An assessment of Computer Literacy education: Perceptions of Boston computer teachers concerning the teaching of Computer Literacy in the Boston public schools

As perceived by Boston computer teachers, to what degree is the Computer Literacy program in the public schools of Boston serving its students and faculties? To answer this question, the goal of this research was to make an assessment of the perceptions of Boston computer teachers concerning the teaching of Computer Literacy in their schools. A review of the literature and the discussions held in connection with a pilot study showed that a reasonable set of questions could be developed to provide some definitive answers. These answers expressed not only what individual teachers do encounter on a day-to-day basis, but also what they believed should be occurring in their classrooms. A questionnaire was designed with three Areas of Interest to obtain data. The three Areas of Interest were called Curriculum, Facilities, and Policies. After the pilot study-group arrived at consensus, a reliability test was conducted on the instrument. Then the questionnaire and accompanying material was mailed to every certified computer teacher listed by the City of Boston School Department. With extensive follow-up procedures, the return rate reached 78%. The computer facilities of the University of Massachusetts (Harbor Campus), using a statistics management program called Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (Version X), treated the received data. The questionnaire asked for two responses to each question: one for current practice ( Does ), and the other for desired conditions ( Should ). For each question, SSPSx generated Means, Mean Discrepancies, Standard Deviations, and also made ANOVA comparisons between subgroups which related to school levels taught and to years of experience in teaching Computer Literacy. The data from Boston Computer Literacy teachers ranked the three Areas of Interest, with Curriculum most favorable and Policies least favorable. Middle school teachers with longer experience were most content with the current conditions. Those teachers with an average (four to six years) length of experience appeared to be the most disturbed, regardless of the school level at which they worked