The organization my team has the privilege of working with is Code VA, a children’s computer science education camp with a location on Broad St. They receive a lot of traffic for their summer programs, but keep busy in the fall/winter/spring, teaching sessions at schools or libraries, after school programs, and even train teachers to provide computer science education at their respective institutions.
Maggie, the representative from CodeVA knows that they have more resources for financial aid students, and wants to make computer science education an equitable option for all families, but is finding certain blockages, or a limit to how far she’s been able to reach out.
A caregivers' misconception about the importance of computer science greatly limits a child's potential in the modern world.
We’ve determined that the root issue to be addressed is in the way that the parent or caregiver of a child thinks about computer science education, whether that be that they don’t think it’s a viable opportunity for their daughter or they can’t visualize the broad range of applications it has.
The primary population affected by the choices will make is the children, whether that be the students, the volunteers, or members of CodeVA’s robotics team.
Secondarily, the ones who we hope to affect in order for the primary population to succeed is the parents/caregivers, school administrations, teachers, the school board, the Parent Teacher’s Association, libraries, and partner organizations. The last ones that would be impacted are the donors, higher institutions that work with CodeVA, and those that give grants to the nonprofit.
The physical, measurable outcomes of our involvement that we would ideally see are the following:
Increased understanding of the importance of computer science from caregivers.
Increased parent involvement in a child’s interests.
Increased number of children entering the modern world with basic-advanced computer science knowledge.
Increased increased amount of children signing up for classes.
It was my job to collect all of the resource materials that CodeVA offers to prospective students and parents. She provided us with their physical materials, and I researched their online presence independently.
This brochure is the primary physical source of information that inquiring caregivers receive. After voicing my opinions to Maggie, I came to find that we agreed on a lot of the points that I spoke about, and that it was created without her consultation.
It’s content heavy with only a few examples of the fun times that they have there, with four pictures, thirteen blocks of text, and two graphics. The dense information is divided only by three headers and two subheaders, and it only gives information on three of the many programs that they offer. It’s in a single language (english) and is primarily just straight blocks of text.
This has much of the same issues as the brochure, with being content heavy and crowded. The front is a chart of the programs that they offer, and the bag features a wordy Frequently Asked Questions. This was also created without Maggie’s involvement. One good thing about this is that the simple design and paper choice has a great reproducibility, and can be made at a moment’s notice.
The site overall is even more busy than the print materials, there are five links in the navigation bar that lead to nineteen different links. The “For students” tag leads to text blocks and images showing statistics of student participation and a 9x9 grid of pictures, with further links in sidebar. There are two locations for upcoming events on homepage, each one displaying a different one.
The language used on the landing page could be reduced so that it’s more equitable. Examples:
“bring equitable computer science education”
“fluent in the literacy of the future”
“vitally important to the success of future generations”
The website is run through WordPress, and updated irregularly by a single woman, whose main focus is the teacher education programs. Unfortunately the website might be inaccessible to our touch.
The facebook has 2,080 likes and 2,152 followers. It’s updated almost daily, focusing on announcements, community outreach, and thank you’s. I’ve come to find out that there are five people with access to the facebook, but it’s Chris Dobe, the executive director who updates it.
The instagram has 652 followers, and primarily posts repeated graphics/images with updates on events found only in the description. It updates most frequently in the late spring and summer. It’s run by the lead graphic designer, who manages a program called Full Steam Ahead.
The twitter has 1,737 followers. Tweets seem to be on a set schedule to post, mainly information about upcoming programs, used as a halfway point, and most of the information is linked elsewhere rather than directly present. This is ran by a woman named Rebecca.
Both the print materials and online presence can be updated with a focus on ease of communication and the fun events happening at CodeVA. It seems counterproductive to have three different people run the social media, and has lead to a big difference in what is covered.
