Underrepresented High Schoolers’ Interests, Engagement, and Experiences in an Information and Communications Technology Summer Workshop: A Three-Year Study

In this paper we describe our investigation of underrepresented high school students’ interests, engagement, and experiences in design-based Information Communications Technology (ICT) summer workshop activities; with the goal identifying activities, aspects, and/or elements program that can be tailored or improved upon to attract, engage, educate, retain schoolers who have historically been ICT. Our primary research question is “which activities are most engaging for students typically ICT careers programs,” additionally report on psychosocial changes across workshops. A total 139 (of which 98 identified as being female racially minoritized students) participated workshops hosted three consecutive summers at a large, public, urban university Midwestern region United States. Employing mixed methods design, quantitative results qualitative findings suggest sample found workshops’ group projects hands-on courses activities. Implications results/findings further discussed.