Introduction

  • Article

So who am I and why should anyone care what I have to say about teaching computer science? Good question.

I’m a 30 year veteran of the computer industry. That doesn’t mean all that much but I also spent 9 years as a teacher. One year I was a K-8 “specialist” in two elementary schools. At one I taught grades K-6 and in the other I taught grades 4-8. An interesting year to be sure. The next year I started the first of 8 years teaching high school computer science. There I taught programming in Visual Basic, C++ and Java. I taught Advanced Placement Computer Science for several of those years. One year I even got to help grade the AP CS exam which was a wonderful experience.

Currently I work for Microsoft where my job is to help computer science teachers (including those at a few universities but primarily now on K-12) with resources, training, and curriculum materials. I also act as an advocate for teachers with product groups and try to make sure that Microsoft products, such as Visual Studio .NET, meet the specific needs that teachers have. It’s an interesting job that give me a chance to meet a lot of wonderful people.

A couple of links to get things started.