Ten Years Ago Fewer Than 3,000 Girls Took the AP CS Exam. Now There Are...

21st Century Skills

Ten Years Ago Fewer Than 3,000 Girls Took the AP CS Exam. Now There Are Nearly 30,000

By Jenny Abamu     Jul 18, 2017

Ten Years Ago Fewer Than 3,000 Girls Took the AP CS Exam. Now There Are Nearly 30,000

Educators and students around the nation are celebrating the completion this year’s Computer Science Advanced Placement (AP) Exam. Students are mostly celebrating the fact that it's over, but teachers are excited that data (released from Code.org this morning) indicates a record number of students, in particular girls and minorities, taking the exam.

According to data from College Board and Code.org, the Computer Science Principles AP course had 111,262 test takers, including 29,708 girls and 22,199 underrepresented minorities taking the exam—an increase of over 100 percent since 2016 for both groups. Leaders see this as a positive sign for nonprofit groups such as Code.org and Girls Who Code who center their missions around supporting underrepresented groups in Computer Science education. We took a peek at Twitter to gauge reactions from the education community.

This morning, Code.org shared a dramatic chart showcasing the improvements.

Students and teachers expressed feelings of excitement and relief at their results.

Government officials also shared their approval.

Even before the results were out, there was a round of Twitter applause for students who trailblazed in their schools.

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