| NSF Org: |
CNS Division Of Computer and Network Systems |
| Recipient: |
|
| Initial Amendment Date: | August 26, 2014 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | May 8, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1440878 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Janice Cuny
CNS Division Of Computer and Network Systems CSE Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering |
| Start Date: | September 1, 2014 |
| End Date: | August 31, 2018 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $474,695.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $617,143.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
FY 2015 = $16,000.00 FY 2016 = $110,448.00 FY 2017 = $16,000.00 |
| History of Investigator: |
|
| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
4505 S MARYLAND PKWY LAS VEGAS NV US 89154-9900 (702)895-1357 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
|
| Primary Place of Performance: |
4505 Maryland Parkway Las Vegas NV US 89154-1055 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
|
| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
|
| Parent UEI: |
|
| NSF Program(s): |
STEM + Computing (STEM+C) Part, Special Projects - CNS, Computing Ed for 21st Century |
| Primary Program Source: |
01001516DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01001617DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01001718DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT |
| Program Reference Code(s): |
|
| Program Element Code(s): |
|
| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.070 |
ABSTRACT
The University of Washington, in collaboration with the University of Las Vegas Nevada, proposes a project - AccessCS10K - to increase the successful participation of students with disabilities in the new Exploring Computer Science (ECS) and Computer Science Principles (CSP) courses. Both courses are designed to introduce the big ideas in computer science and to inspire students from diverse backgrounds to consider computational competence as part of their career plans. This project focuses on the inclusion of students with disabilities. It has two objectives. The first is to build the capacity of ECS and CSP teachers to serve those students with professional development aimed at the CS 10K PD trainers, curricular units, online tutorials, virtual communities of practice for teachers, and real-time, individual teacher support. The second objective is to create accessible materials, both tools (including iterative refinement and deployment of the Quorum language) and curricular units that ECS and CSP teachers and students can use in their classrooms. The work will be led by teams at the University of Washington and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, building on the prior work of the Principal Investigators and experienced partners. Further, the project leaders will work in partnership with many of the current and future CS10K grantees and with developers of accessible tools and curricula to maximize the impact of their work. All students in ECS and CSP classes, regardless of disability, will benefit from more inclusive teaching strategies practiced by their teachers.
This project addresses the need to prepare computing educators for diverse students, including those with disabilities, and the need to create tools and curricula that meet the needs of diverse students including those with disabilities. An external evaluator, with the help on an internal evaluator, will track project activities, outputs, and early outcomes as part of the formative evaluation, and will help establish the impact of the interventions as part of the summative evaluation. The evaluation will assess how well CS 10K trainers able to learn and use the AccessCS10K professional development modules and whether CS 10K teachers able to use teaching strategies, individualized support, curricular units, and accessible technologies in their classrooms.
PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH
Note:
When clicking on a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) number, you will be taken to an external
site maintained by the publisher. Some full text articles may not yet be available without a
charge during the embargo (administrative interval).
Some links on this page may take you to non-federal websites. Their policies may differ from
this site.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
AccessCSForAll (formerly AccessCS10K): Including Students with Disabilities in Computing Education for the Twenty-First Century was funded to increase the successful participation of students with disabilities in Exploring Computer Science (ECS) and Computer Science Principles (CSP) high school courses. Both courses were designed to introduce big ideas in computer science and to inspire students from diverse backgrounds to consider computational competence as part of their career plans.
AccessCSForAll had one principal goal which was to increase the successful participation of students with disabilities in ECS and CSP courses. To achieve this goal AccessCSForAll focused on preparing ECS and CSP teachers to welcome and successfully teach students with disabilities in their courses. Project objectives were:
- to build the capacity of ECS and CSP teachers to serve students with disabilities through professional development training and intensive individualized real-time support.
- to create accessible materials that ECS and CSP teachers can use in their classrooms, both tools and curricular units.
Activities for Objective 1:
- Partner Engagement. Partners agreed to (1) include professional development (PD) materials on accessible technologies and effective teaching practices to include student with disabilities in their own PD programs; (2) encourage their PD staff to attend at least one capacity building institute; (3) inform teachers who participate in their PD about AccessCSForAll and its online resources and CoP; and 4) designate one person on their project to facilitate the partnership.
- Capacity-Building Institutes (CBIs). Project CBI agendas included presentations and discussions to explore access issues and solutions; focused on developing the expertise of the trainers with accessible tools and curricular units and on the concepts of universal design of instruction; participants were invited to join CoPs. CBI proceedings were shared via the website, through CoPs, at conferences, and within published articles.
- Professional Development Activities for Trainers. CBIs helped partners learn about accessible tools and effective teaching strategies to include students with disabilities. Staff helped partners plan their professional development efforts for their ECS and CSP teachers.
- Online Resources. The AccessCSForAll website, www.washington.edu/accesscomputing/AccessCSForAll, provided a clearinghouse for K-12 teachers to find resources related to their students with disabilities. Resources included links to information about effective teaching for students with disabilities and accessible tools and curriculum.
- Community of Practice (CoP) and Real-time Support. In CoPs practitioners helped each other improve practices. AccessCSForAll provided a phone number and email address for requesting individual assistance.
Activities for Objective 2:
- Iterative Refinement of Tools to Increase Accessibility to a Wide Variety of People with Disabilities. Project staff modified Sodbeans to make programming more accessible to students with disabilities and Quorum, an accessible programming language. Release notes are available at https://quorumlanguage.com/release.html.
- Create Accessible Curriculum for ECS. The ECS team asked us to adapt only chapter 4. It is online at https://quorumlanguage.com/ECS_Unit_4.zip.
- Create Accessible Curriculum for CSP. We saw CSP as an organizational structure for the big concepts in the discipline. We focused on adapting visual technologies to be accessible, with the first version of this accessible output system being placed in Quorum 6.0.
- Teach Students how to Invent Accessible Apps in ECS and CSP. AccessCSForAll staff worked to provide a standard way for teachers to not only ?include? students with disabilities in the classroom, but a mechanism whereby students with disabilities could work on difficult computer science problems that also have a direct benefit for students with similar disabilities. The final outcome of this area was that the team developed an Android capable version of Quorum.
- Hour of Code Activity. AccessCSForAll staff created and launched the first accessible online Hour of Code in 2014. Its tutorial is accessible for the visually-impaired, and works with screen readers. The Quorum Hour of Code is available on the Code.org website or at http://quorumlanguage.com/documents/hourofcode/part1.php.
- Online Accessible Programming using Modern Web Standards. AccessCSForAll continued to add further support to the Quorum programming language, allowing students who cannot easily use drag and drop animation interfaces to execute and manipulate Quorum code online. Quorum is now available online for a vast majority of the standard library.
- AccessCSForAll Development Partners. Project staff engaged a community of developers who helped create more accessible tools and curricula.
Broader Impacts from AccessCSForAll
AccessCSForAll?s principal broader impact was to broaden participation in computing fields by including more people with disabilities. The increased number and competence of students with disabilities in computing fields will improve the nation?s STEM and computing workforce. Individual students with disabilities will benefit from increased access to opportunities in one of the fastest growing parts of the national economy. ECS and CSP teachers will benefit by becoming more capable of including students with disabilities in their classrooms. Additionally, the accessible technologies and curricular units and more inclusive teaching strategies will strengthen computer science education. All students, regardless of disability, in ECS and CSP classes will benefit from more inclusive teaching strategies practiced by their teachers.
Last Modified: 11/29/2018
Modified by: Andreas M Stefik
Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.
