What does it look like to lead AI implementation in a way that is coherent, responsible, and equity-driven? This session highlights strategies for building systemwide alignment across leadership, instruction, and operations while centering equity in every decision. Participants will explore practical approaches to developing guidelines, supporting educators, and ensuring AI enhances access, inclusion, and meaningful learning experiences for all students. You will also hear directly from a member of a school district AI task force who successfully scaled this work, offering real-world insights, lessons learned, and actionable strategies for your own context.
The Hartnell College Foundation K-12 STEAM Program partners with districts to align computer science instruction with TK-6 educational goals, ensuring students build strong foundational skills early and consistently. Our approach scaffolds computer science fundamentals across grade levels while incorporating continuous feedback from administrators to align with district priorities, including standards-based instruction and long-term academic outcomes.
This session highlights how early exposure to computational thinking prevents learning gaps as students transition into upper elementary grades, where science and technical rigor increase. We will share how our model integrates both technology-based and unplugged learning experiences, ensuring equitable access across diverse school environments regardless of device availability.
Additionally, we will explore how evolving workforce demands, particularly the rise of AI and technology-driven careers, require a shift toward creativity, problem-solving, and innovation. By intentionally embedding the “A” in STEAM, our program fosters creative thinking and adaptability.
Participants will gain insight into building scalable, aligned computer science pathways that support academic success and future careers. We will also highlight open source platforms such as Tinkercad, Scratch, and Code.org, demonstrating how these tools remove barriers and enable inclusive, hands-on learning experiences for all students.
As AI tools become a natural part of how we learn, plan, and create, educators are being asked a deeper question: how do we design assessments that genuinely capture learner understanding, thinking, and growth in an AI-rich world?
In this collaborative session, participants will explore innovative, inclusive approaches to assessment that honor human reasoning, while encouraging thoughtful integration of AI. Together, we will examine ways to design learning arcs and assessments that surface Computational Thinking practices, and the 5Cs (Collaboration, Creativity, Critical Thinking, Communication, and Compassion)—while challenging learners to leverage AI as a tool to support and extend their thinking and impact.
Grounded in assets-based practices, UDL, and workforce-aligned learning, this session emphasizes student agency and access for ALL. Participants will engage in dialogue & reflection, and begin envisioning assessment strategies that support meaningful learning, and prepare students for the future, in a rapidly evolving educational and technological landscape.
This session highlights how the Los Altos School District (LASD) designed and implemented an innovative integrated computer science model that develops computational thinking skills and learner mindsets from Transitional Kindergarten through eighth grade. Participants will explore LASD’s progression of learning experiences that foster problem-solving, creativity, collaboration, and critical thinking through age-appropriate computational thinking practices. The session will feature instructional models, curriculum integration strategies, and examples of student-centered learning that support deeper learning outcomes while increasing equitable access to computer science education for all students.
Join us for an inspiring session where college students will share their personal journeys from high school to college, reflecting on the experiences, challenges, and opportunities that shaped their pathways in computer science and related fields. Students will also discuss what they feel is missing in computer science education and what they wish they had experienced to better prepare them for their future. Following the presentations, participants will engage in an interactive panel and Q&A to gain authentic student perspectives, explore pathways in computing, and spark ideas for creating stronger and more meaningful computer science learning experiences.
In an increasingly digital world, the bridge between abstract code and physical reality is where true "aha!" moments happen for students. By integrating the RoboBlockly computer science program into the core of our elementary curriculum, we have observed that students don't just 'study' coding and math—they apply them to solve real-world challenges. This approach builds a concrete foundation of mathematical concepts before moving toward abstract understanding.
When an elementary student sees their first line of code move a robot, they are visually experiencing the manipulation of math. This sets the stage for future success; by the time they reach high school, their early hands-on experience allows them to master complex algebraic logic at an abstract level.
The RoboBlockly platform scales with the learner, ensuring that every student develops the digital literacy and critical thinking skills essential in today's tech-focused environment. The 'icing on the cake' is threefold:
1) The program supports English Learners in their native languages.
2) Educators can access all grade levels to differentiate instruction based on individual academic needs.
3) High achievers and GATE students have the freedom to explore as far as their curiosity takes them, preventing boredom and redundant remedial work.
We will begin by exploring the dual nature of the program, examining how the web-based block coding interface seamlessly integrates with hardware peripherals. Participants will gain practical insights into the administrative "heavy lifting"—we will demonstrate efficient classroom creation, streamlined assignment organization, and the use of built-in automated assessment tools to track student progress in real-time.
The presentation will culminate in a showcase of high-leverage extension activities. We will move beyond basic coding exercises to explore performance tasks
Feeling the pressure to integrate multiple initiatives without adding more to your plate? This session introduces a practical model for designing integrated, future-ready lessons that align with math, science, computer science, UDL, and SEL—without overwhelming teachers. Using an ELA-based story sequencing lesson as the anchor, participants will examine how a single lesson can intentionally incorporate multiple disciplines, including computational thinking and real-world connections such as sequencing, algorithms, and scientific concepts like food chains. Attendees will engage in a “behind-the-design” analysis, identifying key integration points and unpacking the strategies used to build coherence across content areas. The session will also highlight how AI can support this process by surfacing hidden integration opportunities and accelerating lesson design. Participants will explore a reusable AI meta-prompt and a flexible planning framework that can be adapted across grade levels and subject areas.
Find out how SCRIPT (Strategic CSforAll Resource & Implementation Planning Tool) has guided Coronado Unified in planning for CS implementation. Learn about what SCRIPT is, the process and the journey. Hear from administrators and teachers about wins and opportunities along the way and how this work continues moving forward.
In the summer of 2025, 4 teachers from Salinas Union High School District's La Paz Middle School started a grassroots, Computer Science program, with the aim of integrating Computational Thinking Practices and physical computing skills into their already busy curricula, with no prior experience, no CS background, no set curriculum, and very little funding. How did we do it? Why did we do it? Join us for a journey into the rationale for teacher-led CS instruction, the skills developed in both our teachers and our students in the past year, tips for any teachers who would follow in our footsteps, and a bounty of resources, templates, lesson plan ideas and tools developed by teachers, for teachers, already tested in our classrooms, to make your first year journey a little less bumpy than ours!Bui
Many districts are asked to implement new initiatives, computer science, AI, and intervention systems, often as separate efforts. But what if the most impactful work is not adding something new, but building coherent systems that already support the kind of thinking these initiatives require?
In this session, a team of instructional coaches and a district leader will share their journey of developing aligned systems for teacher support, data-driven instruction, and Tier 2 intervention. Presenters will demonstrate how core practices, unpacking standards, using data to guide instruction, and building responsive systems, mirror the structured thinking and problem-solving central to computer science.
Participants will explore how strong instructional systems can serve as a foundation for integrating emerging priorities like computer science and AI without overwhelming teachers or adding disconnected initiatives.
The Plugging into Power initiative collaborates with families and community partners to co-design resources with and for parents to advocate for equitable CS and AI education. In December 2025, we released a free parent advocacy guide (pluggingintopower.org) available in English, Spanish, and accessible HTML version, and we are currently developing a parent workshop. In this session, members from the Plugging into Power research-practice partnership and the CAL-MSCS FACEinSTEM leadership team will share key principles and lessons learned that guide how we approach any Family and Community Engagement (FACE) initiative. You will walk away with research-based and practical frameworks, hear about trust-building and value-mapping activities, and learn what common challenges and misconceptions we’ve encountered as we work towards empowering parents, families, and community members as key stakeholders in the movement to bring CS to all California students.
