About 40 seventh grade students from Grand Rapids will come to campus on Friday, May 15 from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. to learn about computing - one of the few career paths actually still booming in a struggling economy.
Professors at Calvin College are collaborating with K-12 computer teachers and their students to help dispel the myths of computing by showing young students that the field isn't just math, science, and cubicles.
On Friday the students will be demonstrating some of the projects they put together using "Alice," a 3-D educational software program. Calvin professors will show students how computers get used at the college level, including demonstrating a Star Wars application of a virtual reality technology developed at Calvin.
Jeff Nyhoff, a professor of computer science at Calvin College, has visited a number of K-12 schools this past year. He's hoping that collaborating with these schools will help students see the exciting opportunities that await them in the computing field.
"Computing has become a key liberal art, something that spreads across almost all departments, careers, and areas of life ... The problem is, for the past decade or more, our notions of computer literacy have focused too much on 'how to do stuff on a computer,' instead of understanding the computer for what it has always been: a powerful medium for discovery and expression" said Nyhoff.
Nyhoff also said that over the past decade there has been an enormous drop in college students entering computing programs, which has led to a nationwide shortage of college graduates with those skills.
See data: http://cs.calvin.edu/p/ComputingCareersMarket
The students will begin their day in room 352 of the Science Building.
For more information, contact Jeff Nyhoff at 526-6553.
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Received on Thu May 14 14:31:21 2009
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