Decker's computing education research featured at Frontiers in Education conference

Assistant Professor Adrienne Decker's research on "Designing and Developing a Resource Center for Primary and Secondary Computing Education Researchers" was published at the 2020 Frontiers in Education conference.

Held virtually on October 21-24, Frontiers in Education is a major international conference focusing on educational innovations and research in engineering and computing education.

The publication considers the resources needed to meet the research and evaluation needs that come with incorporating computing education in primary and secondary schools. In order to support these efforts, Decker and her co-author and Monica M. McGill (Knox College) developed CSEdResearch.org, a resource center designed to serve primary and secondary computing education researchers, practitioners, and evaluators. Co-author Jeffrey Xavier (SageFox Consulting) is an external evaluator for the project.

Also submitted to the conference was a work-in-progress paper authored by engineering graduate student Sean Mackay titled "Updating our Understanding of the Impact of Pre-College Computing Experiences on University Students," on which Decker served as a co-author.

A faculty member in the Department of Engineering Education at UB since 2019, Decker's research interests include the effectiveness of pre-college computing education; introductory programming education; broadening participation in computing and gaming; assessment in computing education; and the history of computing, computing education, and computer games.