[R-sig-teaching] long term follow up from R workshops with high school students

[Christopher W. Ryan]

Some of you may recall, from a couple years back, a discussion of
teaching R to high school students. Thought the group might be
interested in some follow up.

I did two 5-hour workshops with a group of students in a longitudinal
science research class at Rondout Valley High School in the Hudson
Valley region of New York State.

Their teacher is retiring after many years of service, and she was kind
enough to drop me a line.  Edited to remove some personal info, here is
what she wrote:

=============================================
HI Chris,

. . . I did want to tell you that three of my senior students (you came
to visit these students 2X) have continued to learn R up to an
intermediate level. Two of my juniors (out of six) are learning R on
their own up to an intermediate level. Two of these have research
projects that will involve R in the analysis. Two students did not use R
but are capable of using other statistical analysis programs. Of my
twelve Junior and senior students  five of them are much more capable
with statistical analysis and readily continue to pursue coding and
statistics. One of the Juniors is teaching other students R and other
coding and has formed a computer club. I am really amazed at this
success . . . .  This is an inspiration to me. Students are willing to
go into areas that are completely unknown and become mathematically
literate in coding and statistics . . . . So you are right Chris you can
tell your friends on the R list that high school students can learn R
and become adept at it.