President Barack Obama has introduced the "Computer Science for All Initiative," wherein the administration will be allocating $4 billion worth of funds towards the improvement of the computer science curriculum of the schools in every state.
"Our economy is rapidly shifting, and both educators and business leaders are increasingly recognizing that Computer Science is a 'new basic' skill necessary for economic opportunity and social mobility," wrote Megan Smith, U.S. Chief Technology Officer, according to the White House blog.
Various grants will be given to states that can provide well-designed proposals on how they plan to improve the computer science education in their schools. The Department of Education will be responsible for reviewing the proposals and distributing the fund.
Aside from the $4 billion, the administration is also reserving $100 million worth of funds that will be spent in training teachers, expanding access to high-quality instructional materials and building effective regional partnerships, according to Digital Trends.
Before the initiative pushes forth, it has to be incorporated into Obama's 2017 budget, which will, in turn, need the approval of the Congress. However, tech companies like Google, Salesforce and Microsoft have already expressed support for the campaign and even different cities across the U.S., TechCrunch reported.
Mark Zuckerberg also expressed his belief in the effort in a Facebook post, relaying the story of how he first started coding when he was only 10 years old. Obama even left a comment on the post to express his gratitude of Zuckerberg's recognition of the initiative.
