Leaving Las Vegas thinking about Computer Science Education

The SITE conference was in Las Vegas this year. It was great to connect with old friends and find new ones. While on the plane home, I want to reflect on what I learned before the hubbub of teaching and my next conference arrives. 

What did I see? I chose to focus on the work being done in Computer Science. The panel put together by Chrystalla Mouza was especially excellent. The panel had a great discussion of strategies and challenges in recruiting and retaining teachers for CS. The metaphor I settled on was the blanket that is too small. If a specific district is able to "recruit" from another school system, the problem does not get solved. It just changes location. The same can be said if we transition Math or science teachers. The three strategies that emerged were:

1. Recruit internally from areas that have a enough teachers (e.g. art, Media, English or Social Studies). For this to be successful the professional learning has to be different and address ways of thinking and projects of interest that would fit different thinkers within their domain expertise.

2. Make it part of a general campaign to go into teaching. 

3. Focus on second career/ career changers. Here there is a need for short programs and funding during the process of changing career.

The second strand was TPACK which after over 15 years of research is still one of the most often used frameworks. Punya Mishra led a series of presentations sharing the work done on the third handbook of TPACK research soon to come out. The work was varied and interesting and the variety of approaches, measurements and direction was extensive. 

Finally, and unsurprisingly there was discussion and grappling with AI everywhere I went. AI is changing everything including education in ways that we do not fully understand, but researchers from around the world are trying to apply what we learned from previous critical moments (advent of personal computing, internet, social media). 

Thinking about the Future of Conferences

 For the past three weeks, I have been to three conferences. SITE, the Society for Information Technology in Teacher Education, in San Diego, was an international hybrid conference (I went in person). NETA, the Nebraska Educational Technology Association, was an in-person-only conference. And finally, AERA, the American Educational Research Association meeting in San Diego, is a hybrid conference, and I am attending virtually only.

These are in no way my first conferences after the pandemic. Still, their concentration in a span of two weeks allowed me to think about the affordances and limitations of technology. First, there is no doubt that the face-to-face interaction of in-person conferences allows a different set of interactions. For example, after one of my presentations, I just happened to meet Erkko Sointu from Eastern Finland university in the corridor; a short interaction resulted in his declaration "Go Big Red" and a discussion about his ties to Nebraska. This led to great conversations, me hearing about some of the work done by the group and a cluster of proposals for a conference they are holding next Fall (Hybrid). NETA is a practitioner conference. At NETA, I  spent a good part of my time interacting with teachers in our booth. I reached out to passers-by and engaged with them. This would not be possible at all in an online format in which participants have to choose to engage with me specifically.

Right now, I am in a hybrid format meeting of AERA. I have not engaged in many sessions despite paying and having an interest. The online interaction is more challenging because staying at home/work means that I have many competing commitments away from the intellectual benefits of the conference. Not seeing people in person lowers my level of engagement considerably. All of these reasons point to the significant affordances of the in-person conference. Well, not so fast.

On Thursday afternoon of the SITE conference, I walked down the corridor. Four rooms had no living person in them but had a projection of presenters and participants, all online,  engaged. It was an eerie experience that felt like bad science fiction; however, the participants included many who were limited in their ability to travel (cost, health) or international participants for whom the travel was onerous. The result is that many participants who would not otherwise have access to the work were able to present, learn and grow. 

Travel, especially by plane, has a significant carbon footprint. There is no doubt that in-person conferences are full of growth opportunities, serendipity, and fun. But are these qualities worth the price in carbon footprint? 

I do not have an answer to what we should do, but I would like to suggest:

1. We should keep exploring alternative formats for conferences that engage participants in fuller ways than they do now. 

2. We should be highly selective of the conferences we choose to attend in person.

3. We should experiment in other ways to interact with each other through digital means- perhaps ed camp (unconference) style.

Conferences, Engagement, and Ethics

I am on my way to the American Educational Research Association meeting in San Francisco. This is one area that even the best of current technologies cannot compete with. Despite the best of technology an online conference experience is still far removed from the real deal. In a way its like the idea of a pilgrimage. We need the physical distance and separation to create enough space in our goal system to allow full engagement with the conference. For online conferences to be as successful there is a need to simulate among others that separation.

Figuring this out is not a minor concern, as research and information become globalized we have to travel great distances to present and hear. This limits our ability to interact effectively, engage scholars from less affluent communities and to do so with lower impact on the environment. This important for professional development as well.

I often participate in webinars, hangouts and other digital formats and the expereinec for me is not even close. Mostly I am in my hometown, my office or home and all the daily distractions and goals are still ever present taking away from my engagement and making the experience less satisfactory.

So what can be done, well perhaps the key is creating a blended experience. First scholars and professionals in each of the locations need to be both consumers and producers of presentations. Participants are sequestered during the day in a separate location with peers say a hotel with meeting rooms. Each location can have a moderator and a tech staff making sure that tech problems do not become an obstacle to a good experience. Online informal meeting rooms can be set up for chats. Social can be used just as it is in F2F conferences to help direct traffic and enhance the participant experience.

This version of a virtual conference is considerably less cost effective than a series of webinars or Google plus hangouts- but it would be far more engaging and deeply interactive.
Until then I will enjoy San Francisco seeing old friends and my overpriced hotel room.