Submission + - UK Replacing Narrowly Focused CS GCSE in Pivot to AI Literacy for Schoolkids
theodp writes: The UK Department for Education announced this week that it is "replacing the narrowly focused computer science GCSE with a broader, future-facing computing GCSE [General Certificate of Secondary Education] and exploring a new qualification in data science and AI for 16–18-year-olds." The move aims to correct the unintended consequences of a shift made more than a decade ago from the existing ICT (Information and Communications Technology) curriculum, which focused on basic digital skills, to a more rigorous Computer Science curriculum at the behest of major tech firms and advocacy groups like Google, Microsoft, and the British Computer Society, who pushed for a curriculum overhaul to address concerns about the UK’s programming talent pipeline (a similar U.S. talent pipeline crisis was also declared around the same time).
From the Government Response to the Curriculum and Assessment Review: "We will rebalance the computing curriculum as the Review suggests, to ensure pupils develop essential digital literacy whilst retaining important computer science content. Through the reformed curriculum, pupils will know from a young age how computers can be trained using data and they will learn essential digital skills such as AI literacy."
The UK pivot from rigorous CS to AI literacy comes as tech-backed nonprofit Code.org is orchestrating a similar move in the U.S., pivoting from its original 2013 mission calling for rigorous CS for U.S. K-12 students to a new mission that embraces AI literacy. Code.org next month will replace its flagship Hour of Code event with a new Hour of AI "designed to bring AI education into the mainstream" that's supported by AI giants and Code.org donors Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. In September, Code.org pledged to the White House at an AI Education Task Force meeting led by First Lady Melania Trump and attended by U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon and Google CEO Sundar Pichai (OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was spotted in the audience) that it will engage 25 million learners in the new Hour of AI this school year, build AI pathways in 25 states, and launch a free high school AI course for 400,000 students by 2028.
From the Government Response to the Curriculum and Assessment Review: "We will rebalance the computing curriculum as the Review suggests, to ensure pupils develop essential digital literacy whilst retaining important computer science content. Through the reformed curriculum, pupils will know from a young age how computers can be trained using data and they will learn essential digital skills such as AI literacy."
The UK pivot from rigorous CS to AI literacy comes as tech-backed nonprofit Code.org is orchestrating a similar move in the U.S., pivoting from its original 2013 mission calling for rigorous CS for U.S. K-12 students to a new mission that embraces AI literacy. Code.org next month will replace its flagship Hour of Code event with a new Hour of AI "designed to bring AI education into the mainstream" that's supported by AI giants and Code.org donors Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. In September, Code.org pledged to the White House at an AI Education Task Force meeting led by First Lady Melania Trump and attended by U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon and Google CEO Sundar Pichai (OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was spotted in the audience) that it will engage 25 million learners in the new Hour of AI this school year, build AI pathways in 25 states, and launch a free high school AI course for 400,000 students by 2028.
