More Than $149,000 in Federal Funds Granted to Texas State University for STEM Curriculum

August 17, 2012

Washington—Today, U.S. Congressman Lloyd Doggett, a senior member of the House Ways and Means and Budget Committees, announced $149,000 in federal funds is available for Texas State University from the National Science Foundation. The funds will help enhance the undergraduate computer science curriculum to better prepare students for real-world deployment of their computer programming skills. Outreach activities associated with this curriculum improvement will help to increase the participation of female and Hispanic Central Texas students in the computer science field.

"Continued investments in STEM education ensure that Central Texas remains on the cutting edge of our economy," said Rep. Doggett. "We must prepare all of our students for the global workforce with the best education possible, especially in the science and technology fields."

Texas State Assistant Professor of Computer Science Apan Qasem also noted the importance of the funding. "The enhanced curriculum will equip computer science students with skills that are highly sought after by the computing industry. The project bears special significance as it will leverage Texas State's diverse student body to broaden the participation of both female and Hispanic students; two traditionally underrepresented groups in STEM disciplines," he said.

Texas State's Department of Computer Science will use the funds to develop course material to introduce parallel computing concepts in earlier computer science courses and to design a new upper-level course focused on parallel computing. The new materials allow students to learn both traditional sequential programming and more modern parallel programming throughout their curriculum.

Funding from the National Science Foundation is critical to developing STEM education and to ensuring students are taught the modern skills and thinking patterns required in this career field. These funds will also help increase diversity in this fast-growing area of study.