Gov. Jerry Brown appointed 15 technology and education experts Friday to a newly created panel charged with making recommendations on the implementation of K-12 computer science standards in California.
The panel, called the Computer Science Strategic Implementation Advisory Panel, was created by Assembly Bill 99. Its members will draw up plans to make sure teachers are prepared, schools have enough resources and the state’s new computer science standards are implemented fairly and effectively. The Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Legislature will also appoint members.
The panel’s recommendations will go to the Legislature, California Department of Education and State Board of Education by Jan. 15, 2019. The Department of Education will then turn those recommendations into a specific implementation plan, which the State Board of Education will vote on by July 15, 2019. The Legislature will approve a final plan.
The new panel members are:
- Gayle Nicholls-Ali, 61, of Altadena. Nicholls-Ali has been a curriculum writer and team lead at CTE Online since 2013, an adjunct professor at Pacific Oaks College since 2012 and a career tech education teacher at La Cañada High School since 2007;
- Jenny Chien, 32, of Carlsbad. Chien has been a teacher at the Casita Center for Technology, Science and Mathematics in the Vista Unified School District since 2007;
- Andrea M. Deveau, 42, of Sacramento. Deveau has been vice president for state policy and politics at TechNet since 2016, where she was executive director for California and Southwest Regions from 2014 to 2016;
- Shirley H. Diaz, 58, of Chico. Diaz has been assistant superintendent of educational services for the Glenn County Office of Education since 2007;
- Julie Flapan, 49, of Los Angeles. Flapan has been executive director at the Alliance for California Computing Education for Students and Schools and director of the Computer Science Project at the UCLA Center X;
- Jose L. Gonzalez, 44, of Atwater. Gonzalez has been superintendent of the Planada Elementary School District since 2010;
- Janell M. Miller, 40, of Clovis. Miller has been a teacher at the Washington Academic Middle School in the Sanger Unified School District since 2015, where she was a teacher for Jackson Elementary School from 2003 to 2015;
- Sathya Narayanan, 46, of San Jose. Narayanan has been a professor of computer science at California State University, Monterey Bay since 2017, where he has held several positions since 2007, including director, associate professor and assistant professor;
- Agodi E. Onyeador, 17, of Pittsburg. Onyeador has been a student at Oakland Technical High School since 2014, where she has been a consulting representative for Supporting People of Color Now since 2015. She was a summer math and science honors academy scholar for the Level Playing Field Institute from 2015 to 2017 and was a mentee at the Intel Computer Science Academy from 2016 to 2017;
- Michael J. Pazzani, 59, of Riverside. Pazzani has served as a vice chancellor of research and economic development and professor for computer science and engineering at UC Riverside since 2012;
- Dean M. Reese, 38, of Tracy. Reese has been an international baccalaureate coordinator for the Tracy Unified School District since 2017, where he has been a science teacher at Tracy High School since 2002, and has been a faculty scholar at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory since 2007;
- Solomon Russell, 39, of Los Angeles. Russell has been an assistant professor at El Camino College since 2015. He was a lecturer of computer science at UCLA in 2017 and an online moderator at Code.org from 2014 to 2015;
- Mehran Sahami, 47, of Palo Alto. Sahami has been a professor of computer science at Stanford University since 2013, where he has held several positions since 2001, including associate professor, lecturer and visiting lecturer and was a teaching fellow from 1992 to 1998. He was a consulting senior research scientist at Google Inc. from 2002 to 2007;
- Claire K.L. Shorall, 31, of San Francisco. Shorall has been an investor at Neo and a part-time advance placement computer science principles teacher for the Life Academy High School of Health and Bioscience since 2017. She served in several positions for the Oakland Unified School District from 2010 to 2017, including computer science manager, site-based instructional coach and teacher;
- Vandana Sikka, 45, of Los Altos Hills. Sikka has been founder and chief executive officer at Learnee Inc. since 2015. She was chairwoman at Infosys Foundation USA from 2014 to 2017 and vice president at Mitrix from 2008 to 2010.
This story was updated on Feb. 14, 2018.
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