By Melissa Wagoner
Robby Morrissey’s AP Computer Science class at John F. Kennedy High School recently got the attention of an organization known as the College Board, which oversees advanced placement classes across the nation. The class enrollment is unusual in an industry composed mostly of white males.
“Last year the majority of the class (we had about 20) were females,” Morrissey explained. “And the year before that it was about a 50/50 split as well.”
Recognized by the College Board for his efforts to “increase female participation” in his classes, Morrissey sees the trend as having less to do with his influence and more to do with the culture of the school.
“A lot of times our female students are our higher achieving students,” he said. Explaining, “The draw [of AP classes] is college credit options.”
And JFK, with less than 200 students enrolled, is necessarily limited.
“It’s hard to get full AP classes every year,” Morrissey explained, “Realistically at a small school we don’t have 15 AP kids in a grade.”
Instead, to keep the classes they do offer full, JFK’s AP courses rotate, with computer science offered every other year.
“That allows students to at least experience it,” Morrissey said. “Because even having a little background [in computer science] will set them up.”
After all, in today’s job market nearly every line of work requires the use of a computer.
“Maybe you have a business and have to set up your own website.” Morrissey said, explaining that, even those students who will one day take over their family’s farm will need to use programs like Excel to organize crop yields.
“You’re going to have to track that stuff on a spreadsheet,” he emphasized. “Just being able to get around on a computer… So many students are still computer illiterate.”
It’s a problem he hopes to remedy one computer science class at a time, by preparing students – regardless of their ethnicity or gender – for the future.
