Evaluating an Alternative CS1 for Students with Prior Programming Experience
Michael S. Kirkpatrick, Chris Mayfield · 2017
Before Fall 2013, our CS majors were required to take the same 4-credit introductory programming course as part of a two-semester CS1 designed to be welcoming to novices. As CS in K-12 has expanded, the diversity of incoming students' programming backgrounds has increased, raising concerns that the climate was becoming increasingly intimidating for novices. The literature suggests these effects could disproportionately impact retention of female students and other underrepresented minorities, undermining other efforts to broaden participation in computing. To address these concerns, we split the first course based on students' prior programming experience. Using statistical techniques, we analyzed the intermediate quantitative impact of this and other curricular changes. Our results suggest that adding the alternative CS1 course had little effect on retention, but the overall structure has been successful in achieving comparable CS2 outcomes regardless of prior experience.