Happy Birthday, Grace Hopper! Computer Science Education Week (CS Ed Week), the annual program designed to engage students of all ages in computer science is here! Each year we recognize CS Ed Week around the birthday of U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Grace Hopper (December 9, 1906), a pioneer of computing. Last year, President Obama became the first President to write computer code as a part of Hour of Code at the White House and the Administration announced a host of public and private commitments to expand access to computer science education in K-12 schools. This year, to kick-off the week, the White House hosted its first ever CS Tech Jam, bringing together educators, students, and […]

The AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellows at the National Science Foundation (NSF) have organized another talk in their Data Science Seminar Series from danah boyd on Making Sense of Found Data. The talk will be on Thursday, December 10th from 1:30-2:30PM at NSF Stafford I, Room 110.  danah boyd is the founder and president of Data & Society, a research institute focused on understanding the role of data-driven technologies in society. She is also a Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research, and a Visiting Professor at New York University. Her research is focused on addressing inequities in society. Currently, she’s focused on research questions related to “big data”, privacy and publicity, and the […]

The following Great Innovative Idea is from Philip J. Guo, Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Rochester. Philip recently attended the Computing Community Consortium Computer-Aided Personalized Education Workshop in Washington, DC and presented his work on Python Tutor. The Innovative Idea One of the most fundamental skills to develop when learning computer programming is forming a mental model of how the computer executes a piece of code step-by-step. Instructors often draw diagrams to help learners form these mental models. But what if no instructor is available? I have developed a Web-based tool called Python Tutor (http://pythontutor.com/) that can automatically draw these diagrams for learners. As its […]

The mission of Computing Research Association’s (CRA) Computing Community Consortium (CCC) is to catalyze the computing research community and enable the pursuit of innovative, high-impact research. CCC conducts activities that strengthen the research community, articulate compelling research visions, and align those visions with pressing national and global challenges. CCC communicates the importance of those visions to policymakers, government and industry stakeholders, the public, and the research community itself. In accordance with the mission, CCC is issuing a new call for proposals for workshops that will catalyze and enable innovative research at the frontiers of computing. From the solicitation: Successful activities will articulate new research visions, galvanize community interest in those visions, mobilize support for those visions from the […]

Does your research generate, analyze, and/or visualize data using advanced digital resources? CADENS is looking for scientific data to visualize or existing data visualizations to weave into larger documentary narratives in a series of fulldome digital films and TV programs aimed at broad public audiences. Visualizations of your work could reach millions of people, amplifying its greater societal impacts! The deadline to submit your application for the next documentary production is November 30, 2015. It’s easy—just answer a few questions on the web form found here.  The process for selecting scientific data and visualizations to be included in CADENS projects is unlike typical proposal review procedures. This selection process involves […]

The following blog post is from Sokwoo Rhee, the Associate Director of Cyber-Physical Systems Program at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). He is leading the Global City Teams Challenge that had its kick-off event in early November.  Hello, NIST and US Ignite are pleased to report that the Global City Teams Challenge Kick-off on November 12 and 13th was a great success. Thank you to all who joined us in person, via webcast and at satellite Kick-off events in Chicago, Raleigh, and Toronto. Plenary programs included 27 speakers representing government agencies, non-profits and private sector. If you missed any of these presentations, you can catch-up here. Copies of […]