The Education Board and Education Council – an update on activity

1. The Education Board and Education Council – an update on activity Andrew McGettrick ACM Education Council Meeting Denver, CO March 2013

2. Outline • Provide an overview of the Education Council and Education Board priority areas and changes here • Provide an brief update on activity • Provide an overview of discussions at a recent Ed Board meeting • Give a brief outline of some European developments

3. The Education Council • Education Council is internal to ACM and brings together all the computing education interests within ACM • Contains representatives from • Various SIGs, e.g. SIGCSE, SIGITE, SIGPLAN, SIGGRAPH, SIGCHI, SIGCAS • The two-year colleges committee (CCECC) • CSTA and the Computing Education Policy Committee • Editors of computing education publications • CSAB and ABET representatives • Industry • Education Board members • There are around 30 members in total • Meetings held every 8 months approximately

4. Identifying Priorities At a meeting of the Education Board in Seattle back in December 2010, the Board agreed its strategic priorities but also felt that it needed to provide a focus for current activity. The following priority areas were identified • CS 2013, the next major version of the Computer Science guidelines • The Advanced Placement initiative and the related CS 10k teachers issue • An educational initiative involving ACM India has been developing • Statistics gathering for all CS institutions which evolved into TauRus or rather the ACM-NDC project

5. Review of priorities • The Ed Board held a meeting in San Diego on 17th and 18th January 2013 and reviewed its priority areas. It would retain • CS 2013 • The Advanced Placement initiative and the related CS 10k teachers issue • An educational initiative involving ACM India • It also added two new priority areas for attention, namely online education and cyber security education • Of course, it would continue to retain an active interest in ACM-NDC (formerly TauRus) • Other projects are ongoing – CCECC project involving IT, IS project to review Masters level guidance, SE and CE updates, update of IT guidance

6. Online Education • At the previous Ed Council meeting in San Francisco in June 2012 we had an excellent session and associated discussion on MOOCs. It was organized by Mehran Sahami and involved • Candice Thille (CMU), Woodie Flowers (MIT), John Mitchell (Stanford) • Peter Norvig (Google) and Dave Patterson (Berkeley) • An outcome of that was the white paper which has appeared under the name of the Ed Council and can be found at http://www.acm.org/education/WhitePaperOnlineEducation2013 • It was also felt that some follow-up was needed and accordingly it was decided to hold a Symposium on Online Education • A co-chair will be Armando Fox from UC Berkeley; it will be held prior to SIGCSE 2014 in Atlanta, March 2014; Armando wishes to have a co-chair and this is being addressed

7. Towards the Symposium on Online Learning • Plans are at a very early stage of development. Tentatively: • The symposium (lasting around one and a half days, perhaps) should take place relatively soon, but not too soon; agreed date seems to be SIGCSE 2014 approximately • The proceedings should be published by ACM • There is much happening and it would be desirable to establish ACM’s position as a supporter of these efforts • An outcome of the Symposium should be a clearer picture of how online learning might be embedded in the ongoing activities of ACM • Online learning has the potential to underpin many of ACM’s activities in support of its members and it would be important for ACM to establish a position on this

8. Cyber security • The Ed Board had been approached by the National Science Foundation (NSF) regarding the possibility of creating a report similar to CS 2013 but for the area of cyber security • Following lots of discussion it was felt that the most appropriate way forward was to hold a meeting of recognized experts who would advise on the best way ahead • That meeting took place in Atlanta on 21st and 22nd February 2013 • More about this later

9. ACM Europe - Educational Developments • One initiative involves working with Informatics Europe and SIGCSE (Special Interest Group in Computer Science Education) to consider creating a highly prestigious computing education conference in Europe for Europeans • A meeting is due to take place at the Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI), the national research institute for mathematics and computer science, in Amsterdam • This will be adjacent to the (ninth) annual European Computer Science Summit (ECSS) organized by Informatics Europe and taking place on 7-9th October 2013 • SIGCSE will be present as well as Informatics Europe (IE) but also others who hold conferences on computing education in Europe • Possible annual conference co-sponsored by SIGCSE and IE • A second initiative also involves working with Informatics Europe and to create a report on computing in schools for Europe

10. Notes on Ed Board meeting • The Ed Board had a meeting in San Diego on 17th and 18th January 2013. Topics for discussion included: • The review of priorities • Certain changes to Ed Board and Ed Council membership • The various projects, etc. in which the Ed Board / Council are involved • Certain financial matters leading to our budget submission for the next fiscal year • Discussion of aspects of this Education Council meeting • Planning the cyber security meeting (that took place in February) • Ed Board and Ed Council changes have been implemented; there are ongoing issues here

11. Activity in UK • Considerable progress is being made in the UK on computing in schools • A new curriculum has been devised, and there is increased recognition of computer science, etc • These developments and others can be followed at the CAS - Computing at School web site www.computingatschool.org.uk

12. Summary of Education Board / Council activity • Strategic priorities have been revised with • two new areas added for immediate attention • Progress on all, and in particular progress on the new areas • Certain changes have been made to Ed Board and Ed Council membership; a note on these changes had been circulated • A brief overview of the recent Ed Board meeting • Other activities remain important and are ongoing