OAKLAND — A trio of top White House officials descended upon Roosevelt Middle School on a special assignment on Monday morning.
Their mission: to inspire Oakland’s youth to someday help “debug” the nation’s biggest, seemingly insurmountable problems by “unlocking the power” of data via computer coding.
The VIPs included D.J. Patil, chief data scientist for the United States and deputy chief technology officer for data policy; Lynn Overmann, senior policy adviser to the U.S. Chief Technology Officer; and Afua Bruce, executive director of the National Science at Technology Council. They visited the middle school, then Oakland Technical High School, with hopes of reaching Oakland’s most promising computer programming whiz kids and would-be white-hat coders of the future.
“And we’ll be calling upon you to think about serving at some point, at a city, state or national level, to help us figure out problems,” said Patil, to young computer science students seated in a circle with him in Dan Belsky’s computer science class at Roosevelt. “Because those problems are always going to be there … And hopefully all of you will have a chance to be there at the White House, some day running the show.”
This visit is part of a larger recognition of Computer Science Education Week in which schools across Oakland will participate in the Hour of Code, an annual one-hour introduction to computer science. The program is designed to demystify the basics of code for all and promote the power of computer coding at schools worldwide. On Wednesday the district will announce a partnership with Code.org and technology professionals from across the region will volunteer in classrooms with the aim of infusing the city’s youth with a love of computer programming and information technology. Claire Shorall, manager of computer science at Oakland Unified, said that the middle school was selected for the White House visit Monday because it’s “a leader among all schools in the district.”
“The last time I visited, students were writing advanced programs in Python, measuring specs for an art installation, and determining the supplies necessary to decorate for a Halloween party,” she said. “They are truly leaders and a model for other schools moving forward.”
Principal Clifford Hong said it’s the only middle school in the district that offers computer science and programming and robotics classes. It won third place in an annual robotics competition at UC Davis out of 36 Northern California teams in their division in May.
No small feat for the East Oakland middle school, where 96 percent of its students are low income and 100 percent are students of color, Hong said.
“It’s always intriguing for students to meet someone from the White House,” Hong said. “And it’s nice to have real-world applications to what the students are learning in the classroom.”
Eighth-grader Slah Alomari, 13, seemed star-struck by the White House visit.
“It was exciting because they are famous,” said Alomari, who said he wants to be a scientist and a soccer player. He was all smiles after posing for a cell phone photo with Patil. “And I really want Obama to know me some day.”
Patil is a Cupertino native who previously worked for companies like eBay, PayPal, Skype and Linked In before working with the government.
“My mission is to unleash the power of data to the benefit of all Americans,” Patil said about his job as chief data scientist for the United States. He explained to the students that every day he looks to harness computer science and technology to mine data to tackle the biggest problems facing the country, in health care, community policing, education, agriculture, weather emergencies, and national security concerns like ISIS.
Yet, he humbly recounted how he was “a near high school dropout” at Monta Vista High in Cupertino before he found his true calling in computer science and coding in college. It transformed his life, in the way he hoped other students could also be inspired by the power of computers.
“The only reason I am here is because I had access to a computer,” he said. “This is a world you can do anything in … As just one person, all of you, with a little bit of coding and a little bit of technology, can singularly change the world.”
Contact Joyce Tsai at 925-945-4764. Follow her at Twitter.com/joycetsainews.
