Students in the lowest-SES neighborhoods were 3 percentage points less likely to enroll in CS, a gap largely explained by differential access to schools offering CS¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associational r3 · q3
Currency · newest study 2020 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person · overdue for a recheck since 2025: baselines and conditions change

Subclaims¶

q3 i? Students from the lowest-SES neighborhoods enrolled in CS at rates 3 percentage points below the district average, but were about as likely as the average student to enroll once access to CS courses is accounted for. → Barrow 2020

Evidence¶

Barrow 2020¶

Barrow, L., Freire, S., & de la Torre, M. (2020). Trends in computer science education: Access, enrollment, and performance in CPS high schools. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Consortium on School Research. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED606832

q3 · i? · associational · r3

Analysis of CS enrollment by neighborhood SES with and without adjustment for school-level CS access. The report states that once access is accounted for, "students living in the lowest-SES neighborhoods were about as likely as the average student to enroll in a CS course."

"Students living in the lowest-SES neighborhoods were 3 percentage points less likely to enroll in a CS course, relative to the overall average. This difference was largely due to these students being less likely to attend a high school that offered a CS course."

Discussion¶

Learner Variables¶

• Socioeconomic Status — predictor: outcomes differ by group: a gap reflecting circumstances and treatment, not a cause

Related Claims¶

• School test score averages are strongly related to the income of the families a school serves — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it
• Black students were least likely to enroll in CS overall but most likely to enroll once school-level access to CS is accounted for — related
• Students earned higher average grades in CS courses than in core courses, with few failing CS — related
• Larger CPS high schools were consistently more likely to offer CS courses than smaller schools in both 2012 and 2018 — related
• Student access to CS grew faster than school access because larger high schools were more likely to offer CS, reaching 92 percent of students by 2018 — related
• Participating districts report large enrollment gaps in CS courses by income and gender — related
• ICCSD's enrollment data showed its high school CS courses were not attracting a student demographic representative of the wider district — related
• U.S. high schools with high enrollments of students from low-income families are less likely to offer advanced mathematics courses than low-poverty schools — related
• Access to computing instruction in US schools is limited and inequitable by school level and poverty — related
• CS course offerings in CPS high schools more than doubled between 2009 and 2018, with 80 percent of schools offering at least one CS course by 2018 — related