The impact of computer science education on Oregon's economy

What if I told you that I know how to increase the future earnings of Oregon students by 8%?

A recent study from the University of Maryland shows a cause-and-effect relationship between taking a computer science course in high school and future earnings.  The study shows that students who took a computer science course earn 8% more money than other students.  Furthermore, the effect is greater for classically underrepresented communities.  Females showed a 10% increase in earnings, students from lower socioeconomic status showed a 14% increase, and Black students showed a 12% increase.

Here's how Maryland did it.

Maryland "has rapidly expanded CS course offerings over the last decade. A 2018 law further requires all Maryland high schools to offer at least one “high-quality” CS course aligned with rigorous K-12 CS standards. These “high-quality” courses include foundational courses such as Computer Science Essentials, AP courses such as AP Computer Science Principles, and more specialized programming courses. They are also closely aligned with Code.org’s definition of “foundational” CS courses."

Last year, researchers at the University of Maryland analyzed the impact of these measures by looking at the "rich longitudinal data from the Maryland Longitudinal Data System (MLDS) Center".  Their "study is among the first that offers causal evidence on how access to these “high-quality” CS courses in high school affects" future earnings.

In short, the state of Maryland recognized the importance of computer science education and took steps to provide more of it to their students.  And now, they're reaping objectively measureable benefits.

Let's do a thought experiment to translate Maryland's experiences to Oregon.  With respect to computer science education, Oregon is starting from almost ground zero.  Last year, Code.org published their 2023 report on the state of computer science education.   This report ranks each state on the number of policies that they implement that support computer science education.  Maryland ranks near the top, implementing 9 of the 10 recommended policies, while Oregon is dead last among the 50 states, implementing only 1 of 10 policies.  So it's conservative to estimate that we'll get a similar benefit from increased spending on computer science education.

The average annual salary in Oregon is $70,000, for which people pay an average of $13,290 in state taxes.  If that salary were increased by 8% to $75,600, the tax would be $15,012, an increase of $1,722 in tax revenue.  Since there are around 2.2 million Oregon taxpayers, the net increase to the state's revenue would be about $3.8 billion.  Admittedly, these calculations assume that every student takes a course in computer science.  But if only 1 of 50 students takes a computer science course, the Oregon revenue increase is still $76M.

According to the Oregon plan for computer science education, the annual cost to fully fund the plan, including teachers salaries, would be $25M.

People, we cannot afford not to spend the money on computer science education.

We've already taken significant steps towards improving computer science education.  In 2023, we published our first plan for computer science education.  The experts at the Oregon Department of Education (ODE), led by Andrew Cronk, are currently working on Oregon's first standards for computer science education.

But we still have a long way to go to get to where Maryland is:

• Oregon dedicates no money to training computer science teachers

• If someone wants to become a computer science teacher, there's no pathway to get certified in computer science education

• There are no statewide requirements that schools teach computer science

• There's no statewide policy to allow computer science to count towards a core graduation requirement

• There's no statewide policy to allow computer science to satisfy a college admission requirement

Our next step we must take is to pass the legislation we need to support computer science education.  Such legislation should:

• Require computer science learning opportunities be available to all public school students K-12.

• Fund and authorize permanent positions to support computer science education at ODE

• Establish computer science as a content area

• Allocate stable, long-term funding for computer science education

• Give control of that funding to the computer science education experts at ODE

The first step to creating this legislation is to create a legislative concept.  And the deadline for creating such a concept is September 27th, 12 days from now!

If you support computer science education, please let your representative and senator know.  Act today!

Bringing computer science education to Oregon's underserved communities

Last week, my wife showed me a great story in the Cedar Mill News about a remarkable group of Westview High School students who set up a non-profit called the NorthWest Data Science Collective "dedicated to democratizing data science education for underserved communities. Established in 2022 and based in Portland, Oregon, NWDSC targets low-income and minority students, providing them with free, virtual educational programs in programming, machine learning, and statistical applications. The courses focus on interactive and hands-on learning, culminating in capstone projects where students apply their skills to real-world problems."  NWDSC offers instruction in Data Science, Machine Learning, Programming, and Artificial Intelligence.  Their motto is "Empowering young students with the wonders of data science".

When I heard about NWDSC, my first thought was how great it is that a dedicated group of kids is helping prepare Oregon for the future by giving underprivileged students the technical skills they'll need to succeed.  According to the NWDSC website, they've reached over 100 students, a great achievement for the four members of the NWDSC team.

But, according to the Oregon Blue Book, the number of students in Oregon's public schools for kindergarten through 12th grade, is 571,018.  Shouldn't we be providing computer science education to all of them?

You might wonder why these altruistic volunteers decided on computer science education as their best opportunity to improve the futures of underserved communities.  Why, for example, did they not create a program focused on math, chemistry, or something else?

Perhaps the NWDSC team was aware of the sad reality that Oregon is the worst state in the country for computer science education, and they saw an opportunity to fill that need.  

You might be surprised that I say that Oregon is the worst state for computer science education.  But every year, Code.org produces a report on computer science education.  Code.org's 2023 State of Computer Science Education report ranks every state on 10 key policy initiatives.  Page 11 of the report has a map of the United States labeling each state with the number of policies that the state implements that promote computer science education.  Oregon is in last place since we only implement one out of the 10 policies.

The things we fail to do include:

• Oregon has no standards for computer science education

• Oregon dedicates no money to train teachers to teach computer science

• If someone wants to become a computer science teacher, there's no pathway to get certified in computer science education

• There are no statewide requirements that schools teach computer science

• There's no statewide policy to allow computer science to count towards a core graduation requirement

• There's no statewide policy to allow computer science to satisfy a college admission requirement

In short, we're not encouraging schools to offer computer science, teachers to teach computer science, or students to take computer science.  This is in stark contrast to the many other areas funded in Oregon's public schools -- math, English, chemistry, art, music, history, basketball, soccer, ...

People, we can do better than this.  If we want to prepare our children for a world where algorithms determine what information they see, robots are becoming omnipresent in their lives, and artificial intelligence is producing an increasing amount of the content that distract their attention; where technical knowledge is critical to getting a job -- any job, we must do better.

The good news is that Oregon published a Plan for Computer Science Education in December of last year.  Remarkably, the main goal of the plan is almost the same as NWDSC's goal -- to ensure that Oregon provides computer science education equitably to all of Oregon's students.  This plan lays out the specific steps we need to take to make computer science education a viable reality in Oregon.  

But this plan will go nowhere without funding, which means that we need to pass legislation to provide that funding.  And the first step to creating such a law is to create a legislative concept.  This legislative concept should contain three items:

1. Permanently fund a "CS Education Director", a position in the Oregon Department of Education to be responsible for computer science education

2. Allocate 1/2 of 1 percent of ODE's budget for computer science education

3. Give the CS Education Director complete control over how the money for computer science education is spent.

Oregon legislators, I'm talking to you.  I need someone to work with me to create a legislative concept and introduce it to the House of Representatives.  And the deadline for creating such a concept is September 27th, less than three weeks away!  Please step up to help fund this vital initiative.

Turning Oregon's girls into tech savvy women

Oregon has a crying need for more tech savvy people.  According to Code.org, Oregon averages 7,260 open computing jobs each month.  At the same time, fewer than 2,000 students are graduating with computer science degrees.

Where can we find the people to fill these jobs?

Looking at the demographics, our biggest opportunity is to educate our female student population.  Studies have shown that girls are just as capable as boys.  And yet women make up a small fraction of the people working in tech.  We need to change the way that we teach computer science to include girls and other underrepresented populations.

Luckily, one of the world's top experts on teaching computer science to underrepresented communities is our own Professor Joanna Goode, the Sommerville Knight Professor in the University of Oregon College of Education. She helped create Exploring Computer Science, a curriculum and professional development program used in schools across the country.  Professor Goode was recently interviewed by Oregon Public Broadcasting where she talks about Oregon's statewide plan for computer science education.

According to Code.org's report on the state of computer science education, Oregon is the worst state in the country for computer science education policies.  Please check out OPB's interview with Professor Goode to get a better idea of the challenges and opportunities that we face to implement this plan.

But having a plan is not enough.  The plan provides a roadmap, but we need to provide sustained funding to ensure its success.  The upcoming legislative session is our best opportunity to do that.  Please reach out to your representative and senator to let them know that you want them to take action to provide this funding.

Our future depends on it.

Pete Steinfeld
Executive Director
TechStart

Funding the Implementation of Oregon's Plan for Computer Science Education

Oregon is often referred to as the Silicon Forest and has traditionally been home to high technology companies such as Intel, Tektronix, and HP. These companies have spun off hundreds of other businesses. Oregon is also noted for our software and IT industry with companies specializing in design, digital & social media, financial solutions, open source, training, mobile applications, and health care. More than 5,300 software and IT companies were located in Oregon over the past 10 years.

Technology and software industries support high paying jobs that pay Oregon’s taxes. Oregon’s software industry pays an average S140,000 annually, more than double the average across all industries. However, software employment statewide is down 7,4% from its peak in 2022. 

It is critical that Computer Science and software remain vital Oregon industries. To help grow the software industry we need to train more programmers and software engineers starting with state-funded K-12 computer science education. 

Introducing the CODE.org Advocacy Coalition for Computer Science Education 

The Code.org Advocacy Coalition includes over 100 industry, nonprofit, and advocacy organizations with the goal of making computer science a fundamental part of K-12 education. Code.org’s 2023 State of Computer Science Education Report describes ten policy recommendations for K-12 computer science education (page 5 in report). States are graded on whether their K-12 computer science education programs implement the ten policy recommendations. 

Oregon is the worst state in the country, meeting only one of the policy recommendations (page 11 in report). 

Status of K-12 Computer Science Education in Oregon

Oregon already has a dedicated group of organizations and volunteers providing K-12 computer science education. Organizations with a long history of supporting K-12 computer science education include the Technology Association of Oregon (TAO), TechStart, Oregon Computer Science Teachers Association (OregonCSTA), Oregon Robotics Tournament and Outreach Program (ORTOP), and Saturday Academy. But Oregon has traditionally lacked a state-supported K-12 computer science plan and state funding.

Oregon Computer Science Education Statewide Implementation Plan and Funding

Oregon has a plan to change the dismal statistics on computer science education. In December 2023, the Oregon Department of Education published the Oregon Computer Science Education Statewide Implementation Plan. The goal of the statewide plan is to provide K-12 computer science education for all students. The implementation plan estimates an investment of $50M for the first biennium.  This will require legislation to be passed to become a reality. 

The Oregon Computer Science Education Statewide Implementation Plan states that every Oregon student deserves the opportunity to learn computer science and critical thinking. The study of computer science supports developing collaboration and interdisciplinary skills and opens doors both to higher education and to high-wage, high-demand careers. But disparities exist in access to computer science education particularly among female-identifying students, rural students, students of color, students with disabilities, and multilingual students. Computer science education should be based on a framework that guides students from computer users to computer literate creators who are proficient in the concepts and practices of computer science, as informed by national frameworks and standards.

Plan Outcome #3: Computer Science Education has Stable, Long-Term Funding

The recommended funding strategies in the Oregon CS Plan include:

• Strategy 3.1: Fund efforts to support and expand equitable access to culturally responsive and sustaining computer science education for Oregon students on an annual basis. 

• Strategy 3.2: Fund and authorize permanent positions at the Oregon Department of Education to support computer science education.

Take Action Now

Implementing the Oregon K-12 Computer Science Education requires the Oregon legislature to pass adequate, continued funding.

According to John Tortoricci, TechStart’s Chair Of The Board Of Directors, “Today it would be impossible to find anything in our lives that is not touched by technology and specifically by Computer Science. It’s a sad state of affairs to see Oregon falling so low on the list of states that support Computer Science in schools. Oregon’s ‘CS Plan’ can reverse this situation and bring us into the twenty-first century so that our companies can hire young people from Oregon rather than having to import qualified staff from other states.”