A Statewide Survey on Computing Education Pathways and Influences: Factors in Broadening Participation in Computing

In computing education, we have only just started developing methods for accurately measuring a student’s understanding of introductory computing, let alone characterizing a whole classroom, school, or university system. As part of evaluating the impact of “Georgia Computes!” we sought an understanding the factors influencing undergraduate enrollment in introductory computing for an entire state in the United States of America. We gathered surveys from over 1400 undergraduate students in introductory computing classes from 19 higher-education institutions in a single state. The analysis provided insight into the impact of “Georgia Computes!”, into the connections between stages of the computing education pathways, and how factors that influence students’ pursuit of computing differ between genders and majority/minority group students.