Coding Kids: Big Tech's Battle to Remake Public Schools

Summary

The inside story of how Big Tech catalyzed, co-opted and ultimately came to capture computer science and AI education in America.

Fourth graders doing Google-branded coding lessons. Amazon schooling seventh graders on its warehouse robots. High school AP computing courses from Microsoft and Apple. Over the last thirteen years, the tech industry has helped spread computer science and artificial intelligence education in schools at astonishing speed and scale.

In Coding Kids, award-winning New York Times reporter Natasha Singer tells this extraordinary story by chronicling the viral success of Code.org, a nonprofit backed by Big Tech companies whose lessons have reached tens of millions of children. Singer draws on a decade of reporting to show how giants like Google and Microsoft used their clout and colossal reach to sell schools on industry visions of computer science and AI education. Singer also profiles compelling educators fighting for a broader vision of computer science, one that not only studies algorithms and app-making, but also asks students to grapple with the societal consequences of powerful tech corporations and their disruptive digital tools.