Last week, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) announced a new report titled “Telling the Stories of the BPC Alliances”. This report describes how the National Science Foundation’s Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC) program has had tremendous success in boosting participation of underserved students in computer science.

The BPC program funds 11 alliances involving a diverse set of institutions—large research universities, historically black colleges, states, middle and high schools, and various non-profit organizations. Together, they leverage their faculty and financial resources to encourage more students to pursue computer science degrees, and, ultimately, careers.

While national participation in computer science is declining, the number of students pursuing CS degrees at BPC-participating universities has increased. According to Daryl Chubin, the director of the AAAS Center for Advancing Science & Engineering Capacity and lead author of the report:

The report shows that, taken as a whole, the BPC Alliances are an effective model not only for other higher education computing programs, but also across the board for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

I encourage you to check out the report, and to think about how the lessons learned may be applied to your university.

(Contributed by Chase Hensel, CRA/CCC Tisdale Fellow)