9 Dots Year in Review 2020-2021
Dear Colleagues, Partners, and Supporters,
July is here and that means we’ve officially closed out the 2020-2021 school year. Before we lay this year to rest, I want to take some time to reflect on what it has meant for 9 Dots and our growing community.
Experiencing a global pandemic has made it perfectly clear that access to a quality Computer Science Education is more important now than ever before. From businesses scrambling to move operations to digital mediums, to schools relying on Zoom for distance learning—technology was often what made the difference between a business staying open or not, between a student learning or not, and between a person keeping their job or not.
Reflecting on that last part provoked something within me. I am the daughter of two amazing parents who in all their good intentions taught me that hard work will get you anywhere. But for all of their hard work, the 2008 market crash still cost us our home. This year—as I witnessed my loved ones being forced to make impossible decisions like having to choose between going into work to make rent and safely isolating—I found myself returning to the unsurprising yet disappointing truth that hard work alone is not enough if you don’t have access to real opportunities.
In February 2021, 75% of families in LAUSD reported someone lost their job due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet at the same time tech job postings saw a 28% increase. This tale of two economies urges us to confront the inequities that bar access to career pathways in the tech industry which represent real economic power.
We know that technology is here to stay. It is our present and our future. But not all are afforded the opportunity to learn the programming skills necessary to become the creators of these technologies. The 2020 State of Computer Science Education report showed that Black, Latinx, and low income students are still less likely to attend a school that teaches even a foundational Computer Science course. Furthermore, the presence of female students taking AP Computer science has hardly risen—growing from 22% in 2014 to 29% in 2020. We are far from parity and it is costing our students their futures.
This is why our work to make a transformative Computer Science Education accessible is critical.
We know what kids can achieve when they are given the opportunity. At 9 Dots we see it all the time and are continually inspired and humbled by the creativity, the passion, and the dedication of our students. During the last few weeks of classes, I attended a virtual assembly at an LAUSD school. There, I had the opportunity to see one of our 6th grade students share her code with nearly the entire student population. I watched her face glow with pride and her voice echo with confidence as she explained what her code did. That alone was really powerful but what happened next truly moved me. Each subsequent student who shared their code at that event not only beamed with the same confidence but they complimented one another and affirmed each other’s hard work.
We know what kids can achieve when they are given the opportunity, and even more, we know there is a multiplier effect when this opportunity is paired with consistent support from a nurturing community. That is what 9 Dots represents.
Right now we are serving over 8,000 students and a little over 5,200 of those students are at a school that already has a full Computer Science pathway. From kindergarten, to first grade, all the way up until 6th grade, these students are learning how to code. When we talk about creating access to opportunities, full Computer Science pathways for every student represents real progress. Change that you can sink your teeth into.
I want to conclude by saying that, while this year was far from perfect, I am incredibly proud of the program we were able to create in partnership with our teachers, principals, and district officials. Emboldened by the urgency that this year demanded, we not only maintained access to a quality Computer Science Education, but we forged deeper relationships, nurtured a stronger CS community, and laid the foundation for another great year to come. Our students deserve nothing less—because at the end of the day, our kids know what hard work is. The real question is, what are we doing to ensure they have consistent access to the opportunities they need to thrive in today’s complex world?
Thank you again to the 290 Get Coding 9 Dots teachers, the 20 administrators, and the countless district officials that have made coding possible this past year. A special thanks to our donors who supported the organization through such a difficult year. Our work continues to be possible because of generous supporters like you. If you'd like to join the effort and donate to support our work, you can do so here.