research-article

Measuring demographics and performance in computer science education at a nationwide scale using AP CS data

Authors:

Barbara Ericson,

Mark GuzdialAuthors Info & Claims

SIGCSE '14: Proceedings of the 45th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education

Pages 217 - 222

https://doi.org/10.1145/2538862.2538918

Published: 05 March 2014 Publication History

Get Access

Abstract

We examine the current state of computing education in the United States, in order to be able to identify problems in diversity and performance. Data on computing education are difficult to come by, since computer science courses are not tracked in US public education systems. By using a large and nationwide quantitative data source, we can gain new insights into who is participating in computing education, where the greatest need is, and what factors explain the variance between states. We used data from the Advanced Placement Computer Science A (AP CS A) exam to get a detailed view of the demographics of who is taking the exam across the United States and in each state, and how they are performing on the exam. We use economic and census data to provide explanations for some of the AP CS data. We find that minority group involvement is low in AP CS A, but the variance between states in terms of exam-takers is driven by minority group involvement. We find that wealth in a state influences the number of students taking the AP CS A exam, but indirectly.

References

[1]

W. R. Adrion, R. Fall, M. Matos, and A. R. Peterfreund. Integrating evaluation into program development: benefits of baselining a NSF-BPC alliance. In Proceedings of the 41st ACM technical symposium on Computer science education, SIGCSE '10, pages 27--31, New York, NY, USA, 2010. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[2]

O. Astrachan, A. Briggs, L. Diaz, and R. B. Osborne. CS principles: Development and evolution of a course and a community. In Proceeding of the 44th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education, SIGCSE '13, pages 635--636, New York, NY, USA, 2013. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[3]

N. C. C. Brown, M. Kölling, T. Crick, S. Peyton Jones, S. Humphreys, and S. Sentance. Bringing computer science back into schools: lessons from the UK. In Proceeding of the 44th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education, SIGCSE '13, pages 269--274, New York, NY, USA, 2013. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[4]

M. E. Caspersen and P. Nowack. Computational thinking and practice: A generic approach to computing in Danish high schools. In A. Carbone and J. Whalley, editors, The 15th Australasian Computer Education Conference (ACE 2013), Adelaide, South Australia, February 2013. Conferences in Research and Practice in Information Technology (CRPIT).

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[5]

B. Franke, J. Century, M. Lach, C. Wilson, M. Guzdial, G. Chapman, and O. Astrachan. Expanding access to K-12 computer science education: research on the landscape of computer science professional development. In Proceeding of the 44th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education, SIGCSE '13, pages 541--542, New York, NY, USA, 2013. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[6]

M. Goldweber. TAURUS: A "Taulbee survey" for the rest of us. ACM Inroads, 2(2):38--42, June 2011.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[7]

M. Guzdial, B. Ericson, T. McKlin, and S. Engelman. A statewide survey on computing education pathways and influences: factors in broadening participation in computing. In Proceedings of the Ninth Annual International Conference on Computing Education Research (ICER'12), pages 143--150, New York, NY, 2012. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[8]

C. M. Lewis, H. Khayrallah, and A. Tsai. Mining data from the AP CS A exam: patterns, non-patterns, and replication failure. In Proceedings of the ninth annual international ACM conference on International computing education research, ICER '13, pages 115--122, New York, NY, USA, 2013. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[9]

J. Margolis, R. Estrella, J. Goode, J. J. Holme, and K. Nao. Stuck in the Shallow End: Education, Race, and Computing. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2008.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[10]

S. Reges. The mystery of "b := (b = false)". In Proceedings of the 39th SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education, SIGCSE '08, pages 21--25, New York, NY, USA, 2008. ACM.

Digital Library

Google Scholar

[11]

S. Tavernise. Education gap grows between rich and poor, studies say. New York Times, February 9 2012.

Google Scholar

Cited By

View all

Stanfield M(2024)Bridging the GapMultisector Insights in Healthcare, Social Sciences, Society, and Technology10.4018/979-8-3693-3226-9.ch005(75-91)Online publication date: 5-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-3226-9.ch005
González-Pizarro FLópez CVásquez ACastro C(2024)Inequalities in Computational Thinking Among Incoming Students in an STEM Chilean UniversityIEEE Transactions on Education10.1109/TE.2023.333419367:2(180-189)Online publication date: Apr-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/TE.2023.3334193
Bahar KKaya EZhang XMjavanadze E(2023) Quo Vadis Racial Disparities? Trend Analysis of the Participation and Top Achievement in Advanced Placement Computer Science Exams Journal of Advanced Academics10.1177/1932202X23121848734:3-4(240-270)Online publication date: 28-Nov-2023
https://doi.org/10.1177/1932202X231218487
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

Measuring demographics and performance in computer science education at a nationwide scale using AP CS data
1. Social and professional topics
  1. Professional topics
    1. Computing education
      1. Computing education programs
        Computer science education

Recommendations

A statewide survey on computing education pathways and influences: factors in broadening participation in computing
ICER '12: Proceedings of the ninth annual international conference on International computing education research

In computing education, we have only just started developing methods for accurately measuring a student's understanding of introductory computing, let alone characterizing a whole classroom, school, or university system. As part of evaluating the impact ...
CS Education: Catching the Wave
SIGCSE '16: Proceedings of the 47th ACM Technical Symposium on Computing Science Education

Computer Science (CS) education has caught a wave -- of media attention, public support, public/private commitments, broad-based participation by educators, and a surge in student enrollments at the undergraduate level. It is a startling change over ...
K-12 CS Teacher Education: What are We Teaching and to Whom? How do We know We are Moving the Needle?
SIGCSE 2024: Proceedings of the 55th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 2

Over a decade ago, "Running on Empty: The Failure to Teach K-12 Computer Science in the Digital Age" (Wilson et al., 2010) compelled stakeholders in the United States to recognize the critical need for K-12 computer science (CS) education. The report ...

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

SIGCSE '14: Proceedings of the 45th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education

March 2014

800 pages

ISBN:9781450326056

DOI:10.1145/2538862

Conference Chairs:
J. D. Dougherty
J.D. Dougherty, Haverford College
,
Kris Nagel
Georgia Gwinnett College
,
Program Chairs:
Adrienne Decker
Rochester Institute of Technology
,
Kurt Eiselt
University of British Columbia

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 05 March 2014

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Request Permissions

Check for updates

Author Tags

Qualifiers

Research-article

Conference

SIGCSE '14

Sponsor:

SIGCSE

SIGCSE '14: The 45th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education

March 5 - 8, 2014

Georgia, Atlanta, USA

Acceptance Rates

SIGCSE '14 Paper Acceptance Rate 108 of 274 submissions, 39%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 1,595 of 4,542 submissions, 35%

Upcoming Conference

SIGCSE TS 2025

Sponsor:
sigcse

The 56th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education

February 26 - March 1, 2025

Pittsburgh , PA , USA

Contributors

Other Metrics

View Article Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

37
Total Citations
View Citations
558
Total Downloads

Downloads (Last 12 months)32
Downloads (Last 6 weeks)1

Reflects downloads up to 25 Jan 2025

Other Metrics

View Author Metrics

Citations

Cited By

View all

Stanfield M(2024)Bridging the GapMultisector Insights in Healthcare, Social Sciences, Society, and Technology10.4018/979-8-3693-3226-9.ch005(75-91)Online publication date: 5-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.4018/979-8-3693-3226-9.ch005
González-Pizarro FLópez CVásquez ACastro C(2024)Inequalities in Computational Thinking Among Incoming Students in an STEM Chilean UniversityIEEE Transactions on Education10.1109/TE.2023.333419367:2(180-189)Online publication date: Apr-2024
https://doi.org/10.1109/TE.2023.3334193
Bahar KKaya EZhang XMjavanadze E(2023) Quo Vadis Racial Disparities? Trend Analysis of the Participation and Top Achievement in Advanced Placement Computer Science Exams Journal of Advanced Academics10.1177/1932202X23121848734:3-4(240-270)Online publication date: 28-Nov-2023
https://doi.org/10.1177/1932202X231218487
Parker M(2023)Barriers and Supports to Offering Computer Science in High Schools: A Case Study of Structures and AgentsACM Transactions on Computing Education10.1145/357290023:2(1-27)Online publication date: 14-Mar-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3572900
Ramagoni SBrylow D(2023)The Impact of Certified CS Teachers on AP Computer Science Exam Scores: A Study in WisconsinProceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research - Volume 210.1145/3568812.3603486(30-31)Online publication date: 7-Aug-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3568812.3603486
Bahar AKaya EZhang X(2022)Gender Disparities in AP Computer Science Exams: Analysis of Trends in Participation and top AchievementJournal of Advanced Academics10.1177/1932202X22111949933:4(574-603)Online publication date: 15-Aug-2022
https://doi.org/10.1177/1932202X221119499
Parker MHendrickson K(2022)Capacity-related factors associated with computer science access and participation in Georgia public high schoolsPolicy Futures in Education10.1177/14782103221081920Online publication date: 14-Apr-2022
https://doi.org/10.1177/14782103221081920
Xie BOleson AEverson JKo A(2022)Surfacing Equity Issues in Large Computing Courses with Peer-Ranked, Demographically-Labeled Student FeedbackProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35129126:CSCW1(1-39)Online publication date: 7-Apr-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3512912
Bodon HWorsley MKumar V(2022)Youth Experiences with Authentically Embedded Computer Science in SportProceedings of the 21st Annual ACM Interaction Design and Children Conference10.1145/3501712.3535297(504-509)Online publication date: 27-Jun-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3501712.3535297
Oleson AXie BSalac JEverson JKivuva FKo A(2022)A Decade of Demographics in Computing Education Research: A Critical Review of Trends in Collection, Reporting, and UseProceedings of the 2022 ACM Conference on International Computing Education Research - Volume 110.1145/3501385.3543967(323-343)Online publication date: 3-Aug-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3501385.3543967
Show More Cited By

View Options

Login options

Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

Full Access

Get this Publication

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

PDF

eReader

View online with eReader.

eReader

Abstract

References

Cited By

Index Terms

Recommendations

A statewide survey on computing education pathways and influences: factors in broadening participation in computing

CS Education: Catching the Wave

K-12 CS Teacher Education: What are We Teaching and to Whom? How do We know We are Moving the Needle?

Comments

Information

Published In

Sponsors

Publisher

Publication History

Permissions

Check for updates

Author Tags

Qualifiers

Conference

Acceptance Rates

Upcoming Conference

Contributors

Other Metrics

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

Other Metrics

Citations

Cited By

Login options

Full Access

View options

PDF

eReader

Share

Share this Publication link

Share on social media

Affiliations