Distance Learning, mLearning, Digital Education, Technology

I recently wrote to the Ontario Ministry of Education to obtain female and male enrollment information for Ontario’s high school Computer Studies courses1.

Considering the number of Computer Science (CS) initiatives in K-12 education and the desire to ensure equity within these initiatives, educators, policy makers and researchers should be considering these numbers in an effort to uncover the causes and impact of the profound under-representation of females in high school CS.



I have shared the enrollment numbers below, but before scrolling down, I would encourage readers to first explore some research and perspectives surrounding gender and computer science enrollment. It is a complex issue that includes a number of influences spanning economical, historical, political, psychological, and social domains.

Via John Evans

Six years ago, universities like MIT and Stanford first opened up free online courses to the public. Today, more than 800 schools around the world have created thousands of free online courses.

I’ve compiled this list of 630 such free online courses that you can start this month. For this, I leveraged Class Central’s database of over 10,000 courses. I’ve also included each course’s average rating.

Via John Evans

Big Data Technology is a data collections term that are too large or difficult for common data-processing application software to deal with well.

Above all, introducing computer science projects and activities can bring a new, experimental hands-on element to many science lessons. This integrative approach also helps students who do not have a CS elective in their school, or who cannot add a CS elective due to schedule conflicts or space availability. (Many schools have limited CS elective classes due to a teacher shortage.)

Via Carlos Fosca