Promoting game accessibility: Experiencing an induction on inclusive design practice at the global games jam

Copyright @ 2013 The AuthorsThe Global Games Jam (GGJ) attracts many people who are passionate about games development, coming from a range of educational backgrounds. Therefore, the event can be experienced by novices and student developers as an opportunity for learning. This provides an opening to promote themes and ideas that could help form future thinking about games design, emerging as a form of induction on key design issues for new practitioners. Such an approach aims to raise awareness about issues which learners could help develop and take with them into industry. However, the experience itself affords a deep experiential rhetoric and dialogue with experts that could be an effective pedagogical tool for issues seldom addressed deeply in formal educational settings. This paper describes an account by one such individual, being introduced to game accessibility through participation in the GGJ. As such, it is not intended as a rigorous empirical analysis, but rather a perspective on one way a game jam can be experienced, inviting further research on the topic

Guest Editors\u27 Introduction: Best of RESPECT, Part 2

The guest editors introduce best papers on broadening participation in computing from the RESPECT\u2715 conference. The five articles presented here are part two of a two-part series representing research on broadening participation in computing. These articles study participation in intersectional ways, through the perceptions and experiences of African-American middle school girls, the sense of belonging in computing for LGBTQ students, the impact of a STEM scholarship and community development program for low-income and first-generation college students, a leadership development program, and how African-American women individually take leadership to enable their success in computing

The Need for Research in Broadening Participation

Underrepresentation in computing is a global problem, marked by a disturbing lack of access to computing resources and education among people underrepresented by race, ethnicity, gender, income, disability, and sexual-orientation status. It is urgent that we address this divide between those with and without the knowledge to create computational artifacts or even basic functional literacy. Important alliances for broadening participation (BP) are catalyzing efforts to engage more people in computing, but they are not enough. We need solid research as well

Human computer interaction for international development: past present and future

Recent years have seen a burgeoning interest in research into the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the context of developing regions, particularly into how such ICTs might be appropriately designed to meet the unique user and infrastructural requirements that we encounter in these cross-cultural environments. This emerging field, known to some as HCI4D, is the product of a diverse set of origins. As such, it can often be difficult to navigate prior work, and/or to piece together a broad picture of what the field looks like as a whole. In this paper, we aim to contextualize HCI4D—to give it some historical background, to review its existing literature spanning a number of research traditions, to discuss some of its key issues arising from the work done so far, and to suggest some major research objectives for the future

Animal-Computer Interaction: the emergence of a discipline

In this editorial to the IJHCS Special Issue on Animal-Computer Interaction (ACI), we provide an overview of the state-of-the-art in this emerging field, outlining the main scientific interests of its developing community, in a broader cultural context of evolving human-animal relations. We summarise the core aims proposed for the development of ACI as a discipline, discussing the challenges these pose and how ACI researchers are trying to address them. We then introduce the contributions to the Special Issue, showing how they illustrate some of the key issues that characterise the current state-of-the-art in ACI, and finally reflect on how the journey ahead towards developing an ACI discipline could be undertaken

Arizona’s Rising STEM Occupational Demands and Declining Participation in the Scientific Workforce: An Examination of Attitudes among African Americans toward STEM College Majors and Careers

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (2008), science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) occupations constitute a growing sector of Arizona’s economy. However, the number of African Americans earning degrees related to these occupations has not kept pace with this growth. Increasing the participation of African Americans in STEM education fields and subsequent related occupations in Arizona is vital to growing and maintaining the state’s economic stature. This objective is made even more compelling given that each year, from 2008– 2018, there are 3,671 projected job openings in STEM fields in Arizona. This study explores the extent to which the attitudes held by African Americans in Arizona toward STEM related majors and careers influence their likelihood of joining the state’s scientific workforce. Our analyses reveal the importance of career consideration, confidence in one’s ability to be successful in a STEM related field, and family support of the pursuit of STEM education and careers.Educatio

An Innovative Partnership between National and Regional Partnerships: STARS Meets McPIE

The Students & Technology in Academia, Research, and Service (STARS) Computing Corps is a nationally-connected system of regional partnerships among higher education, K-12 schools, industry and the community, with a mission to broaden the participation of women, under-represented minorities and persons with disabilities in computing (BPC). With support from National Science Foundation funding, the University of North Carolina at Charlotte founded the STARS Alliance (now the STARS Computing Corps) which includes 44 universities, each with its own “constellation” of local and regional partnerships. McClintock Partners in Education (McPIE) is a partnership between a middle school, a church, and their surrounding community. This paper describes how a STARS-McPIE “partnership between partnerships” has impacted both the middle school students and their college student mentors

Overcoming the adversity of diversity : an Australian story

The low participation rate of women in computing education and the computing industry is a phenomenon that has been recognised by many western countries. While much has been written on the underlying reasons for the low participation in such a growing and dynamic industry, the situation only seems to be worsening. This paper examines briefly a number of approaches taken by researchers in Australia to try and address the problem. One tertiary institution, Victoria University, has undertaken over a ten year period a sequence of projects, aimed at encouraging and supportingfemale students to study information technology and then make a successful transition from university to the workplace. The strategies and outcomes of the most recent project is the focus of this paper. This project concentrated on equipping graduatingfemale students with skills and knowledge to enable them to participate on equal terms with their male counterparts in workgroups and project teams. An outcome from this work was the preparation and distribution of a resource book to graduating female students during 2002.<br /