Re-examining Inequalities in Computer Science Participation from a Bourdieusian Sociological Perspective

In this episode I unpack Kallia and Cutts’ (2021) publication titled “Re-examining inequalities in computer science participation from a Bourdieusian sociological perspective,” which uses Bourdieu’s discussions of capital, habitus, and field to analyze 147 publications on CS interventions.

  • Welcome back to another episode of the

    CSK8 podcast my name is jared o'leary

    each episode of this podcast talks about

    computer science education from the

    perspectives of practitioners and

    researchers

    by interviewing a guest or multiple

    guests or doing a solo episode where i

    unpack some scholarship in relation to

    cs education in this particular episode

    i am unpacking a paper titled

    re-examining inequalities in computer

    science participation from a bordugian

    sociological perspective this paper was

    written by maria khalia and quentin cuts

    all right so here is the abstract for

    this particular paper quote concerns

    about participation in computer science

    at all levels of education continue to

    rise despite the substantial efforts of

    research policy and worldwide education

    initiatives in this paper which is

    guided by a systemic literature review

    we investigate the issue of inequalities

    in participation by bringing a

    theoretical lens from the sociology of

    education and particularly bordeaux's

    theory of social reproduction by paying

    particular attention to bordeaux's

    theorizing of capital abitus and field

    we first establish an alignment between

    bordeaux's theory and what is known

    about inequalities in computer science

    ces participation we demonstrate how the

    factors affecting participation

    constitute capital forms that

    individuals possess to leverage within

    the computer science field while

    students views and dispositions towards

    computer science and scientists are

    rooted in their habitus which influences

    their successful assimilation and

    computer science fields subsequently by

    projecting the issues of inequalities in

    cs participation in bordeaux's

    sociological theorizations we explain

    that because most interventions do not

    consider the issue holistically and not

    in formal education settings the

    reported benefits do not continue in the

    long term which reproduces the problem

    most interventions have indeed

    contributed significantly to the issue

    but they have either focused on

    developing some aspects of computer

    science capital or on designing

    activities that although inclusive in

    terms of their content and context

    attempt to reconstruct students

    habituates to fit in the already

    pathologized computer science fields

    therefore we argue that to contribute

    significantly to the equity and

    participation issue in computer science

    research and interventions should focus

    on reconstructing the computer science

    field and the rules of participation as

    well as on building holistically

    students computer science capital and

    habitus within computer science fields

    end quote if i were to summarize this

    particular paper into a single sentence

    i would say that this paper uses

    bordeaux's discussions of capital

    habitus in field to analyze 147

    publications on cs interventions now in

    the show notes you can find a direct

    link to this particular paper as well as

    a link to the author's google scholar

    profiles you can find that at jared

    o'leary.com where there's hundreds if

    not thousands of free cs related

    resources including a link to boot up

    pd.org which is the non-profit that i

    create curriculum for and that

    curriculum is also 100 free now just a

    little disclaimer before i get started

    and you probably notice this from the

    abstract bordu is a little bit more

    complicated than you typically see in

    educational scholarship so from a

    sociological perspective bordeaux

    particularly talks about power and

    capital and the way that structures

    impact society so here's a little

    explanation from the introduction and

    this is on page 379 quote our

    theoretical lens stem from the field of

    sociology of education and as such we

    see education achievement and outcome

    being affected by the interplay between

    school structural patterns and social

    class stratifications among other

    factors schools or universities are seen

    as micro societies in which issues of

    authority democratization role structure

    and position power and dominance the

    interplay between social classes their

    culture language and gesture hidden

    structural rules social stratification

    and elitism are some of the perspectives

    to understand a given problem end quote

    in other words if you're going to use

    bordeaux's theory as a lens to look at

    something and you're likely going to

    explore those things that were just kind

    of listed right there now another famous

    person that we talked about briefly in

    an interview with roger manti is uh

    foucault so foucault is another

    philosopher

    sociologist who has discussed similar

    topics so bordeaux and foucault kind of

    have some parallel scholarship that are

    interesting to investigate if you are

    interested in looking at the interplay

    between social structures and power on

    people and groups which is particularly

    important if you're interested in equity

    work alright so here are the research

    questions for this particular study this

    is from page 379 and 380. quote how can

    inequalities in computer science

    participation be understood by applying

    sociological perspectives and

    particularly purdue's theory of social

    reproduction what new directions and

    opportunities does the sociological

    alignment offer for tackling issues and

    inequalities in computer science

    participation end quote alright so

    here's a quote from page 380 that kind

    of discusses bordeaux's theory a little

    bit more quote his sociological

    framework is based on the sociology of

    power and it is particularly useful for

    investigating how resources are

    allocated in society and how a person's

    internal dispositions are influenced by

    society's external structures and quote

    a little bit further down on that page

    quote bordu argued that the education

    system contributes to the reproduction

    of the structure of power relationships

    and symbolic relationships between

    classes as such for bordeaux schools are

    regarded as mechanisms for reinforcing

    the social and cultural inequalities end

    quote and a little bit further in quote

    for purdue the social and cultural

    reproduction within schools is generated

    purely by the tendency to acknowledge

    students who are ready to participate in

    such a school system whereas due to the

    school's structural refusal of inability

    to discontinue this tendency and to

    develop a pedagogy that considers

    nothing for granted it leaves behind the

    unprepared working class ordu's view of

    school structure highlighted the power

    that is transferred within schools by

    the privileged groups in society by

    doing so these groups legitimize their

    dominant culture at the expense of the

    less privileged groups that lack the

    resources and opportunities to obtain

    the legitimized cultural and social

    capital end quote okay so i mentioned

    this in a podcast that i did well over a

    year ago that was on maker culture and

    it was a critique of it and so in that

    particular critique i don't remember if

    they actually cited bordeaux but they

    certainly could have if they didn't but

    they mentioned that the maker movement

    isn't anything new and in fact if

    anything it is a whitewashing of

    blue-collar jobs that is largely done in

    communities of color and communities of

    low socioeconomic status but by

    rebranding it as something that high

    socioeconomic status people and middle

    class people can do and in particular

    some of the studies that mention

    that much of the imagery and media

    around the maker culture involves white

    males the kind of interplay between

    power dynamics going on right there can

    be viewed from a bordugian perspective

    now another more concrete example

    directly related to cs is if we think of

    storytelling versus problem solving so

    some cultures have a lot of high value

    on storytelling while other cultures

    tend to have value on problem solving

    and it's not to say that you can't have

    both but if we look at

    what's kind of gone on in computer

    science curriculum over the past decade

    or so there's been a huge focus on

    problem solving through like

    problem-based learning and whatnot to

    the point that storytelling has been

    kind of put on the back burner like some

    platforms and languages you can't tell

    stories with them you're literally just

    solving puzzles or problems now if we

    look at where the funding is coming from

    for some of the organizations that are

    promoting that it's often coming from

    well-intentioned

    donors such as large tech companies who

    are trying to get future engineers or

    software developers or whatever now from

    a bordugian perspective this can be

    looked at as a dominant culture is

    allocating resources to promote one way

    of being one ontology that being

    problem-solving or way of knowing or an

    epistemology and this can be a form of

    like axiological colonization or

    colonization of the values that i've

    mentioned in other podcasts that is

    putting storytelling on the back burner

    and that is not to say that it's good or

    bad i'm just pointing out that this is a

    way that you can look at that particular

    scenario through a bordean perspective

    just to give you some context for how

    you might use bordus writings and for

    clarification i read some of bordu's

    work not all of borde's work so don't

    consider myself to be a scholar of it

    okay so the next section of this paper

    uh starting on 380 it discusses three

    different aspects of bordeaux's

    sociology of education which is great

    because i haven't heard it to discuss

    much in cs education so if you want a

    deeper dive in this check this out and

    it points towards some publications that

    you can dive even deeper in by actually

    reading these source materials or at

    least the translations of them because

    bordeaux was french so if you can speak

    french great if you're like me and you

    cannot then you'll probably read the

    translations alright so the first main

    thing that they discuss in here is

    bordeaux's notion of capital so from

    purdue's perspective quote capital takes

    time to accumulate it can be reproduced

    or expanded and as a persisting force it

    has the power to create possibilities or

    impossibilities end quote now are there

    are three types of capital that they

    mention here so one of them is economic

    capital so this refers to financial

    resources so it could be owning land it

    could be having money could be equity in

    your house et cetera the next one

    cultural capital this can be converted

    into economic capital and it is learned

    through social interaction or

    socialization so this could be like

    social manners like when to stand in

    line and when not to stand in line or

    like a queue or social manner is about

    how to greet somebody or how to listen

    in a conversation that's different

    depending on which culture you're in so

    for example should you engage in eye

    contact or avoid eye contact in some

    cultures one of those is considered to

    be disrespectful while in other cultures

    that same thing that was considered to

    be disrespectful is valued or preferred

    now the authors break it down into three

    more distinct versions of cultural

    capital so one is embodied capital the

    other is objectified capital and then

    the last one is institutionalized

    capital here's a quote from page 380 and

    those three quote embodied capital which

    includes long lasting dispositions of

    the mind and body and it is usually

    transferred from a person to person from

    a parent to child example knowledge

    manners of speaking it is transferred

    into an integral component of the person

    into a habitus another construct and it

    functions as symbolic capital this

    indicates that it is not being

    acknowledged as a capital but rather as

    legitimate competence objectified

    capital which refers to cultural goods

    like books instruments machines and its

    necessities and it necessitates embodied

    capital to be fully valued

    institutionalized capital which is a

    form of objectification eg formal

    qualifications in quote and then the

    last one is social capital which they

    kind of describe as like the social

    relationships that are beneficial or

    generate some kind of a good outcome or

    beneficial outcome for a person so these

    forms of capital are to be used as a

    resource that can give you some kind of

    an advantage or elevate your status

    within society so for example if you are

    a millionaire that might be a form of

    economic capital if you have a phd that

    might be a form of cultural capital and

    if you are somebody who has a good

    relationship with people in industry or

    decision makers within a field then that

    might be a form of social capital so

    these are important to look at in

    education to just kind of understand

    some of the power at play within the

    field now the next section in here is

    habitus which i've also heard is habitus

    but the one that i've heard most

    frequently is habitus if it's wrong i

    apologize here's a quote from page 381

    it is considered as the way of culture

    is embodied in the individual as a

    system of embodied dispositions that are

    the groundings of an individual's

    practice and behavior end quote a little

    bit further down quote habitus is

    reflected in individuals as predisposed

    actions that align with the social

    structures they hold thus habitus is a

    way of portraying the social structures

    as being embodied in individuals and as

    a way they understand and act in the

    world this view however does not

    marginalize the individual's own agency

    and therefore it does not imply that

    social structures are deterministic of

    behavior end quote okay so a way that

    you might be able to think of habitus is

    it's like the habits or the dispositions

    or the ways that you engage in society

    that are valued and you embody those

    valued forms of engagement by enacting

    them and simply doing them in social

    context alright so the last area that

    they unpack is field so this is from

    page 381 quote urdu describes the

    concept of field as a social space of

    interactions a space of struggle and

    competition in this field individuals

    are classified by the capital they

    possess and that is the reason why

    researchers often use the concept of

    market to describe fields as it better

    emphasizes the capital exchanges

    individuals have diverse purchasing

    capital as well as different forms of

    capital which they can use to their

    advantage the nature of the field

    therefore is hierarchical and the

    individual's classification within the

    field is determined by what is valued

    and valid in the field and thus

    individuals with a high volume of valued

    capital will hold the highest rankings

    in quote here's one more quote from page

    field involves the structures principles

    and values of the classrooms e.g the

    expected ways of behaving norms of

    interactions and discourses in order to

    succeed students are supposed to play

    according to the rules stemming from the

    field end quote alright so tying it back

    to earlier so in order to succeed in the

    cs class that i mentioned if it's a

    curriculum that is using problem based

    what's valued is solving a problem not

    your ability to tell a story through

    code so even if you are the best

    storyteller and you can code a really

    awesome project in scratch if you can't

    solve a problem in a particular field

    that values problem solving you would

    have lower status than somebody who

    could solve the problem so if you are

    from a particular culture that values

    problem solving great you'll do really

    well in this field but if you are in a

    culture that does not value problem

    solving and values other forms of being

    or other ways of being you will not do

    as well as somebody who does value that

    now from an educator standpoint we have

    the different forms of capital to

    consider so like the economic capital

    might be how much you make as an

    educator so if you work in a private

    school that pays more then that might

    have a higher value than a public school

    that pays less from a cultural capital

    standpoint if you have an edd or a phd

    then you will have higher status within

    the field and from a social capital if

    you know people from universities or

    organizations or departments of

    education that can also give you some

    power to be asked to join advisory

    committees etc and if your habitus

    aligns with a particular field then it

    makes it so that you can be promoted

    within that field or at least have

    higher status than other educators who

    do not have those forms of capital or

    habitus okay so the next section talks

    about the method for this particular

    paper so basically they looked at 147

    papers

    and they tried to specifically find

    cs interventions and then look at it

    from a bordugian perspective to better

    understand the interventions that they

    engaged in and what forms of capital and

    habitus and field were basically implied

    or mentioned indirectly in the papers

    itself so the next main section starting

    on 383 kind of unpacks each of these so

    on page 383 that section talks about the

    different factors influencing

    participation so they broke it down into

    a cultural theme a social theme and a

    psychological theme so from a cultural

    perspective that might be having some

    kind of an impact on a culture so for

    example improving the views and

    dispositions of computer scientists so

    for example cs is largely dominated by

    white males so if you are a black female

    then there might be an intervention that

    was developed to try and help you see a

    place for yourself within a field that

    is largely white males now from the

    social theme that was kind of like

    providing social support so like role

    models or guidance like guidance

    counselors and stuff to assist with the

    particular intervention and then the

    psychological theme was like stuff like

    looking at self-efficacy and sense of

    belonging within the field now 41 of the

    which means 59 were in informal settings

    like hackathons or competitions or

    summer camps etc alright so the first

    research question was quote how can any

    qualities in computer science

    participation be understood by applying

    sociological perspectives and

    particularly purdue's theory of social

    reproduction end quote page 384 so

    within that the first subsection is on

    knowledge and skills and so this is an

    intervention that improves cs knowledge

    and skills in some way so for example we

    designed an intervention that was going

    to improve computational thinking so

    they'll measure like pre and post or

    something like that the next subsection

    of this focused on views and

    dispositions toward computer science or

    scientists so like i mentioned earlier

    like if you're in a marginalized group

    that typically is not seen within

    computer science as a field or within

    media so these interventions were like

    trying to improve your sense of seeing

    yourself as a computer scientist or at

    least somebody like you or within your

    community all right so the next section

    of this particular question is social

    capital related to computer science and

    so here's a quote from page 385 that

    kind of summarizes this section quote to

    develop the aforementioned skills

    knowledge and particularly positive

    dispositions and views toward computer

    science a supportive environment and

    access to computer science opportunities

    are particularly important end quote so

    they summarize some different studies

    that kind of fall within that particular

    description so if you're interested in

    that i recommend checking it out the

    next section is on the psychological

    capital in computer science and so in

    this section they mentioned that there's

    some research that suggests that a field

    that is familiar to someone can be

    accompanied by positive feelings such as

    ease and comfort whereas if a field is

    unfamiliar to a person then it can be

    accompanied by shame fear anxiety or

    indignation that paraphrase is from page

    cultural capital and habitus and exist

    within a field in their home life that

    values cs then they will likely approach

    it and

    find psychological rewards for

    participating in it but if we have

    cultures that do not then it's going to

    have potentially a negative

    psychological impact on students so

    might instead create a disdain for cs or

    something like that so if you're

    interested in hearing more about the

    studies for that check out that summary

    on page 386. also on that same page is

    the next section on interventions and so

    there were some different types of

    interventions so improving knowledge and

    skills or the dispositions or broadening

    participation and focusing on like

    self-efficacy and sense of belonging or

    even building some social spaces where

    mentors and teachers could kind of get

    together to provide some support for

    students or even their peers can provide

    support for each other if you want to

    see studies that talk about that check

    out the citations on 386 and 387 and

    then on 387 there's a section on

    computer science capital habitus and its

    impact on participation so i'm going to

    read the final paragraph of this

    particular section quote overall the

    central theme that is highlighted here

    is that although there is a vast amount

    of papers that aimed to address

    inequalities in participation with

    indeed significant contributions

    inequalities continue reproducing until

    today until this point and by focusing

    on bordeaux's notion of capital

    inhabitees we have identified two

    potential reasons first most of the

    interventions focus on some of the

    components of computer science capital

    instead of considering it as the

    combination of four aspects cultural

    capital as reflected on students

    knowledge and skills and views and

    dispositions and social and

    psychological capital secondly most of

    the interventions implemented in

    extracurricular activities which means

    that the reported positive changes on

    students capital and particularly on

    students habitus reflect a particular

    point in time rather than long-term

    benefits when students return to formal

    educational settings the misfits between

    the habitus and the structure of the

    field might cause an inner conflict that

    students may be unable to handle

    therefore the structure of the field is

    equally important when we consider the

    issue of participation but it seems not

    to have been the focus of studies in

    computer science education and thus the

    next section focuses explicitly on

    highlighting its importance and the new

    research directions stemming from this

    end quote so the next section of the

    paper talks about the second research

    question which was quote what new

    directions and opportunities does

    bordugi and lens offer for tackling

    issues and inequalities in computer

    science participation end quote page 387

    so the first section of this is

    discussing capital and habitus are not

    enough all right so i'm going to read

    for you two quotes from page 388 that

    kind of summarizes quote we believe that

    the structure of school and university

    computer science fields is likely to

    legitimize specific forms of capital not

    necessarily depicted in the literature

    and thus favors the students who already

    possess this capital while unconsciously

    rejects other capital forms and

    habituses that do not align with its

    structure end quote a little bit further

    down quote while research has focused on

    investigating how the content can be

    more interesting for all students and

    meaningful by creating engaging context

    and on educating the teachers on

    inequalities issues while enhancing

    their pedagogical content knowledge and

    creating culturally relevant instruction

    less attention has been given to the

    underlying rules of participation what

    exactly constitutes valid legitimate

    participation in computer science how

    the structural positions of its agents

    are formed and claimed and who

    determines the rules of the game and

    gives the power of the agents to sustain

    these rules end quote okay so let's

    unpack that a little bit so one way that

    you can look at this is they mention a

    lot of studies look at like pedagogy

    approaches that help improve

    understanding of computational thinking

    or something along those lines and you

    focus on what occurs within the

    classroom space so like what the teacher

    is doing different types of approaches

    there or how these students are engaging

    so are you going to code with one

    language or a different language or a

    different platform et cetera while these

    studies are useful the authors might

    argue from a bardugian perspective you

    might zoom out a bit and look at some of

    the structural inequalities that might

    exist within that so for example is your

    class going to be offered as a mandatory

    class or is it offered as an elective or

    is it offered as something that only a

    select set of students will participate

    in so for example the gifted and

    talented programs which is a term that i

    don't like some other schools will call

    it the honors kids other things to

    consider is will students have access to

    devices both within the school and

    outside of school and if so how

    frequently what about internet so if

    kids have access to devices at home but

    they don't have internet how does that

    create forms of inequalities compared to

    the students who do have access to

    devices at home zooming out even further

    which schools within the district have

    the opportunity to do this which

    districts have the opportunity to do

    this what standards are being reinforced

    or introduced within schools that are

    either mandated or voluntarily directed

    by department of education or by like

    csta's national standards and who are

    the people who make those decisions is

    it donors from corporate influence so if

    you have a district that is supported by

    a local corporation do they get to have

    a say on what students learn and how

    these are the kind of questions and

    things to consider from a bordugian

    perspective that often is not discussed

    from a specific intervention so if

    you're a researcher great take a look at

    bordeaux zoom out a bit take a look at

    some of these structural inequalities

    that might be impacting students yeah

    you may have created the best summer

    program ever when they go back to their

    classroom there are still going to be

    some inequalities that need to be

    addressed that aren't addressed by the

    intervention that you designed from a

    teacher perspective try and consider not

    just what you are doing in the classroom

    but how students are able to continue

    their engagement and their learning

    outside of the classroom what factors

    are preventing students from continuing

    their learning outside of school what's

    something that you can do about it what

    kind of committee can you form to do

    something about this etc alright so the

    next section that answers the second

    research question basically argues that

    we need to have a more rigorous

    discussion around inequalities so if we

    think of from like a paulo ferreri

    perspective pedagogy the oppressed the

    dominant and the subdominant class or

    the dominant and the dominated this

    particular section kind of unpacks this

    that concept from a bordugian's

    perspective so this is from page 388 so

    here's a quote quote the dominant class

    consists of students with higher levels

    of capital it is the class that

    possesses the right amount of capital to

    leverage within the field and therefore

    have the advantage over students of the

    subordinate class because the former

    joins the field with the necessary

    resources to succeed and position

    themselves higher in the hierarchy in

    computer science fields this group

    consists of students with a good

    background of knowledge and or skills

    related to computer science and thus the

    course content appears familiar to them

    these students share a common language

    and discourse related to computer

    science a specific style of

    communication and interaction with their

    peers of the same position and with

    their teachers a code of interaction

    relevant to computer science and

    accessible to those with high computer

    science capital and positive views and

    dispositions towards the discipline

    habitus that aligns with their future

    goals the subordinate class consists of

    students that do not possess the capital

    to negotiate their positions within the

    field this group is further divided into

    those who are interested in weakening

    the symbolic order and those who go

    through a form of symbolic violence

    discussed below lodged in the habitus in

    quote so on page 389 here's a quote that

    talks about symbolic violence a little

    bit more quote symbolic violence

    indicates a gradual acceptance and

    internalization of ideas and structures

    that tend to subordinate certain groups

    of people and because of its

    invisibility constitutes an effective

    tool of silent domination and silencing

    dominated end quote so going back to the

    problem based versus story based a form

    of symbolic violence might be hey we

    value problem based this is the platform

    we're using it only does problem-based

    learning we don't have the opportunity

    to engage in storytelling you need to

    learn how to engage in computer science

    in our way rather than try and approach

    it from something that you

    would prefer or more familiar with

    that's an example of symbolic violence

    it's saying our way is the right way to

    do this and you need to assimilate to us

    rather than engage in computer science

    from like a multi-perspective list

    approach where kids can explore cs

    through many different paths or venues

    for example in my class kids had

    opportunities to work on several

    different languages and platforms that

    they got to choose and within those

    platforms they could work on projects

    that were interesting to them rather

    than mandating everybody engaged in the

    same project the same way that would be

    described as a form of symbolic violence

    or at least could be if you use a

    bordugian perspective here's the final

    quote from page 389 in this particular

    section quote all in all for the

    dominated group to be heard and be part

    of the game it is not enough to just

    permit them to speak nor to increase

    their capital alone nor to introduce

    content familiar to their culture while

    sustaining a pathologized field but

    rather systemic and cultural changes

    should be implemented to a court agency

    in this group structuring the field

    narrowly and creating and reproducing

    limited definitions of what it means to

    be engaged and participate in computer

    science what it means to be a computer

    science student or scientist reproduces

    disadvancements particularly for

    students whose habituates seem not to

    align with the field end quote alright

    so the paper ends with the discussion on

    some of the gaps in research and future

    directions and some suggestions so

    basically if i were to summarize those

    couple pages into a short paragraph and

    say that the authors argue that yes we

    should take a look at the interventions

    that are like on pedagogy and like how

    students learn and things like that but

    we also if we want to have systemic and

    long-lasting change we need to look at

    the structures that are influencing

    participation in order to better

    understand how we can have a larger

    impact so instead of using a microscope

    to investigate an

    intervention we could instead look from

    a kaleidoscope or multi-perspective list

    approach that looks at systemic changes

    over time rather than one-off

    implementations or interventions all

    right so that's kind of a summary of the

    paper itself which i do highly recommend

    reading it is denser than other cs

    education

    research out there but i highly

    recommend it and it includes a lot of

    citations to other publications that

    dive deeper into this particular topic

    so each one of these unpacking

    scholarship episodes i'd like to share

    some of my lingering questions or

    thoughts this one's going to be a little

    bit different so i have a question for

    you and so the question is what do you

    want to learn more about this topic or

    other topics in cs education so you can

    respond to this by hitting the contact

    me button at jaredaler.com or you can

    comment in the website by going to the

    bottom of the show notes and then

    respond there or you can send me a

    message on twitter or something which i

    only check about once a week so i

    apologize if i don't respond right away

    but i genuinely want to know what you

    are more interested in what topics i

    should dive deeper on some of the

    unpacking scholarship episodes and

    interviews that i've done have been more

    undergraduate level discussions

    introducing a particular topic while

    others have dove deeper so more of a

    graduate student version of discussing

    like equity or gender

    or power dynamics or whatever i'm trying

    to provide some kind of a balance

    between breadth and depth but i'm

    curious what topics you would like to

    hear more about in particular for me to

    dive deeper on now the next couple of

    weeks are going to be podcasts related

    to national suicide prevention month and

    awareness next week's episode is a

    repeat of an episode that i did the

    previous year it is the most important

    episode i've ever recorded as it can

    literally save some lives if you dive

    deeper into learning more about

    depression and suicide ideation in

    education and then the following episode

    is a super cut of the guests over this

    past year talking about how they prevent

    burnout and then following those two

    particular episodes we will resume doing

    some interviews and some unpacking

    scholarship episodes so please stay

    tuned for those particular episodes and

    until then i hope you are having a

    wonderful week and are staying safe

Article

Kallia, M., & Cutts, Q. (2021). Re-examining Inequalities in Computer Science Participation from a Bourdieusian Sociological Perspective. International Computing Education Research (ICER), 379–392.


Abstract

“Concerns about participation in computer science at all levels of education continue to rise, despite the substantial efforts of research, policy, and world-wide education initiatives. In this paper, which is guided by a systematic literature review, we investigate the issue of inequalities in participation by bringing a theoretical lens from the sociology of education, and particularly, Bourdieu’s theory of social reproduction. By paying particular attention to Bourdieu’s theorising of capital, habitus, and field, we first establish an alignment between Bourdieu’s theory and what is known about inequalities in computer science (CS) participation; we demonstrate how the factors affecting participation constitute capital forms that individuals possess to leverage within the computer science field, while students’ views and dispositions towards computer science and scientists are rooted in their habitus which influences their successful assimilation in computer science fields. Subsequently, by projecting the issue of inequalities in CS participation to Bourdieu’s sociological theorisations, we explain that because most interventions do not consider the issue holistically and not in formal education settings, the reported benefits do not continue in the long-term which reproduces the problem. Most interventions have indeed contributed significantly to the issue, but they have either focused on developing some aspects of computer science capital or on designing activities that, although inclusive in terms of their content and context, attempt to re-construct students’ habitus to “fit” in the already “pathologized” computer science fields. Therefore, we argue that to contribute significantly to the equity and participation issue in computer science, research and interventions should focus on restructuring the computer science field and the rules of participation, as well as on building holistically students’ computer science capital and habitus within computer science fields.”


Author Keywords

Inequalities, sociology, computing education, Bourdieu, computer science, capital


My One Sentence Summary

This paper uses Bourdieu’s discussions of capital, habitus, and field to analyze 147 publications on CS interventions.


Some Of My Lingering Questions/Thoughts

  • What do you want to learn more about on this topic or other topics in CS education?


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