Computing for All: A Prototype-first Approach

This is a hands-on, education-focused project to develop, create, and test new intro-to-computing ideas. 

Student researchers who join these positions will 

  • Create a new intro-to-computing course, inspired by cs5, but with additional hands-on/artifact-building components:
    • physical circuits and physical Picobot (well, Picobot-inspired robots)
    • building practice with file-system, remote-access, and software-management toolsets (github, et al.)
    • prototype-first development of webapps, online visualizations, and APIs
    • "using AI well" -- almost a cliche, as sought by employers these days -- including chat, CLI, and agent interfaces 
    • along with additional computing-related skills you and the team might be interested in pursuing...
  • Then, coteach this new intro-to-computing course, in the latter part of the summer
  • And (!) improve future versions of early cs courses (cs5, cs35) by strategically integrating these new ideas

For the optional essay prompt, perhaps share a few sentences on your personal interest and/or vision, with respect to computing and education.

Name of research group, project, or lab
Computing for All: A Prototype-first Approach
Website
https://www.cs.hmc.edu/~dodds/cs35/nsf.html
Why join this research group or lab?

An important fraction - perhaps half, maybe more - of the summer's effort is working with the students who take our summer intro courses. This includes both high-school and higher-ed students. It's perhaps a notch or two more involved than grutoring -- all of which is great experience and great fun. Looking to build-then-test your ideas immediately? Join in!

The summer offers the chance to add a layer of reflection, research, and iteration atop all these experiences, and our goal will be to write and submit a conference paper that summarizes the insights we've gained.  (The attached document is a paper that 2025's team created.)

Representative publication
Future_of_Intro_CS (3).pdf
Logistics Information:
Project categories
Computer Science
Student ranks applicable
First-year
Sophomore
Junior
Student qualifications

Prior experience is not required. 

The most important characteristics are enthusiasm, enjoyment of working in a team, enjoyment of helping intro-cs students, and interest in expanding your technical computing skills by building systems and software that make computing/cs more accessible, more understandable, and more fun overall. 

(If you'd rather not  overlap with cs5 or cs5-type content, other projects may be a better fit.)

Time commitment
Summer - Full Time
Compensation
Paid Research
Number of openings
3
Techniques learned

Students joining our Prototype-first Computing team will develop a number of technical computing skills -- some inherent to the project, many you'll choose on your own. For example, building webdev skills will be a notable portion of the effort, starting by maximizing what LLMs can do and then building from there. Want to learn SQL?  Join us and do so, specifically by creating small, sharable modules that engage with databases... .  Want cs5 taught entirely in R?   Want cs5 taught by LLM?   Join us and make it so!    ((Well, perhaps not entirely so... ☕🦔😃))  

Project start
Flexible
Contact Information:
Mentor
Zach Dodds
dodds@hmc.edu
Mentor
Name of project director or principal investigator
Zach Dodds
Email address of project director or principal investigator
dodds@g.hmc.edu
3 sp. | 0 appl.
Hours per week
Summer - Full Time
Project categories
Computer Science