That was the big tech news today. I know there was a good deal of vocal outrage about the deal but to be honest I was pretty surprised by the news. Normally deals like these get steamrolled through for better or worse. I have decidedly mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I have no problem with Amazon - I've got a bunch of former students working there. Mostly in Seattle but at least one in NYC.

I stumbled upon a thread over in the APCS-A Facebook group the other day. It seems that the College Board is making some changes in their registration timeline. In the past, students registered for the exam sometime in March with the exams administered in May. The new changes include requiring registration in November along with $40 late registration and cancellation fees. The College Board is, of course, spinning this as for the student's benefit.

Do we really need CS focused high schools? That's the question Alfred Thompson asked partly in reaction to my post talking about Bill Gates' visit to AFSE, a NYC public school with a CS focus. On both posts, Michael Preston shared some important and good points about AFSE as a starting point and gateway that helped lead to CS4All in NYC and also specifically about AFSE. In response to Alfred's question I thought it was time I shared a bit about what I was pushing for AFSE back when I was involved.

Yesterday I shared my thoughts on Bill de Blasio's plans to "fix" the selection criteria for New York City's specialized high schools. If you haven't read the post, you can find it here. I was going to get back to CS and CS Ed related blogging today but there's more to the story. In spite of what BdB stated, it's not enough for him to switch to another measure - the middle school state exam along with some modifiers.

Yesterday, Bill de Blasio, the current Mayor of New York City outlined how he would "fix" our specialized schools. The schools he was referring to were the "big three" of Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, and Brooklyn Tech and then five additional schools - The High School for Math Science and Engineering at CCNY, The High School for American Studies at Lehman, Brooklyn Latin, The Queens Arts and Science High School at York College, and Staten Island Tech.

There's been a lively discussion on pushback to CS for All at the K12 level over on Facebook. Mark Guzdial started a sub thread asking if CS for All should first be implemented at the undergrad level rather than K12. It's an interesting question and as good as anything to get me out of my month long non-blogging rut. Mark was right when he said that if Colleges implement CS for All, K12 will likely do so to follow - just look at AP.

A fear revolving around CS For All concerns where will the money come from and how will we fit in the new classes. One suggested solution is to integrate CS into other subjects. I thought I'd write today about why I don't think the fear is valid and while integrating CS into other classes can have value, it probably isn't a long term solution for CS education. Let's start with the integration solution.

This morning, Mark Guzdial wrote about unfunded mandates and CS for All. Unfunded mandates frequently wreak havoc on schools in a number of ways but in the long run, I don't think it should have a severe effect on CS for All. Rather, it could have a big impact on the number of CS courses we offer beyond that. Mark relay's a story from the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School where at the time many students wanted more CS classes but the school wasn't planning on hiring a new CS teacher.

About a week ago New York State's new regulation creating a K12 CS teacher certification went live. Just the other day I was honored to be interviewed by Matt Flamm of Crain's New York in a follow up piece about it. Having K12 CS teacher certification is big and having quality programs that lead to certification is HUGE. In my view, it's a game changer. Let's Focus on high school, my wheelhouse.

In the New York City department of education a recurring hot topic is the Absent Teacher Reserve or ATR pool. A teacher or administrator in the ATR pool is a licensed, most likely tenured teacher not assigned permanently to a school. Each year these educators get shuttled from school to school and denied a chance to actually settle in a position. The ATR pool was created under the Bloomberg administration.