Public higher-level schools must offer computer science and technology courses

The governor Pedro Pierluisi signed an executive order requiring the Department of Education to promote teaching in computer science and applied technologies, an initiative for which they allocated $10 million.

The proposal must be available in public higher education schools starting in the 2024-2025 school year.which begins in August of next year, the chief executive said this Monday, at a press conference in La Fortaleza.

Regarding the money for the new regulations, Pierluisi said that they come from the Emergency Aid Fund for Primary and Secondary Schools (ESSER, in English) and the second federal educational rescue program managed by La Fortaleza (GEER II, in English). . The millionaire sum allocated will be used for training and equipment, among other things.

“The Department of Education must offer an elective course of at least half a credit in computer science and applied technologies, and provide a teacher trained to provide that course in all schools“, indicated Pierluisi.

A total of 224 public schools would benefit from this course, reported, for her part, the nominated Secretary of Education, Yanira Raices, who added that “Technology is the key to the competitiveness of Puerto Rico’s education system”.

He assured that they have already identified 200 teachers who can provide this course and clarified that They will not be recruiting more educators for this task, but there will be “constant training”.

Pierluisi specified that the agency must coordinate the double enrollment mechanism so that the courses offered to students can be valid, not only in public school, but also at the university level.

He added that the executive order is part of his administration’s project called 21st Century Techforce, for which they allocated $50 million in state funds, which the Department of Education already has.

The objective of this initiative is to turn Puerto Rico, in 10 years, into one of the 10 main jurisdictions with the greatest human and technical capital, through the development of “software” (operating system), artificial intelligence, programming, computer science, computers and electronics, among others.

“We want to have 50,000 additional jobs in the technological field and, to achieve this, the schools have to be there,” said the president.

The initiative will be developed through an agreement between Education and the Department of Economic Development and Commerce (DDECC), an agency that must provide technical assistance.