According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the field of computer science is growing much faster than other jobs at an average of 16% per year. However, according to an NAEP transcript study, while the amount of students who are taking STEM classes are increasing, the amount of students taking computer science classes are decreasing. Blake offers multiple computer science classes: AP Comp Sci A, Principles, and Game Development. Yet, they seem to not be as popular as other classes.
Chas Sabre ’24 says that ”there’s eight or nine people in [game development], it seems less popular than other classes because coding feels off to the side, but I think that you don’t need any prior skills and you can just go in and learn.” Sabre shares that he enjoyed game development after he learned about the course from one of his friends and he was a fan of the collaborative environment that it encouraged, and it made him want to do more coding in the future.
Kelly Deng ’25 shared that while she hasn’t taken a computer science class through Blake, she’s heard about the difficulty of coding at Blake. Deng shares that she’s heard that “it can be a difficult class, [but] after getting into it, they’ve really liked it and they like the opportunity to take a different science class rather than the ‘basics’ like biology, chemistry, and physics.” Deng adds to this by saying that “for a lot of people [who don’t take computer science] it’s a scheduling problem, and they would rather take other classes.”
However, this lack of promotion is seeming to change, as Blake is implementing more computer science classes in the middle school. Interim computer science teacher Katie O’Bryan hopes that “from there we will see a change in how many people are taking these classes, since the earlier you get exposed the earlier you can get an interest in it.” She adds to this by saying that “[your] exposure to computer science in general comes from family members or friends, but I think that it’s never too late to take a computer science class, since I originally discovered computer science when taking it for my math major.”
