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    How to make ICT inspiring for our young people

    ICT Thumb"If we cannot address the problem of how to educate our young people in inspirational and appropriate ways, we risk a future workforce that is totally unskilled and unsuited to tomorrow's job market," Prof Steve Furber The Royal Society Report on the teaching of IT released Jan 2012

    Challenging words which schools need to respond to! To assist me to understand Roedean’s current position on the provision of IT and computing skills, I talked to representatives from the IT, Maths and Physics departments. I wanted to hear what they are already doing to prepare a skilled workforce for tomorrow’s job market, and what more we should be doing.

    “On Thursday I started teaching Decision Maths to a 62 Further Maths group. This is a change to our usual course. We discussed algorithms and their efficiency and looked at 2 particular sorting algorithms. Although it is not part of the course they want to write computer programs based on these algorithms. So on Saturday afternoon I decided to brush up on my programming skills and wrote two programs. I’m looking forward to discussing these with the girls and enabling them to start writing their own.” Maths department

    “I would like to continue to offer some element of programming (on an informal basis) to those Sixth Form Physicists or potential Engineers who choose an extracurricular project.” Physics department

    And the IT department:

    “Girls learn Computing via HTML, Scratch, Logo, Animation and database concepts (including a little MySQL, thanks to SQLZoo!).  This works well alongside the design skills fostered by ICT and the creative use of web technologies together with, for example, movie creation and editing.”

    In contrast to Mr Gove’s statement that current ICT lessons were "demotivating and dull”, this is not the case at Roedean and teachers are clearly proactive in responding to the interests of the students as they progress through the school.

    However, the school recognizes that it needs to explore more deeply the challenge that the report has put forward. Whilst reviewing our IT offer, we are also reassessing the KS3 Design Technology curriculum. Ideas have been put forward to develop robotics and control as well as exploring how we can tie together the growing interest in graphics within Art with an extension of IT and programming skills.

     A critical part of the wider discussion, however, must be whether we should encourage students to take up Computing as an academic discipline at school whilst universities do not appear to be encouraging this. The Royal Society’s report provides ample evidence of the lukewarm reception of high profile universities to school qualifications in Computing or IT. The University of Cambridge undergraduate course information on Computer Science is quoted as follows:

    “Computer scientists need to enjoy problem–solving, and be able to think logically and beyond what they’re taught. We don’t require any qualifications in computer science or any prior knowledge of programming. However, since the subject has strong mathematical groundings, it’s essential to have Mathematics at A Level/IB Higher Level. Science subjects are also viewed favourably – often more so than subjects such as IT, which are more vocational in nature”   www.cam.ac.uk/admissions/undergraduate/courses/compsci

    This response has led to the situation currently experienced at Roedean where we do not currently offer A Level IT or Computing but instead have seen more students taking up Maths over recent years. This offer has been supplemented at sixth form level by extension classes in programming offered by an enthusiastic and knowledgeable teacher who has realized the need for students entering the workforce to have further skills in this area. This is yet another way by which girls can be drawn to take up difficult subjects and will be included in our assessment of how we can encourage more girls to engage more creatively in IT and Computing.

    As a school we will continue to debate this topic. We are keen to inspire the girls with a fascination for this way of thinking and we also want to provide them with a sense of confidence as they step into what is often perceived as “a geeky male subject”. With the percentage of male applicants to university to study computing rising since 2007 from 84% to 87% they are going to need it.

    By Frances King, Headmistress at Tuesday, 24 January 2012

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