Understanding how to design and implement equity-based approaches to technology-rich learning in community settings can lead to increased and diversified participation in computing. However, research has shown that making practices can be inequitable, particularly for populations who are situated in low-resourced settings. In US cities, recreation centers have been shown to be promising sites for equity-based hands-on maker learning. However, it is unclear what approaches are needed to create the necessary technical and social infrastructure at these sites to support community uptake. Our study investigates the infrastructure development process for an equity-based makerspace program as developed within city-run community recreation centers in two US cities over 3 years. We developed an infrastructure map depicting the ecosystem of multiple organizations that are involved in creating the program and identified how digital technologies within makerspaces function as sociocultural factors within this ecosystem.

Data storytelling workflows ask learners to integrate analytical, design, and narrative skills, but instructors rarely have the capacity to provide detailed feedback at each step. Computational and AI-assisted storytelling offers opportunities to support student learning, but how feedback should be structured effectively remains unclear. To address this gap, we conducted a two-phase participatory design study. Through participant observations (N=8) and interviews (N=6), the first phase explored learners and educators’ feedback needs and challenges in a data storytelling course. The second phase conducted two design workshops (N=8/10) to design and evaluate feedback strategies (frequency, seamlessness, accountability) for Story Studio: an AI-assisted narrative storytelling application. Our findings show that participants perceived on-demand and process feedback modes as effective, but automatic and outcome feedback as slightly more persuasive. We discuss implications for designing AI-augmented storytelling systems that adapt their feedback modes to the diverse needs and expectations of students.

Personal informatics refers to the data-driven, iterative process of collecting personal data, reflecting on it, and using the resulting insights to inform positive behavioral change. This practice, which grows in popularity with the widespread availability of wearable devices, can also be viewed as a form of data-driven scientific inquiry into personal behavior. When embedded in educational contexts, personal informatics offers college students an authentic and active learning experience that cultivates both data science skills and self-regulation, which are critical competencies for learners whose executive functions are still developing. In this work, we describe a personal informatics project piloted in an introductory data science course. The project began with scaffolded supports to help students identify areas of their lives they wished to improve and to formulate testable hypotheses informed by existing literature. Students then collected personal data continuously over a five-week period, and met with their accountability partner weekly to discuss and reflect on the data based on initial analysis. In the second half of the semester, students engaged in hands-on labs designed to help them generate deeper insights into their own behaviors while building key data analytics skills. These included data wrangling and visualization, making sense of data artifacts, and applying statistical inference techniques. Students wraped up the projects by crafting creative products (e.g. Infographics or Memes) that can be shared with peer students. We present an overview of analysis of students' final reflection and creative artifacts. Our findings offer insights into how this multi-purpose learning activity can be improved to support students' development as data science learners, while empowering them to engage in meaningful, evidence-based inquiry grounded in their lived experiences.

Blind and low-vision (BLV) university students often encounter campus accessibility challenges that impede their ability to navigate campus environments effectively. The lack of customization offered by some navigational-focused assistive technologies (ATs) often falls short in addressing their diverse and specific navigational needs. 3D printing, a promising tool for creating affordable and personalized aids, has been explored as a method to create customized tactile maps to aid BLV individuals with general navigation. However, the use of 3D-printed tactile maps by BLV university students and the impact of their direct involvement in the design process remain largely unexplored. We employed a participatory design (PD) approach to engage BLV students from a university in the United States (U.S.) through semi-structured interviews and a co-design session to create a prototype 3D-printed tactile map. Additionally, we consulted with a blind rehabilitation and independence expert for insight into their perspective on AT and, more specifically, tactile maps and showed the prototype to a group of visually impaired youth and instructors visiting our university for feedback. We present and discuss our findings, provide an overview of the prototype design process, and outline future work.

Understanding how to design and implement equity-based approaches to technology-rich learning can lead to increased and diversified participation in computing. Do-it-yourself (DIY) and maker approaches to interactive technology learning have been hailed as potential equalizers of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education for underserved youth, a narrative challenged by scholarship that has shown that if not designed carefully, making can be exclusionary and hegemonic. Equity-based approaches to making have identified the crucial role of community educators to prioritize community assets and learner participation. We studied educators’ strategies and youth outcomes in four afterschool maker programs in urban recreation centers. Community educators used several equity-based strategies to engage youth that included: identifying their interests through direct conversation and indirect signaling, customizing program activities to respond to interests, and encouraging self-expression and authenticity. These strategies led to increased social connections among youth, and increased technology self-efficacy and project ownership.