Our project is a collaboration between two adjacent urban school districts—Medford and Everett, MA—and the computer science department at UMass Lowell.

We’re working with district teachers, introducing them to computing for social good using MIT App Inventor, and supporting them in developing a 15- to 20-hour curriculum that they’re bringing to their middle school students.

There will also be week-long summer camps for the students who are part of the project during the school year, and in September 2015, a project showcase to highlight work accomplished and get the next cohort of students excited about participation.

For the first project year, we recruited five teachers (three from Medford, and two from Everett), and we ran a series of 10 professional development meetings on Tuesday afternoons starting in October.

These teachers are just about ready to begin project implementation in their classrooms—if only it would stop snowing!