The White House cited Highline Public Schools as a leader in computer science education, as President Obama announced in his weekly address a $4 billion plan to give all students across the country the opportunity to learn computer science.
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[NOTE: The President did *not* mention Highline in his video address above; the district is included in the document]
Highline was one of 25 school districts in the nation praised for their commitment to supporting the President’s vision of expanded computer science curricula for K-12 students (download PDF here).
“I appreciate the President’s commitment to expanding computer science in schools,” said Susan Enfield, Highline Superintendent. “In Highline, we are proud be preparing all our students to graduate tech-savvy and tech-literate.”
In his weekly radio address, President Obama announced he will ask Congress to provide funding over the next three years for computer science learning in elementary, middle, and high schools “In the new economy, computer science isn’t an optional skill – it’s a basic skill, right along with the three ‘Rs.’ … Yet right now, only about a quarter of our K through 12 schools offer computer science,” said Obama.
Highline offers computer sciences on all its high school campuses, including several new computer programming classes and Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles. Highline is also expanding computer science offerings to the middle school level. Pacific Middle School was the only school in Washington to receive a $10,000 grant from Code.org to buy technology to support computer science learning in the classroom. This year the district held its first ever hackathon for girls to practice computer coding and explore a computer science career.
See President Obama’s Computer Science For All Initiative and Fact Sheet for more information.