Sphero Racing League Overview Dr. Kinnis Gosha Assistant Professor, Computer Science Dept. Morehouse College

Synopsis The Sphero Racing League is a project designed to teach coding to students in the Atlanta metropolitan area (especially underserved areas) Students AND teachers are taught coding in order to participate in races The project aligns K-12, Higher Ed and Industry Program will be sustainable and offered yearly

What is Sphero?

Coding Sphero Simple language to learn Users can write and execute code on a phone or tablet (including Android and iOS) Can control movement (speed, directions) and colors Can sense collisions Can have an fully executable program with only three lines of code!

Immediate Vision Expose every interested student and teacher to Sphero in the Atlanta metro area through an intensive one day workshop Diversify the computer science programs in the local metro area Increase the size of local computing departments

Yearly Schedule Workshops with students and teachers Afterschool clubs Stipend for Teachers/Coaches Visits from AUC students to teach new concepts and troubleshoot Competition Students from across the city will compete in multiple challenges Will also contain a computer science career fair

Workshop Agenda Morning Overview Lecture One Practice One Lecture Two Practice Two Afternoon Lunch Lesson Recap Breakout into groups to compete at stations Recap (including Computer Careers Now)

Computing Careers Now NSF Funded Web Portal design to 1) teach urban and rural youth about computing careers and 2) eliminate identity threat associated with computing careers. User ask virtual computing professional questions about their careers Users also can view data from O-net about that specific computing career Kinnis Gosha is the PI on the grant Tool will be completed no later than August 2016

After School Clubs Will consist of students and teachers who participated in one-day workshops and decided they want to be more involved Schools will be leased equipment from the program administration for their participation in the program Students from Morehouse College, Spelman College and Clark Atlanta University will go to the selected schools twice a month to participate in afterschool meetings

Competitions Students will come to compete with challenges they prepared for (already coded) and other challenges they will have to build on site. Prizes will come from local industry sponsors Citywide Sphero Racing League competitions will be collocated with an all computer science college fair All computing programs from the Atlanta area will be present with demos to show to students

Resources Needed Equipment (sphero balls, boards, blocks, spray paint, etc.) Teacher Stipends (for coaching teams) Stipend for Undergraduate Students (to assist schools in coding, create tutorials and manage the website) Transportation (for teachers/students to attend workshops/competitions and for undergraduates to get to the schools) Food (lunch for students/teachers during workshops) Prizes for competition winners

Are you ready...

2015-2016 Culturally Relevant Computing Lab Contact Dr. Kinnis Gosha Assistant Professor Department of Computer Science Morehouse College kinnis.gosha@morehouse.edu Cell: 256-509-3605 2015-2016 Culturally Relevant Computing Lab