Towards a More Inclusive Tech Culture: Promoting Professionalism in CS Classrooms and Labs

Professional behavior in the workplace needs to promote broad participation and inclusion. The competitive nature of the traditional classroom can thwart pedagogical goals to model, support and give practice to collaborative professionalism in the Tech industry and graduate level computing-based disciplines. Diverse populations, ingrained cultural expectations, and a significant range of opportunities for developing computing expertise prior to undergraduate opportunities can all exacerbate this problem. The goal of this BoF is to bring together educators who want to promote inclusive professionalism in the classroom and their community. We hope to use this collaborative setting to identify major issues and to set an agenda for further collaboration among the participants. The long-term goal is to create vehicles for best practice such as stories, curricular activities, and standards that can effect change in the CS community.