, said finding teachers is key — as is giving more youngsters a chance to take such classes.
“We don’t have nearly enough opportunities for students to take computer science,” he said. “Every student isn’t going to be a Bill Gates or a Mark Zuckerberg. But learning to code, learning to problem-solve like this is a skill that can help you really in just about any area.”