Dive Brief:

• In order to help fight disparity in coding, 73 schools comprising the Digital Promise League of Innovative Schools are thinking creatively about how to get students interested in the subject.
• Tactics include exposing students to computational thinking at a young age, giving current educators the opportunity to get certified, making CS a graduation requirement, and providing out-of-school learning opportunities, eSchoolNews reports.
• Many schools use Code.org as a resource for adaptive professional development and no-cost curriculum templates and supplements, while others try to encourage coding beyond the classroom.

Dive Insight:

The DPLIS seems to be leading the way in the ongoing charge toward computer science in the classroom, and its actions to achieve that goal are noteworthy for districts looking to incorporate more coding. The 73 trendsetting schools are all using individual approaches, and school officials should pay close attention to discover new ideas that might work well in their own districts and communities.

President Barack Obama's new $4 billion “Computer Science for All” initiative is meant to boost the presence of skills like coding in K-12 classrooms and boost computer science literacy. Yet that can be hard to do for disadvantaged districts outside major cities like San Francisco, Chicago, and New York, where tech-savvy educators may be more easy to find. District leaders should utilize the free resources offered by Code.org, participate in the Hour of Code, and approach leaders like those schools participating in the DPLIS for ideas.