Career Literacy Online Journals

I am so impassioned after reading the Couragion article, and I have a much better understanding of how Couragion works and how I can use it. I’m aware of the research regarding the lack of CS skills in students and educators, and am beginning to understand how some of those gaps might be filled. I’ve always wondered why STEM/CS fields have lower numbers of women compared to men and if it’s a nature or nurture issue so to speak. I’ve had a gut feeling over the past couple of years that it’s more of an exposure issue than anything else, and the Couragion/Oracle research findings support this.

This research provided the unexpected insight that “...our collective failure as a society to engage groups that are currently underrepresented in computing may have less to do with how we teach computer science and much more to do with our focus on skills in conversations about CS with students.” This could be a revolutionary finding. We can easily change the focus on skills and conversations about CS with students with little training or professional development.

I’ve recently started to understand that CS isn’t just coding, robotics and information technology. Now I am seeing it in a whole new light, especially with respect to design thinking and the area of UX. The idea of using design thinking to focus on the experiences of users has me looking everywhere for designs, good ones and ones that could be improved upon, like the design of a squeeze relish bottle where the hole is too small to get much relish out. It might work for ketchup, but it just doesn’t work for relish. The She can STEM, So Can You article has two great, simple lessons for how to introduce students to UX and the Couragion, Oracle article Altering the Vision of Who Can Succeed in Computing found that teaching competencies such as UX might actually increase interest in STEM, and this knowledge could assist in meeting labor demands and prepare the future workforce with these skills as well. I am seeing everything differently, with new eyes, from my new perspective and love that the research concludes with a one pager of recommendations for educators and advocates so we can easily make changes in the systems we are a part of.

Amplifier, Ad Council, (2019). SHE CAN STEM TOOLKIT: Middle school lesson plans and artwork for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math). Retrieved (April 2022) from https://adcouncil-campaigns.brightspotcdn.com/4d/65/541b508b4872b195f770b448edbf/amplifier-education-toolkit-she-can-stem.pdf.

Couragion Corporation, Oracle Academy, 2019. Altering the Vision of Who Can Succeed in Computing. Retrieved (April 2022) from https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5491d7aae4b0d06755583522/t/5c009925562fa7e3a155d23e/1543543095489/AlteringTheVisionOfWhoCanSucceedInComputing-FINAL.pdf.

I loved the readings this week, gaining insight into how Covid-19 has impacted current and future trends, in combination with recent tech innovations, and I have a better understanding of what skills students will need and what educators will need to do based on the current workforce environment. It seems that gaps in infrastructure and needs in the workforce have forced changes in a way that might not have occurred had the pandemic not exposed them so widely. It has forced so many companies to “rapidly adapt or disappear” (Forsyth, 2022). I’m realizing the impact that AI can have in recognizing patterns and how much more quickly it can identify unseen problems, even predicting problems, that perhaps humans cannot identify based on their own bias. So we must train and expose our students to the knowledge of skills and careers that will be essential to fill, not to mention financially lucrative, in the future.

The “She Can Stem Toolkit” article has excellent resources and lessons that we can easily use for upskilling our own skills as educators and for other STEM teachers. If jobs aren’t coming back after Covid, educators need to be zeroing in on the skills that will be needed by the future workforce. While there is still uncertainty, looking at the needed disruptive skills that are rising in many occupations and industries are a great beginning.

While I’m considering my culminating project and what I’ll present to my district superintendent, assistant superintendent and the IT director will include a list of disruptive skills, what courses they could be taught through including any currently offered CS or CTE courses at our high school, and how we could even bring these skills down to a middle school or even an elementary CS program. One of the skills I would integrate are understanding and activities exploring AI and ML, primarily because those are the most recent skills I’ve been working on and have an understanding of. It will be essential for me to build my own coding, software, cloud technology and security understanding and skills so I can better discuss with stakeholders and teach skills and about career literacy based on these and other disruptive skills in technology. I have my work cut out for me and am up for the challenge.

Amplifier, Ad Council, (2019). SHE CAN STEM TOOLKIT: Middle school lesson plans and artwork for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math). Retrieved (April 2022) from https://adcouncil-campaigns.brightspotcdn.com/4d/65/541b508b4872b195f770b448edbf/amplifier-education-toolkit-she-can-stem.pdf.

Forsyth, James. (March 7, 2022). 8 technology trends for innovative leaders in a post-pandemic world. World Economic Forum. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/03/8-technology-trends-innovative-leaders-post-pandemic/

I love looking at examples of various models of education and considering how they could work at my own school. It's apparent to most people that the public education system in the United States is quite broken. The theme that I'm commonly hearing in most of the models and pathways is that students need communication, critical thinking, collaboration, and creativity skills. These skills have been mentioned in literature for at least a decade or more as I recall, and it seems that we know they are important, yet standardized testing still seems to get more than a majority of the focus.

What I find fascinating is that industry is attempting (and has been for quite some time) to lead educators and education in the direction of the skills that it recognizes are lacking in its workforce. Companies like IBM Dell, HP, Google, GM, Apple, Microsoft, are only a small list of the industry leaders that are trying to empower teachers, students and educational organizations to improve the critical competencies that students need to be successful in the workforce.

I believe that having multiple pathways the diverge from traditional schooling is essential if we want to truly meet the diversity of all learners. We have the technological capabilities to do this, but it seems we need frameworks in place to make it more systemic so that all students can be successful. /much prior research has demonstrated that when the students are at the center of their learning, it's more meaningful so why don't we provide more voice and choice?

I think this quote says it all, "Clearly defining quality learning in the Fourth Industrial Revolution is thus an important first step in setting the direction of innovation in education and reviving it as a pathway to social mobility and inclusion in the future.” (World Economic Forum, 2019). The path to creating a system where students can be successful must be prefaced by clearly setting the skills needed so that practical learning environments can be created for students to learn, grow and practice skills needed in the future Global workspace. This is the place to start.

World Economic Forum, Schools of the Future Report, 2019. Retrieved (May 2022) from https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Schools_of_the_Future_Report_2019.pdf