Micro-Credentials - Active Recruitment Strategies

Details

Key Method

The educator implements equitable recruitment strategies by examining school context, developing personally meaningful messaging to students, formulating a recruitment plan, and actively reaching out to individual students or student groups.

Method Components

Overview

A number of recent studies have highlighted the obstacles that marginalized student communities face in accessing advanced computer science (CS) coursework, including lack of media images and role models, differential teacher encouragement, and differential rates of technology access within their schools or homes. To close gaps in access and achievement, it is imperative that educators make concerted efforts to recruit students from diverse backgrounds. Note that while this micro-credential is written for high school computer science, educators from other disciplines may also find it useful.

Studies of recruitment strategies point to key themes that educators can emphasize to increase engagement with and enrollment in computer science courses. Below are several recruitment themes, or particular ways of representing the broader field of computer science that may appeal to students who otherwise would not think computer science is “for them.”

Recruitment Themes

• Interest: Connect with students’ personal interests and life experiences
  • Art and design: Computers can be used to create static and interactive art and can aid in the design process. Show examples of algorithm-generated visual art or a video of musical live coding.
  • Culture: Highlight the role of computing in popular culture, such as digital music mixing or smartphone apps. Algorithmic and computational practices also appear in indigenous cultures around the world in practices such as weaving and beadwork. Culture can also be documented using computing tools, such as digital community archives or machine learning for languages.
  • STEM: Scientific and mathematical work is increasingly reliant on computing tools and technologies. Provide examples where computing has led to breakthroughs, such as genetics and analyzing big data.
  • Future careers: Expose students to the myriad careers involving computing, especially in regard to how they intersect with students’ interests.
  • Fun: Most importantly, learning to code should be fun! Communicate your own enthusiasm for coding and show fun examples of what students might create in your classes using code, such as games, emojis, photo filters, or stories.
• Belonging: Highlight community aspects of computing
  • Collaboration: Computer science is often seen as a solitary, lonely, and “geeky” pursuit, but this is far from reality. Coding is often done in groups, and showing students the role of collaboration and social interaction through projects, teamwork, hackathons, and clubs can counteract these antisocial messages.
  • Project-based instruction: Ask students to identify issues of concern in their school or community and to develop a technology-based solution.
  • Social impacts: Engage students in discussions of the social impacts of computing, such as data, privacy, surveillance, and algorithmic bias.
• Identity: Support students in developing identities in computing
  • Undermine stereotypes: Counteract unhelpful narratives and perceptions by presenting students with examples of computer scientists and engineers who do not fit the gender and racial stereotypes of what a computer scientist should look or sound like.
  • Present role models: Engage with real-life role models from underrepresented groups in computer science and technology.

Recruitment Activities

Below is a list of proven activities educators can undertake to recruit more diverse students to participate in computer science. This list is certainly not exhaustive, and educators are encouraged to innovate and develop strategies tailored for their school communities.

• Educate administration and staff. For introductory computer science classes, it is important that there are no barriers for participation, such as math skill prerequisites. Refer to the School Resources section for ideas on how to work with counselors to eliminate the possibility of students getting “counseled out” of computer science courses.
• Reach out to individual students or groups of students personally. Talk to them or send a letter or email home to their parents. Students’ peer groups, teams, and clubs represent a unique opportunity to recruit multiple students together.
• Involve parents. Send out mailers, brochures, or informational emails.
• Host open houses or informational nights.
• Ask current students to recruit future students. Empower past students to act as “evangelizers” of computer science and give presentations promoting your CS course.
• Recruit from other classes. Give a presentation or plan a collaborative lesson with teachers from other subjects, showing how computing is used in those fields.
• Organize an Hour of Code event. Work with classroom teachers or librarians to engage all students in an annual Hour of Code.
• Host a CS awareness week. CSEdWeek, which happens each year in early to mid December, is an ideal time to highlight computer science course offerings. See if you can schedule a school-wide event with support from parents and community members. Invite current students to share their work publicly to attract prospective students.

Steps for Implementing Equitable Recruiting Strategies

After reviewing the themes and activities for recruiting, educators will be ready to develop a personalized recruitment plan. The Student Recruitment Planning Guide (provided in the Resources section) is recommended as a starting point.

1. First, examine your current school’s demographic and cultural contexts. Consider these questions: What does current enrollment look like in computer science courses? Are there some student groups that are often excluded from computer science? How might you attract those students to participate in computer science? What barriers might those students be facing?
2. Decide which theme or themes will be most compelling for students, and develop recruitment messaging based on those themes. Messaging may be a verbal “pitch,” emails, printed flyers, posters, or an activity. Make sure to include logistical information about when classes will be held and how students can register. If students have additional questions, you might invite them to visit you during dedicated office hours.
3. Connect with other members of your school or district community who can help with recruitment. Consider scheduling an event to draw attention to your computer science courses, such as presenting to another class, teaching a joint lesson with another teacher, or hosting an Hour of Code event.
4. Implement your recruitment plan. Collect data during recruitment, so you will later be able to evaluate how effective your plan was. For example, you might document the number of class visits made, emails sent to parents, or locations where flyers were posted.
5. Reflect on how you could improve student recruitment for the future. Make sure to consider not just the overall number, but also the demographics of students recruited.

Assessment Details

To earn this micro-credential, you must receive a “passing” evaluation for Parts 1 and 3, and a “Yes” for Part 2.

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Research & Resources

Supporting Research and Rationale

Resources

Score Description

Submission & Evaluation

Part 1: Overview

Prompt

Describe your school context and recruitment messaging plan, including answers to the following questions:

a. What does current enrollment look like in your school’s computer science courses (if your school has a computer science program)?

b. Are there some student groups that are excluded from computer science? If so, how might you attract those students to participate in computer science? Describe the themes (interests, belonging, identity) you plan to use in your recruitment messaging to reach those students.

Part 2: Work Examples/Artifacts

Prompt

To earn this micro-credential, please complete and submit the following:

1. Recruitment Plan: Complete the UTeach Student Recruitment Planning Guide, found in the Resources section above. Feel free to add to the template, including these things:
   • Student populations or groups you plan to target for recruitment, and how to reach them through active, personalized efforts.
   • At least one other individual who can help with recruitment in your school or district.
   • Dates and descriptions of at least two planned recruitment activities.
2. Recruitment Artifact: Provide one artifact you created for recruitment. Examples of artifacts may include a script for a verbal recruitment pitch, a flyer or poster, an “Hour of Code” activity, or an email to parents or counselors. The artifact should demonstrate active and equitable recruitment strategies corresponding with the cultural and demographic contexts of students at the educator’s school.

Part 3: Reflection

Prompt

Provide a written reflection describing the implementation and impact of your recruitment strategies. Your response should address the following questions:

• How effective were you in recruiting students into computer science courses? What data supports this conclusion?
• What additional steps will you need to take to sustain interest and retain individual students or groups of students?