Careers in STEM are growing, and an excellent way to explore STEM at Pleasant Valley is by joining the computer science club. The computer science club is in its 5th year, striving to introduce more high school students to the field of computer science.
The computer science club’s mission is to introduce high schoolers to the basics of programming and the various industry standard processes to prepare them for a career in STEM or computer science.
In past years, the club has taught its members basic skills in multiple coding languages: Java, Python, JavaScript, CSS and HTML. With these skills, the members build their own projects. One of these projects involved web development, where the club taught its members to make a functioning website.
This year, however, Co-President junior Abhinav Anthati is working on bringing about a new structure. “We want to have a curriculum that focuses more on the applications of computer science so that this club better prepares members for future careers. Instead of random projects we hope to begin working on real-world projects for the betterment of our community. Sort of like a Project Lead The Way approach,” he stated.
For context, Project Lead The Way is an organization with the goal of using interactive lessons to teach their students about STEM. They use activity, project, and problem based (APB) learning to help their students use their learned skills in real world applications.
Pleasant Valley does provide its share of computer science classes— Computer Science Principles, Coding and Gaming, Java, AP Computer Science A— but there is a difference between learning skills in class and applying them to situations students will face in the future.
In these classes, students learn how to make variables, print text, and basic file work. This is different from real word applications of computer science as real world applications often integrate things such as physical hardware and APIs.
“Computer science classes teach students how to code, but they don’t teach you the industry specific terminology, team collaboration and work distribution that comes with computer science,” explained Anthati.
One way computer science clubs attempt to bridge the gap between learned skills and real world applications is through the introduction of industry standard platforms like GitHub. GitHub is a software used by many corporations to help develop softwares in teams.
The computer science club also treats their projects like a company would. During the web development project members were split into two teams: the frontend, the graphical interface of a software, and backend, the server side of a software.
Senior Srujan Nuthula recognizes essential skills from participating in the computer science club. “The club helps you learn a lot of soft skills that are necessary for future employment, but often overlooked when you are just taking coding classes. Working as a team and communicating are two big ones. I want to pursue computer science in the future and I know people who work in that field who have told me they are constantly working in teams using GitHub,” he said.
Pleasant Valley students who not only want to learn more about computer science but help prepare themselves for a career in this field are a perfect fit for the computer science club. In order to join, students can come to a club meeting in room 261 on Fridays from 3:30 to 4:00 after school!
