HS Tech Summit

The high school hackathon scene is exploding, with more and more high school students choosing to spend their weekends teaching themselves computer science and becoming makers. Parents support it too: 90% want their child's K-12 school to teach computer science. 67% of parents and 56% of teachers believe students should be required to learn computer science -- demand being highest among parents or teachers of low-income students. More than 50% of Americans rank computer science as one of the most important subjects to student after reading and writing. And for good reason: An estimated 1 million technology jobs will go unfilled by 2020, according to a report put forth byte Bureau Of Labor Statistics.

And yet, this is the state of K-12 computer science education:

Only 25% of K-12 schools (public and private) offer any kind of CS class. In 2015, girls represented only 22 percent and underrepresented minorities only 13 percent of the approximately 50,000 students who took the Advanced Placement Computer Science (AP-CS) exam nationally. In 10 states fewer than 10 high school girls took AP-CS, and in 23 states, fewer than 10 African American students took the AP-CS, with none taking it in nine of those states. As of February 2016, just one city in the entire United States (Chicago) mandates CS as a required class for all high school graduates.

Let's change that.

Join us for the first High School Technology Summit, where we will be celebrating the makers who are pioneering the HS hacker scene and community. We'll host a HS Hack Expo and give out awards to the best hacks created over the past year. We'll feature speaking panels of CEOs and Founders, HS hackathon organizers and organizations, diversity organizations, and representatives from top companies and Y Combinator startups. We'll get you prepared to organize a hackathon at your high school. We'll discuss the importance of computer science in HS and collaboratively brainstorm and work on solutions. We'll have a lot of fun!

Activities and topics will include:
- 2016 HS Hack Expo + Awards
- Hacking Hackathons panel + workshop: Get prepared to organize a hackathon
- How to start a computer science program at your school
- How to land an internship in technology
- Y Combinator panel
- EdTech panel
- Diversity & Inclusion in tech panel
- Civic tech panel
- and more

We hope to see you there :)