Moving Toward a Responsible CS Curriculum: Every Course Has a Role to Play

Abstract

Responsible Computer Science (RCS) requires that students experience aspects of RCS in just about every CS course they take. It must be embedded across the curriculum, and it is the responsibility of all CS faculty to be part of the delivery of RCS. The purpose of this panel is to expand the community of practice around delivering RCS, so that students better understand how the integration of computing-related technologies into our daily lives has shifted the kinds of power and reach they have, both as individuals and in collective groups. Thus, we welcome those educators who are hesitant or are uncertain about adopting RCS into their teaching. To ease this adoption, we understand responsible computer science as broadly as possible and use it as an umbrella term that includes computing ethics, professionalism, computing for good, inclusive computing, diversity and inclusion in CS, security, safety, and computing for justice, just to name a few. The panelists, who have been collaborating on a project as part of the Mozilla Foundation Responsible CS project, will address concerns faculty have when incorporating RCS in their teaching, challenges faced when encouraging involvement of more CS faculty in the teaching of RCS, the value and need for interdisciplinary collaboration, and the value of grounding (or not) the delivery of some modules in ethical theories. Panelists will offer suggestions for moving toward a CS curriculum that embeds RCS modules and address issues that audience members raise.