Email correspondence

[Greeting] 

I’m emailing you because you are an NSF CSforAll RPP grantee who received funding in 2017, 2018, or 2019 and I would like to interview you about your project(s). As you may have seen in the November 17, 2023 Newsletter from SageFox Consulting, RTI International was selected by NSF to conduct an evaluation of CSforAll RPPs funded in 2017-2019. The aim of our work is to document “longer-term” outputs and outcomes at least 5 or more years after the start of the grant and share that in a report to NSF and Congress. Ultimately, NSF and Congress want to understand if the CSforAll RPPs initiative has been effective at improving CS PreK-12 education and broadening participation for students who are historically underserved and underrepresented in CS. The project started in July 2023 and will continue for a minimum of 2 years, and a maximum of 4 years.

The RTI team will need your help, as a CSforAll: RPP grantee, to understand the implementation and outcomes of your grant. They will rely heavily on your grant reports to NSF and will need supplemental information about documented and/or estimated impacts after the grant wrapped up. Please see the attached for an overview of the data sources we’ll use and the research questions we are addressing.

The RTI team will be contacting you to help by (1) participating in an interview about your grant; (2) verifying an “RPP Profile” that summarizes what they learned about your grant from your reports to NSF; and (3) completing a brief survey about your long-term outcomes.

ATTACHMENT:

We will use the following sources of information about the 2017-2019 NSF-funded CSforAll:RPP grants to report long-term outcomes:

Below are the 5 research questions driving the work. The RTI team very much looks forward to future conversations with you and your RPP team about your project and its impact!

RESEARCH QUESTIONS TO BE ADDRESSED WITH THIS PROJECT:

1. To what extent did CS for All’s investment impact the outputs and outcomes (see next page) for professional development for high school teachers who teach computer science? What characteristics (e.g., differences among schools, populations, curriculum) affect these impacts?

2. To what extent did CS for All’s investment impact the outputs and outcomes (see next page) for instructional materials and preparation of K-8 teachers who integrate computer science and/or computational thinking with other concepts and content in their teaching? What characteristics (e.g., differences among schools, populations, curriculum) affect these impacts?

3. To what extent did CS for All’s investment impact the outputs and outcomes for schools and districts to define and evaluate multi-grade pathways in CS and CT? What characteristics (e.g., differences among schools, populations, curriculum) affect these impacts?

4. What are the impacts of the RPPs in creating sustained partnerships/collaborations and understanding of CSforAll?

5. Given the data sources that are available and the data that could be collected as part of this contract, what sets of sub-questions (more specific questions) are most appropriate for answering questions 1, 2, 3 and 4 above?