Camp for girls pushes their high-tech careers

More than two dozen girls participated in Dign’IT at the University of Idaho Coeur d’Alene Center last summer.

Dign’IT was designed for middle school female students to help increase their interest in careers in computer science and software engineering. The free program creates a path to college and high-tech careers for local students with high potential but limited opportunities. The program was sponsored by local tech company iShoutOut, the Verizon Foundation and UI CDA.

“The goal of Dign’IT is to provide students with meaningful experiences that will expose them to interesting careers and motivate them to continue on the academic path needed,” said Julie Amador, College of Education curriculum and instruction assistant professor.

One of the highlights of the camp was learning software engineering and coding while incorporating design and visualization elements.

Amador explained that the software industry is among the fastest growing industries worldwide. In the U.S., five of the Top 10 fastest growing jobs are in computer-related fields. Two of the three highest salaries for bachelor’s degrees are in computer science and engineering.

The Dign’IT camp is part of a bigger effort to create programs to raise awareness of these exciting careers and to address the workforce and research needs of the growing regional software and IT industry.

The region already benefits from a burgeoning and healthy IT industry base, but comprehensive programs for training current and future employees and entrepreneurs for the IT industry are not in place. UI is working closely with existing regional IT companies to ensure that programs focus on the skills required for industry success.

First Dual-Language Textbooks Bring Nez perce Culture to Classroom

By Allison R. Stormo

Assistant Professor Margaret Vaughn was instrumental in a project that created the Nez Perce Tribe’s first dual-language textbooks for the Lapwai School District. The students themselves helped make them.

Vaughn developed the project with a small cohort of Lapwai teachers, whom she met with monthly during the 2012-13 school year, to help them increase cultural responsiveness in their own teaching. Several of the teachers are recent graduates of the prestigious Wright Fellowship Program for educators working on their master’s degrees in curriculum and instruction. The lead Lapwai teacher on the project was D’Lisa Pinkham.

The books were written and illustrated during the three weeks of summer school. Lapwai Elementary School students in kindergarten through fifth grade participating in the “Summer Youth Writing Project: Cultivating Stories, Writing Within an Indigenous Perspective” wrote and illustrated gradeappropriate texts relevant to Nez Perce culture. Nez Perce elders in the Nez Perce Language Program then translated the texts.

The resulting six dual-language books will be used as curriculum to enhance reading and writing skills. They were published by Blue Earth People Group, a publishing company

Department and Center News Curriculum and Instruction

owned by the late Arthur Taylor, who served as UI’s Native American tribal liaison.

“The goal of these books is to keep true to teachers, the tribe and the students — above all,” Vaughn said.

The books are the first of their kind, said Pinkham, who in May 2013 received her doctorate of curriculum and instruction from the College of Education. She said there were no culturally responsive books for Nez Perce students that took learning and connected it to their culture’s rich and diverse history.

“A lot of research shows that making a culturally responsive school increases academic success,” she said.

Pinkham and Vaughn worked together to gain community support by having Nez Perce elders, members and employees come into the summer school classroom and share cultural artifacts, stories and artistic and scientific relevant information as a foundation for the books. The classroom teachers then built on that and helped the students develop the stories, illustrations and layouts for the books. The final product will be used as curriculum in future classes.

“It’s a first for our children and community,” Pinkham said.

The writing project and research was supported by grants from the Inland Northwest Community Foundation, a University of Idaho Seed Grant and the Office of Community Sponsorship.