Should Computer Science Be Required in High Schools?
A Q&A with Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson on how he turned his state into a hub for technology and why expanding computer science education is critical to national security.
Techies aren’t the only ones who need to code.
Photographer: MediaNews Group/Orange County Re/MediaNews Group RM
This is one of a series of interviews by Bloomberg Opinion columnists on how to solve the world’s most pressing policy challenges. It has been edited for length and clarity.
Romesh Ratnesar: You’re in your second term as governor of Arkansas and recently became chairman of the National Governors Association. In that role, you’ve announced an initiative to expand computer-science education in public schools across the U.S., building on Arkansas’ leadership in this area. Every public high school in Arkansas now offers courses in computer science, compared to just 47% nationally. What sparked your commitment to making computer science education a priority for your state?
Asa Hutchinson, governor of Arkansas and chairman, National Governors Association: There are two parts to it. As undersecretary of Homeland Security after 9/11, I had responsibility for overseeing the agencies that were designed to prevent a terrorist attack on our soil. You had to do that through technology — data analytics and software that took massive amounts of information to determine what posed a risk, what was safe for commerce and what needed to be targeted for inspection, whether a container or individuals or passengers on a plane. That experience with the importance of technology for security brought me to run for governor.