Teachers play an important role in shaping student outcomes in computing education, yet less attention has been paid to understanding how educators' underlying beliefs and values shape their instructional practices, particularly among underrepresented teachers who bring unique assets to computing education. This study situates the concept of pedagogical ethos in the context of computing education to understand the beliefs of educators and the ways they act on those beliefs through their teaching practices. In our case study of three educators in a professional development (PD) program, we analyze interview data to understand their beliefs about their pedagogical values and attitudes which we operationalize as observable practices. Findings reveal that participants' pedagogical ethos comprises three core dimensions: a) educators support increasing student access to computing education; b) the centering of students' experiences within educators' pedagogical practice; and c) how educators advocate on behalf of students and communities. We propose that these ethos can be used for designing culturally sustaining PD that recognizes the value of educators' beliefs and translating them into practices.

Embracing the idea that all students should learn the fundamentals of computer science (CS), the United States has funded the development of coalitions designed to expand CS education. This poster employs an exploratory comparative analysis using simple descriptive statistics to examine potential impacts of broadening participation in computing (BPC) coalitions, focusing specifically on measurement of the Expanding Computing Education Pathways (ECEP) Alliance in relation to state-level CS course access, state-level CS course participation, and states' adoption of the Code.org Advocacy Coalition's 10 Policies. Findings include that ECEP states consistently demonstrated higher rates of CS course access and participation than non-ECEP states. ECEP states also were either at parity or above in their adoption of CS education policies. In the live poster discussion, we will theorize these differences might be linked to the elements of the ECEP Model of State Change. Given the ongoing investment in BPC coalitions, these initial findings indicate promising results and warrant further research.

Are you looking to learn more about developing and executing research plans to best meet the needs of your CS education projects? Utilizing case studies from the evaluation research group at the Texas Advanced Computing Center intermixed with hands-on activities, this workshop will help you along your research or program evaluation journey! As a workshop participant, you will work through guided practice activities in small groups to deepen your understanding of how to design research and evaluation methods for your program. Key takeaways from this tutorial will be the steps and considerations for developing a research or evaluation plan that aligns data collection activities and analysis to your research or evaluation questions. Instrumentation will also be shared throughout, with participants taking away examples of surveys and interview protocols that have been effectively used by the team at the Texas Advanced Computing Center. Resources will also be provided on how to find additional instruments and how to assess and repurpose those for your projects. This tutorial will help you determine which data is most critical to collect and which methods are best suited for collecting that data based on your participants and program needs and resources.

Providing high-quality computing education to all students in primary school is essential for reducing computing disparities, by preparing students for success in secondary education. To impact the quality of computing education experiences for large numbers of diverse primary schools and students, a teacher professional development model must be designed for scalability from the outset. As many countries work to expand national access to computing education at the primary level and reach hundreds or thousands of teachers in the process, there is a need to understand effective systems-based strategies for scaling teacher professional learning across diverse schools and communities. This experience report will share lessons learned from the implementation of an initiative to prepare thousands of primary school (K-5) teachers to integrate computational thinking into their instruction.

There is growing consensus that focused attention on increasing the computer science (CS) certification of Black and Brown teachers is needed. More certified CS Black and Brown teachers can propel equity-based CS principles, support diverse CS classrooms, and diffuse culturally relevant teaching practices. The Computing Educator Diversity Initiative (CEDI) is a tailored in-person and online professional development program that supports the growth and development of CS knowledge and inclusive pedagogy for educators. CEDI specifically recruits teachers who reflect the racial and ethnic identities of the student populations in their schools. Through a Research-Practice Partnership (RPP) that facilitated use of improvement science tools, culturally relevant professional development, and collaboration, CEDI assisted aspiring CS teachers to become certified. Findings from two cohorts of CS teachers revealed that engaging within a cohesive community of practice led to the cultivation of CS expertise, pedagogical proficiencies, and equitable teaching methodologies.

The Computing Educator Diversity Initiative (CEDI) is focused around an innovative and interactive online learning process that focuses on teacher professional development. CEDI focuses on virtual versions of in-person workshops that highlight the importance of supporting educators of color as they prepare and eventually become certified to teach computer science. The poster will highlight how CEDI educators work within a community of practice to deepen their CS content knowledge, pedagogical skills, and equitable strategies to obtain their CS certification and become highly effective CS teachers. We will also present approaches and associated principles for preparing and supporting teachers of color through professional development, direct resources to teachers, and strategies for taking CS certification tests.

Collective impact is an approach for solving complex social problems at scale. The challenge of broadening participation in computing (BPC) is one such problem. The complexity of BPC is compounded by the decentralized nature of public education, where decisions are made primarily at the state level and subject to interpretation at the district level. As such, diversifying computer science (CS) pathways across the nation requires a systemic approach such as collective impact to engage all of the stakeholders who influence CS education and whose decisions can either facilitate or hinder BPC efforts. This experience report discusses how the collective impact framework has been used to advance the work of the Expanding Computing Education Pathways (ECEP) Alliance, an NSF funded BPC Alliance focused on states and state policy as the unit of change. We discuss how the five essential features of collective impact (common agenda, shared measurement, mutually reinforcing activities, continuous communication, and backbone support) coalesce to facilitate ECEP's theory of change. The report highlights specific policy changes that ECEP states have addressed to promote BPC, the flipped accountability that results from a non-hierarchical leadership model, and the challenges of measuring systemic changes as an intermediary to BPC.

In recent years, state members of the Expanding Computing Education Pathways (ECEP) Alliance have made efforts to increase access to and broaden participation in computing at the K-12 levels. Each ECEP state's K-12 computer science (CS) education journey has been documented during their ECEP membership resulting in over 25,000 digital documents. Over the course of the project it was necessary to track key events, identify trends across states, and maintain consumable records of state progress. A systematic way to collect and track the data is critical to conduct historical and cross-state analyses. In an effort to quantify and categorize, the researchers engaged in a review process of all ECEP reports, artifacts, and other relevant data to develop a system. Relevant and important components were identified in each type of document and assigned codes using ECEP's Five Stage Model ("a five-step process toward state-level CS education reform"), the Capacity, Access, Participation, and Experience (CAPE) framework (to measure equity in CS education implementation), and specific policies initiatives (alignment with various policy initiatives - Code.org's "Nine Policy Ideas to Make CS Fundamental to K?12 Education"). Indiana was identified as a state to conduct an initial, in-depth case study using this process. Indiana's case will be used as a model to further develop the stories of other ECEP Alliance member states. Through the development of a data dashboard, we hope to organize all of this information to make it more easily accessible for review and further analysis. The ECEP data dashboard development is currently in progress.

Despite the growing demand for computer science (CS) education for K-12 students, one of the most significant barriers to schools offering CS courses is the lack of certified teachers [1]. According to a report by Code.org [2], only a few states have initial CS certification teacher pathways resulting in differences among the types of qualification pathways. The lack of consistent and clear information is confusing for teachers, school districts, and advocacy groups. One of the challenges of creating a clear understanding of computer science teacher certification in the United States is that certificates can have many meanings, and definitions differ from state to state [3]. This study gathers nationwide data of all the pathways to teach computer science to create definitions for the multitude of CS credential pathways and demonstrates the spectrum of credential pathways.

Quantitative research in CS education has suffered from inattention to complexities inherent in measuring educational equity. This study aims to tease apart the complexities of educational equity and advance the field by developing a disparity index for quantifying inequities and using it to investigate the importance of accounting for intersectionality and distinguishing between access to and participation in CS education. This descriptive study analyzed student demographic and course-taking data for N=1,537,073 high school students in Texas. Results showed the disparity index can be a useful tool for quantifying and assessing equity in CS education. Disparities in terms of access to and participation in CS education were compounded for students who were members of multiple underrepresented subpopulations (e.g., rural Black females). Disparities differed between measures of access and participation. Implications of this study are that accounting for the intersectionality of students' multiple social identities and distinguishing between access and participation in quantitative measures are key to understanding (and thus addressing) the complexities of educational equity.

The Computer Science education community is supported by numerous national-focused consortia dedicated to addressing persistent inequalities in student pathways. This panel, comprised of leaders from four of those consortia (CAHSI, STARS, ECEP and RPPforCS) will use four key aspects of improvement communities as a framework for discussing the role, potential and impact of these consortia in supporting the equitable growth of computer science education. While not designed to be Network Improvement Communities per se, we draw upon those frameworks to focus on four specific aspects: 1) guided by shared goals with attention to equity; 2) engaging community in deep understanding of the problems and associated systems; 3) application of improvement science; and 4) coordinated efforts of shared learning and measurements. This will lead towards an open discussion with the audience focused on what has been empirically learned about the value these consortia have for their members and the broader CS Education community.

The expansion of K-12 computer science (CS) has driven a dramatic need for educators who are trained in CS content and pedagogy [1]. This poster describes our effort to train teacher candidates (i.e., pre-service teachers who are students seeking degrees within a College of Education), who are specializing in secondary mathematics education, to be future CS educators. We specifically describe our collaboration to provide a blended preparatory six-week training for the ETS CS Praxis exam (5652), assisting our pre-service students in satisfying the CS certification requirements in our state before they graduate and begin their professional teaching career. Given the unique challenges of pre-service CS teacher preparation [2], blended models, which combine both in-person and online instruction, are an effective approach to building a pre-service program. Within our pre-service CS program, students first complete a two-course pathway that prepares them in AP CSP content and pedagogy experiences, including observations in local AP CSP classrooms [3]. After completing the two courses, our students participate in the blended version of the WeTeach_CS Praxis preparation course to achieve certification. The in-person support provided by the blended model contributed significantly to certification success in this project. With a cut-score of 149 for the Praxis exam, all 11 of our pre-service students who completed the course received a passing score (including one student with a perfect score of 200, and another student with a 195); the average score for our pre-service students was 175. An additional 11 in-service teachers, with diverse backgrounds in CS content knowledge, also participated in the blended Praxis preparation course, with an average score of 166. Given the unique challenges of pre-service CS teacher preparation, university pre-service CS teacher programs should look to innovative models of teacher support developed by in-service programs to make substantial gains in CS teacher certification. Incorporating an asynchronous online course that allows teachers with a wide range of prior experience in CS to learn at their own pace with in-person coursework and support appears to be a viable model for assisting non-CS major teacher candidates in achieving a CS certification. With the blended model, even teachers with no background knowledge in CS were successful. Within our pre-service CS program, students first complete a two-course pathway that prepares them in AP CSP content and pedagogy experiences, including observations in local AP CSP classrooms [3]. After completing the two courses, our students participate in the blended version of the WeTeach_CS Praxis preparation course to achieve certification. The in-person support provided by the blended model contributed significantly to certification success in this project. With a cut-score of 149 for the Praxis exam, all 11 of our pre-service students who completed the course received a passing score (including one student with a perfect score of 200, and another student with a 195); the average score for our pre-service students was 175. An additional 11 in-service teachers, with diverse backgrounds in CS content knowledge, also participated in the blended Praxis preparation course, with an average score of 166. Incorporating an asynchronous online course that allows teachers with a wide range of prior experience in CS to learn at their own pace with in-person coursework and support appears to be a viable model for assisting non-CS major teacher candidates in achieving a CS certification. With the blended model, even teachers with no background knowledge in CS were successful.

Developing your computer science education research evaluation instruments from scratch may be no longer necessary thanks to the growing catalog of instruments curated by CSEdResearch.org. This workshop will teach participants how to find, remix, and use existing instruments by delving into the process of taking openly shared resources and repurposing them for your projects. In addition to discussing the importance of using instruments that have been shown to have evidence of reliability and validity, the team from The University of Texas at Austin will discuss how they amended existing surveys and interview protocols to develop tools customized to their needs for their NSF-funded CSforAll Research Practitioner Partnership. Workshop participants will break into groups and be given extensive time to review and revise research instruments. Key takeaways from this workshop will be the steps you need to take to choose an instrument based on your research question and study design, the role that validity and reliability play in instrument design, how to make modifications to an instrument (if needed) to better address your research question, and how to add your instruments to the CSEdResearch.org site.

A complex web of factors can influence whether students participate in computer science (CS) during high school. In order to increase participation in CS for all students, we need to better understand who is currently participating and what factors might be hindering participation. This study utilized a large-scale, student-level dataset from the Texas Education Research Center to investigate factors that predict high school student participation in CS and advanced CS courses. Our dataset contained information on over 1.1 million Texas high school students from the 2017-2018 school year, allowing us visibility into CS course availability in schools, student course taking, and detailed demographic information. We used multilevel mixed-effects logistic regression models to explore predictive factors of student participation in CS and advanced CS courses, limiting our analysis to students whose schools offered CS. In both models, our results showed that students who took Algebra I before high school had more than double the odds of being enrolled in a CS course. This work supports and extends previous understanding of factors that are predictive of CS participation in high school, contributing to the existing literature by uncovering the importance of Algebra I before high school as a potential gatekeeper to participation in CS.

Broadening participation in K-12 CS education at a statewide level is a challenge that requires substantial structural changes that need to be addressed across the K-12 system. At the same time, it is vital to find early successes in order to build both political and financial support for broadening participation in computing (BPC) efforts. Leadership teams from Expanding Computing Education Pathways (ECEP) Alliance states are responding to these two apparently conflicting drivers as they develop goals and metrics that measure outcomes that are both realistic in the short term and that will lead to long-term success. This lightening talk will discuss a framework for goal development used by Texas that addresses four interdependent components of the K-12 CS education system: capacity, access, participation, and equity. Focusing on measurable outcomes for each of these components can both lead to early "wins" that are meaningful and easily communicated to stakeholders and that lay the foundation for substantive changes in CS engagement and success for students from traditionally underrepresented groups including women, students of color, and students of low socio-economic status.

Students living in rural areas are less likely to attend schools that offer computer science (CS) courses largely because educational institutions in these remote areas lack the resources to staff teaching positions for these courses. This study investigated the impact of WeTeach\_CS, a program designed to train teachers to become certified to teach high school CS in Texas. The WeTeach\_CS collective impact model may be well suited to influence rural areas at scale because it utilizes an existing network of organizations across the state to bring high-quality professional development opportunities to teachers in remote areas. Results from a comparative interrupted time series analysis showed a significant, positive change in the rate in which the number of certified CS teachers in rural areas increased during the period of time after WeTeach\_CS began compared to the period before the program was implemented, whereas the number of teachers certified in technology applications showed no such change. Furthermore, the growth rate in the number of certified CS teachers was much higher for rural schools than urban, suggesting that collective impact models like WeTeach\_CS may be especially beneficial for rural communities.

Currently, 27 states and the District of Columbia have some form of teacher certification in computer science. This includes a variety of pathways such as endorsement, certification, licensure or other authorization that explicitly names CS. Many of these states, as well as those that have no CS teacher certification, are in the process of reviewing certification standards and pathways with the goal of increasing the number and quality of K-12 CS instructors and thus, access to high quality CS coursework in K-12. The Praxis exam is one of the few nationally recognized measures of CS teacher content knowledge but the current exam is out of date. A group of state leaders have been working with ETS to update the competencies measured by the Praxis. The objective of this BOF is to bring together stakeholders interested in contributing to the conversation around what a beginning CS teacher should know and be able to do to in CS, provide an overview of what has happened thus far to address these questions, share the recently revised Praxis draft framework, and give individuals an opportunity to provide input on the development of a national consensus related to new K-12 CS teacher competencies.

With the goal of better understanding how to increase the computer science (CS) teacher workforce, this study examined the factors that predict eventual success in achieving teacher certification in CS. Participants (N = 500) were teachers who were certified in other subject areas and who expressed an interest in becoming certified to teach computer science in Texas. Results showed that teachers were more likely to become certified in CS if they already held a certification in another STEM field or if they had some prior knowledge in CS. The extent to which teachers participated in an online professional development course predicted certification success after controlling for prior CS knowledge and other factors whereas the number of hours spent in face-to-face CS professional development did not. These findings have important implications for policy makers and professional development providers who make investments of time and money to grow CS teacher capacity and increase student access to computer science education at the high school level.

CS Education in primary and secondary schools has experienced a renaissance in the last few years as the CS for All initiative has gained traction across the nation. CS curricula abound and a new AP course, CS Principles, has been deployed that aims to broaden participation. Lack of consensus exists however in what constitutes a qualified CS teacher. A widely accepted and adopted modern certification/licensure process (CSTA 2013) must be developed. Professional development that can be rapidly scaled to build CS teacher capacity is required to realize the vision of CS for All across the nation. In this session we will engage state and national CS thought leaders to discuss the CS certification process, educator standards, and certification tests across various states to determine opportunities for future collaboration. What are the content standards that all beginning CS teachers must meet? What if any specific CS pedagogical topics need to be assessed? Applications today are built in teams and often deployed and distributed in the cloud. Are these topics too advanced for high school CS or should they be integral? How can professional development be designed to help teachers across multiple states meet certification standards? The existing standards from the ETS CS Certification test (Texas Education Agency, 2010) currently used in multiple states will serve as the baseline for group discussion and feedback.

Many states are taking up the President's challenge to provide CS for All. One of the most significant barriers to realizing this goal is the lack of trained and certified CS teachers. Building teacher capacity on a large scale is a challenge each of these panelists has tackled in their own region. Panelists will discuss the pros and cons of targeting in-service vs. pre-service teachers, online vs. face-to-face training, carrots vs. sticks, top down vs. bottom up strategies, and long-term vs. short term solutions to building capacity across an entire state or metropolitan area. Panelists represent CS for All efforts from Texas, New York City, and Arkansas.