Tech's outsized impact on cities like Detroit requires education, investment | Opinion

Communities across the country are grappling with the rapid development of technology and its growing implications for learning.

ChatGPT, generative AI, social media algorithms, facial recognition software — and their biases — have entered the public’s lexicon in ways not previously seen. The rising awareness of these technologies has captured our imaginations and elevated our fears — even as they’re entertaining and engaging, we must also consider the risks new technology can pose to the wellbeing of students and families.

We see these contradictions in Detroit, where a growing tech ecosystem creates new job opportunities, heightens community investment and by some estimates, creates nearly $91 billion in value for the metro area. But tech’s impact remains mixed and continues to cause concern among community groups and city leaders.

The community outcry after facial recognition tools led to the false arrests of several Michiganders and city officials embraced gunshot detection technology to prevent violence amplified the debate.

In the past decade, we’ve seen urban planning algorithms used to justify reallocating city resources away from our neighborhoods with the most need, and social media algorithms amplify disinformation, polarization, and exacerbate mental health challenges for our young people.

As the tech sector continues to grow in Detroit, in Michigan, and across the globe, K-12 computer science education has an important role to play in ensuring that our students have the knowledge to participate meaningfully and critically in the evolving tech economy. This includes having the skills and experience to fill these new tech jobs (if they choose to do so), but also the analytical skills to examine and critique the societal impacts of new technologies and to design new tech solutions to some of our most pressing problems.

Achieving this vision for the young people of Detroit must include a multifaceted approach to developing and implementing equitable, accessible, culturally responsive and comprehensive K-12 computer science education pathways. Critical to this approach will be collaboration between educators, administrators, parents, community leaders, and industry partners, centering the voices of students and building sustainability into these efforts.

Computer science that works for Detroit

The families attending Detroit Public Schools Community District have faced historical barriers in education and employment, restricting opportunities to participate in our tech-driven economy and society. Over 80% of students here are Black, nearly 14% are Latino, and a majority of the student body, 59.9%, is eligible to participate in the federal free and reduced price meal program, a measure of poverty.

Despite the prevalence of community efforts to ensure DPSCD has resources equivalent to the suburban school districts surrounding it, students from Kindergarten through 12th grade in DPSCD  lack access to the rigorous computer science education critical for their futures.

This is why we’re launching CSforDetroit, a community-centered initiative designed to expand K-12 computer science education for students across the Detroit metropolitan area.

In collaboration with Detroit Public Schools Community District, we are working with public and private organizations to expand the district’s computing course offerings, build up the CS competencies of teachers and administrators through training, invest in out-of-school time programs that create CS learning opportunities and launch a CS student leadership team that creates a channel for students to contribute their perspective to the initiative's efforts. The initiative also honors the deeply embedded sense of “place” that commonly fuels a sense of belonging, pride and purpose among Detroiters, and recognizes Detroit’s culture and contributions to technological innovation.

The CSforDetroit initiative is not starting from a blank slate. Residents, educators and parents have long fought for equity and to advance literacy within Detroit public schools.

It is our hope that investments in computer science education, in ways that center racial equity, will have a tremendous impact on reducing educational disparities in Detroit public schools by enhancing the existing literacy movement in Detroit to include computational literacy.

By eliminating barriers to meaningful and sustainable educational opportunities that often leave students from historically marginalized backgrounds behind, this place-based initiative aims to increase access to high quality, culturally responsive learning in computer science and technology related fields – both in school and out.

An equitable digital space

The challenges and our proposed solutions are deeply rooted in the principles of digital justice collaboratively created by the Detroit Digital Justice Coalition over a decade ago, prioritizing access, participation, common ownership and healthy communities. While traditional computer science education tends to focus on technical skills and coding, it often lacks consideration for ethical and equitable aspects of technological development.

We hope to ensure that the communities who are most impacted by the development, deployment and creation of digital and data systems will be at the forefront of shaping them.

In Detroit, we understand that computer science educators are faced with the challenge of designing educational pathways that go beyond simply creating a more diverse computer science workforce. We aim to intentionally ensure that computer science education is a means for Detroit students to generate a sense of pride and purpose in themselves and their community.

This initiative is led by the CSforDetroit Steering Committee, a dedicated collective of leaders in Detroit public schools, local and national nonprofit organizations, higher education, and tech that have lent their ideas and knowledge to this endeavor for the past year.

Part of this effort includes awarding a two-year capacity-building grant to DPSCD to help develop the structures to sustain this work for years to come. In the coming weeks, we will also be announcing a series of community events and activities to help young people and adults understand the value of computer science education. It’s important to note that our plans for this work are only the beginning – we look forward to engaging the community in these discussions and forging new paths for Detroit’s next generation to shape the future of the tech ecosystem.  To learn more, please visit CSforDetroit.org.

Kalisha Davis is the CS Equity Curriculum Project Director at the Kapor Center. Tawana Petty serves on the CSforDetroit Steering Committee and is a convening member of the Detroit Digital Justice Coalition. Dr. Chanel Beebe is an education specialist with the CSforDetroit Intiative. Submit a letter to the editor at freep.com/letters.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Bias in tech requires education, investment in cities like Detroit