GETTING PRINCIPLED
Reflections on Teaching CS Principles
at Two College Board University Pilots
SIGCSE
March 2017, Seattle WA
Jeff Gray, Michele Roberts, Jonathan Corley
Slides will be available at: http://bit.ly/sigcse2017-cspU
Overview
■ Motivation and Background
■ Pilots
– IUPUI
– UA
■ Pilot Results
■ Lessons Learned
Motivation
■ According to the College Board, CS Principles will
– “be the largest debut of an AP ever in the history of the
College Board, with nearly 50 percent more teachers
launching the program than the previous crown-holder:
the AP World History exam, which had 998 teachers in
its first year”
■ There is a growing request from high school CSP teachers for
universities/colleges to offer a mapping to the new AP CSP course,
with a targeted course number for AP credit
■ Our paper shares some of our experiences in creating such a course,
with a few lessons learned, that may be of interest to other CS
Departments considering a new similar CSP course in their curriculum
Attestation
http://www.csprinciples.org/home/about-the-project/attestation
The Need
Background – CSP Pilots
■ From 2010-2016 over various phases, the CSP course was piloted
■ Final Phase: 50 pilots (38 HS teachers and 12 university teachers)
■ Our paper focused on two of the university pilots:
University of Alabama and IUPUI
■ http://www.csprinciples.org/home/pilot-sites
2011-2012
2012-2013
2013-2016
Key Findings
■ College Board approved, and Haynie Research provided access, to the
student responses from our Pilot courses
– Our paper summarizes the past three years of our Pilot courses
■ Enrollment of women in the CSP course at each of our universities
was twice that of our Department’s traditional CS 1
– But one of our CSP courses showed less enrollment impact for
other URMs compared to the CS 1 course. Different from AP CSP
■ A significant difference was observed in the DFW
(Drop/Fail/Withdraw) rates for CSP compared to the CS 1 course.
– At both IUPUI and University of Alabama, the DFW rate for CSP is
only 2% and 3%, respectively, but for CS 1 it ranges from 18% to
54% at IUPUI and 50% to 61% at the University of Alabama.
■ Significant gains in pre-post CS self-confidence
IUPUI PILOT
Indiana University, Purdue University at
Indianapolis (IUPUI)
■ IUPUI is an urban research university located in downtown
Indianapolis
■ Downtown regional campus of IU’s main Bloomington campus and
Purdue’s main West Lafayette campus, with total student enrollment
at 30K, over 90% of which are state residents
Indiana University, Purdue University at
Indianapolis (IUPUI)
■ The CSP pilot was run by Senior Lecturer Michele Roberts from the
Computer Science Department (located in the School of Science).
■ The CS Department serves about 2,100 students a year (including
both majors and non-majors)
Course Launch
■
The CSP pilot launched in Spring 2014
–
Has been offered every Fall and Spring thereafter
■
The course launched with 22 enrolled students
■
The course is offered as a 3-credit, 200 level course for
non-majors
■
After a first successful semester, CSP was marketed to
advisors in face-to-face meetings using:
–
Syllabus
–
sample lab descriptions
–
student project displays
–
testimonials from students
The Course Growth and Evolution
■
In Fall 2015, school and university administration were successful in adding the CSP course in
the Analytical Reasoning category of state core educational requirements.
–
■
■
i.e., Approved to substitute for 3 of 9 required hours of mathematics
By Fall 2016, enrollment had grown
–
175 students (from 22 at launch)
–
5 full and waitlisted sections
In Fall 2016, CSCI faculty voted to count passing AP CSP scores of 3 or higher with CSP credit.
Pilot Administration
■ The IUPUI pilot was run with strong fidelity to the College Board
Curriculum Framework, delivering content within the CSP “Big Ideas”
■ Through Spring 2016 (when the pilot ended), CSP students submitted
the two Performance Tasks and completed a Final Exam
UA PILOT
University of Alabama (UA)
■ UA is a suburban public research university located in a college town
(Tuscaloosa), with an approximate total enrollment of 37,000
■ 46% of University of Alabama students are in-state residents
■ CS Department has approximately 700 undergrads/70 grads
CS 104
■ The CSP course at UA is offered as a 3-credit course within the
Department of Computer Science in the College of Engineering.
■ College Board CSP Pilot from 2011-2016 (UA and UW-Madison were
longest running university CSP Pilots)
■ Since 2013, the course is primarily enrolled by non-majors,
specifically Secondary Math Education (SME) and Math majors.
Pilot Administration
■ Programming Language: Snap!
■ Textbook: Blown to Bits and selected readings
■ Pedagogical approach: Cooperative learning structures
■ Similar to IUPUI, the UA pilot was run with strong fidelity to
the College Board CF. Performance Tasks done as HW; even
included former “Investigate” as an in-class activity
■ Spring 2016, UA formally recognizes CS 104 for AP CSP
mapping
■ 2016-2017 academic year moved to two offerings, with
waitlisted enrollment capped at 40
PILOT RESULTS
Broadening Participation (IUPUI)
Year
2013-2014
2014-2015
2015-2016
CSP
CS 1
CSP
CS 1 CSP
CS 1
Women
37%
13%
58%
12%
63%
22%
URM
8%
12%
18%
9%
19%
20%
■ Successful at Broadening Participation
– Female participation rose from 37% to 63% from first to most
recent offering
– Other URM (Latino and African Americans) rose from 8% - 19%
– These numbers compare more favorably with the more
homogeneous CS 1 population
Broadening Participation (UA)
Year
2013-2014
2014-2015
2015-2016
CSP
CS 1
CSP
CS 1 CSP
CS 1
Women
52%
27%
55%
26%
70%
28%
URM
30%
16%
21%
21%
13%
21%
■ Successful at Broadening Participation
– Female participation rose from 52% to 70% from first to most recent
offering
– Other URM DECREASED from 30% to 13%
– The gender numbers are much improved over CS 1, but URM interest
was disappointing
Student Success (DFW rates)
Year
2013-2014
2014-2015
2015-2016
CSP CS 1 CSP CS 1 CSP CS 1
IUPUI-DFW
2%
54%
2%
23%
2%
18%
UA-DFW
3%
52%
3%
60%
3%
51%
■ Pilots at both universities saw surprisingly low levels of DFW rates
(Drop, Fail, Withdraw rates)
– Less than 3%, which compares to CS 1 DWF rates of 50% or
higher
■ Pilots at both universities saw high levels of pass rates
– Pass rates were above 97%, 30% higher than pass rates for CS 1
Student Self-Confidence
CSP Students Experienced an Improvement in Confidence with CS!
■ Survey question: “I have confidence when it comes to CS”
■ Both CSP pilots observed a significant pre-post gain in student
confidence
IUPUI
UA
Student Interest in CS
CSP Students Experienced No Change in Interest
■ Survey Question:
“I would take additional CS courses if given the opportunity”
IUPUI
UA
Student Interest in CS
■ Disappointing results: neither pilot showed a significant pre-post
impact
■ Neutral results: No loss, but also no gain
■ IUPUI: One change made since reporting these results was to provide
CSP students with course pathways subsequent to CSP completion;
we are monitoring impact, if any
LESSONS LEARNED
Kudos to the CSP Community
■ Fantastic community support for CSP resources
– CS10k Community, Endorsed Providers, Many NSF projects (e.g.,
TeachGlobalImpact.org)
■ CSP curriculum is indeed engaging and welcoming
■ Recommended cooperative learning strategies worked well at both
universities
University-level CSP Course Challenges
■ Curriculum coverage in 1 semester is impossible
(48 contact hours vs over 180 in AP CSP)
■ Culture challenge to faculty committed to a lecture
approach, but opportunity to map back success
from CSP to traditional CS curriculum
■ Covering the programming Big Idea in a single
semester (~12 hours) with non-majors
CSP
CS1
Student Voices
■ Group projects
■ Socially Relevant
■ Wrote programs that they could show off on a cell phone
■ Myth-busting: “I did it” “This is fun!” “Who knew Computing was
Creative?”
■ Pseudo- code
■ Debugging
■ Journaling (however, seems more popular for AP CSP)
Conclusions
■ Summary evaluation results of 3-year student of CSP course at two separate
university College Board Pilots
■ Two separate pathway approaches for CSP
– UA: SEMA students, IUPUI: general math elective
■ Positive Outcomes
– Very deep increase in enrollment diversity with respect to gender
– Significant gains in student self-confidence in CS
– Substantial decrease in DFW rates compared to CS1
– UA: Math Education students increased engagement with CS department and
pre-service training of future CSP educators
■ Surprising Results
– Decrease in URM enrollment at UA, increase at IUPUI
– No change in student CS interest before/after CSP
– Challenges in implementing full AP CSP curriculum in university course
Acknowledgements
■ We would like to thank the College Board, through support from the
National Science Foundation, for selecting us as CS Principles Pilot
instructors.
– In particular, we are grateful to Lien Diaz at the College Board,
Owen Astrachan and Amy Briggs (NSF PIs), and Jan Cuny (NSF).
■ Special thanks to Kathy Haynie and Sheryl Packman for their help with
evaluation data.
■ Part of the project at the University of Alabama was supported in part
by NSF CE21 (1240944).
■ The CS104 course at Alabama also benefitted from the support of
Amber Wagner, Brian Eddy and Mokter Hossain.
QUESTIONS /
COMMENTS
Thank y’all!