Active Recruiting
You may be one of the fortunate teachers in 46 states of the US, Australia, Israel, or the United Kingdom where computer science either counts as an elective or is a required part of the curriculum, (see state by state statistics here). If so, students have a graduation incentive to take computer science. Even so, the gender and ethnic composition of non-required courses may not reflect your school's general population. As discussed earlier in the course, it's important for many reasons (jobs, better technology, more productive workforce) to have all kinds of students interested in computer science.
Part 1 - Strategies
Learn about some strategies for student recruitment with Jennifer Rosato (NCCSE Director)
Part 2 - Strategies in Practice
Putting the Strategies Into Action - Jim Veseskis (Mobile CSP Professional Development Facilitator)
What Steps Can You Take?
NCWIT has a new workbook for high school teachers to recruit girls to computer science classes. Check it out here! The workbook includes information on:
Why it's important to actively recruit a diverse range of students to CS courses
Talking points for recruiting
How you can actively recruit, including:
Creating successful messages that connect to interests, confidence, belonging, and identity
Reaching out to students, counselors, parents, etc.
Raising the visibility of your CS classes
Raising the awareness of CS careers
Identifying what worked and what didn't
Where to find more information
Activity
Practice connecting messages for studying computer science to student interests using MIT Teaching Systems Lab's Swipe Right for CS game.
Counselors for Computing Packets
NCWIT Counselor's for Computing is a great resource for recruiting students to CS. Angela Cleveland, program director, shares more about how to use the resources included in the packets prepared for Mobile CSP. (If you didn't participate in Mobile CSP PD, you can request a C4c packet to share with your counselor at ncwit.org/c4c, though it will include slightly different resources.
Resources
Here are some great recruitment strategies from the AP College Board site.Â
The College Board also has free posters and brochures available. See here for AP CSP | See here for AP CSA
Mobile CSP's Student Recruitment folder provides some sample poster ideas to help get students to sign up for Mobile CSP at your school along with other materials.
Beyond the Flier: Four Actionable Ways to Grow Your CS Program by Jennifer Manly. This article includes email templates, sample presentations and sample videos to help with recruiting.
Discuss the following questions with other teachers in your professional development program.
What are 2 actionable strategies from above that you will take to recruit students for your CSP course?
How can you share the work of your students with your school and community?
What barriers do you think you will face in recruiting students? Do you or others have suggestions for overcoming them?
Activity
Create a student recruitment action plan. Learn more here.