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Computer Science Now Required For Chicago High Schoolers

by Mason Johnson

The Chicago Public School Board of Education has made computer science a graduation requirement for high school students.

The class of 2020 -- next year's freshmen -- will be required to complete a curriculum in the subject, allowing them to better compete in the growing computer science job market.

"Making sure that our students are exposed to STEM and computer science opportunities early on is critical in building a pipeline to both college to career," said Mayor Emanuel in a press release. "Requiring computer science as a core requirement will ensure that our graduates are proficient in the language of the 21st century so that they can compete for the jobs of the future."

This is totally what computer science looks like. via GIPHY

What is computer science? Mostly, it's the ability to code -- to write the language for the applications that run on our computers, phones and tablets. Imagine learning another language, say Spanish, that's also heavily based on algebra (though the qualities differ greatly from computer language to computer language).

As CPS's press release states, demand for computing skills is high and will only grow, creating a gap of one million job opening by 2024. "Currently, there are nearly 600,000 job openings in computing while universities produced fewer than 40,000 computer science graduates last year."

CPS students will be required to complete one credit of computer science education as half of the school system's two-credit Career Education requirement.

Mason Johnson is a Web Content Producer for CBS Chicago. You can find him on Twitter.

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