President Trump wants the Department of Education to focus on computer science education. He suggests that the department spends $200 million annually on STEM education.

It is speculated that he will order the department to spend a total of $200 million annually on STEM education for children in grades K-12. According to Recode, the president wants the department to set aside this amount from its grant funds.

According to Hadi Partovi when interviewed by TechCrunch, this is a huge win for Code.org because this is a cause that the organization started four years ago. Their goal was to get more women and minorities exposed to and involved with computer science programs.

President Barack Obama wanted $4 billion for state funding to make sure that everybody had the opportunity to get computer science training. Sadly enough, Congress did not agree with President Barack Obama and did not approve the initiative. But maybe this administration can obtain funding for more STEM programs. Thus, even if you hate Trump, you have to agree that numerous American children could benefit from an increase in computer science programs.

Per Partovi, because of federal, private industry, local and state government, computer science could eventually become a part of American core curriculums for K-12 schools.  He goes on to say that added teacher training means that more children will get quality computer science education.  Currently, only 40 percent of children in grades K-12 are exposed to computer science.  Hopefully, this percentage will increase to 100 percent by the year 2022.

In a memo to the Department of Education, Trump stated that he wants the department to find ways to get more exposure for computer science training in grades K-12.  He also wants them to consider racial and gender differences when addressing this issue. All in all, President Trump wants the Department of Education to give him an annual report on the effectiveness of his computer science education directive.

STEM Education: Developing 21st century problem solvers