Insights on Gender Differences in CS1

6th International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd'20)

Thompson

Noone

et al. 2020

Programming support services for introductory programmers have seen a rise in popularity in recent years with third level institutions around the world providing “safe spaces” for students to practice their programming skills and get supports without the risk of being judged by anyone. These services appear in many different structures including Support Centres, Software Studios and help desks. The common trend however is that all the users of these services, in general, report that the service has helped them in their studies and garnered them with more confidence in their ability. This paper examines the role which our Computer Science Centre played for students who attended the support service during an intensive higher diploma course. The intensive course is a 3-week course tailored to students who have previously completed a degree in a field not related to CS, and covers CS1 and CS2 material. The structure and design of the support service is outlined in this paper along with the supports offered. A high-level survey was conducted to investigate the effect of the service on students programming self-efficacy. Study design and methodology are described in detail. Early findings suggest that the support services offered to these students improved their belief in their own programming ability which in turn improved their exam grade outcome. The findings provide valuable evidence to justify future research into the functions of support services with the computer science domain.

Section: Self-efficacy In Computer Sciencementioning

confidence: 99%

An Investigation of the Role Programming Support Services Have for Mature Students.

6th International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd'20)

Thompson

Noone

et al. 2020

“…The Cambridge Dictionary defines Inclusive Outreach as "An inclusive group or organisation tries to include many different types of people and treat them all fairly and equally" [1]. In the K-12 space inclusive outreach should at a minimum include: gender (in particular female students, due to the low female uptake at third level of about 20% [28]), as well as disadvantaged and rural schools (schools outside the metro areas that may have limited or no access to third level institutions or outreach). The literature reports outreach models that may not fully satisfy these criteria, or do not report in detail the model or student responses.…”

Section: Inclusive Outreachmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Only one programme had an open call, which was however restricted geographically to three local area schools [25]. Due to low female uptake of CS [28], some outreach models focused on female only outreach activities [25], or were largely female attended [15]. A study by Kamberi reported that running all-female outreach programmes may not be optimal [18].…”

Section: Inclusive Outreachmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Ireland is a strong player in the global IT industry [2] and there is an ongoing concern about the inability to fill related jobs in the market [19,32]. This is compounded with falling numbers pursuing third level CS in Ireland (it fell by 8% in 2018 alone [8]) and a low female uptake of the subject [28], which is currently about 20%. With the competitive pressures at third level institutions for funding, etc., institutions are implementing outreach models to promote CS, address stereotypes and generally improve perceptions of the subject.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Developing an Inclusive K-12 Outreach Model

Proceedings of the 2020 ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education

Faherty

Quille

et al. 2020

Self Cite

This paper outlines the longitudinal development of a K-12 outreach model, to promote Computer Science in Ireland. Over a three-year period, it has been piloted to just under 9700 K-12 students from almost every county in Ireland. The model consists of a two-hour camp that introduces students to a range of Computer Science topics: addressing computing perceptions, introduction to coding and exploration of computational thinking. The model incorporates on-site school delivery and is available at no cost to any interested school across Ireland. The pilot study so far collected over 3400 surveys (pre-and post-outreach delivery). Schools from all over Ireland self-selected to participate, including male only, female only and mixed schools. The no-cost nature of the model meant schools deemed "disadvantaged", to private fee-paying schools participated. Initial findings are very positive, including the balance of male and female participants, where in the 2017-18 academic year it was 56:44 and in 2019-20 (to date), it is 35:65 respectively. Once the model is validated and tweaked (based on survey data), the model will be published (open access) for other institutions to implement the model locally. In addition, the authors intend to link schools (that the team have worked with over the three years) with local institutions, thus developing a sustainable ecosystem for the program to continue. This paper describes the model structure and outlines early findings. CCS CONCEPTS • Social and professional topics → Computer science education.

“…Females display significantly lower confidence and programming self-efficacy in Computer Science when compared to males [1,3,18,27,31]. This is concerning as programming self-efficacy is significantly correlated to success in CS1 [26]. A recent large-scale study, involving 690 students across 11 different institutions, examined perceived self-efficacy and test anxiety during a programming exam [26].…”

Section: Related Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

An Investigation of Gender Differences in Computer Science Using Physiological, Psychological and Behavioural Metrics

Proceedings of the Twenty-First Australasian Computing Education Conference

Mooney

Bergin

2019

Self Cite

Gender imbalance in tertiary Computer Science (CS) and Information Technology (IT) courses is a cause for concern globally. Current estimates of this imbalance are~70:30 male to female. Within the CS education field numerous studies have investigated the cause of this imbalance (e.g. misconceptions of CS, stereotypes, etc.) and have attempted to identify factors that influence uptake, retention, and performance. Whilst these studies have had varying degrees of success, none appear to have investigated in-the-moment physiological differences between genders during module examinations. Such research could provide new insight on how male and female students process and respond in such a setting and provide new opportunities to better tailor module delivery and assessment.This paper describes a novel study that investigates gender differences in skin conductance and heart rate variability during a controlled exam-like setting. Participant background information such as gender, age, previous experience, etc. was collected at the outset. The examination was designed and validated in-house using a peer-review process and carefully constructed to ensure that only one new concept was introduced per question. General behavioural metrics, such as doodling, response time, and researcher observations were gathered. An out-of-the-box psychological test was used to measure self-reported anxiety and physiological arousal was measured using wearable sensors before and during the experiment. Study design, methodology, and analysis are described in detail. Findings suggest differences exists between genders in physiological and behavioural responses when completing programming comprehension questions. The findings provide valuable evidence to justify future research in this area.