BATON ROUGE — Louisiana public schools will soon begin to implement the state's first-ever standards for computer science education, the Louisiana State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education announced Wednesday.

The new standards, which will be implemented for the 2025-2026 school year, are designed to ensure graduates apply analytical and critical thinking skills to real-world situations, demonstrate digital literacy and digital citizenship skills, and utilize technology skills as employable citizens to meet present and future workforce needs, BESE said. 

The standards will be organized into five core concepts: computing skills, networks and the internet, data and analysis, algorithms and programming, and impacts of computing. It will assist teachers in structuring student learning and providing cohesion to the components that make up computer science educational programs.

The new curriculum is also adaptable to varying teaching styles and specific computer science content topics.

The Board’s approval of the standards marks the culmination of a process that began with the passage of the Computer Science Education Act in the 2022 Louisiana Regular Legislative Session that established the Computer Science Education Advisory Commission, which produced recommendations for the development of a state action plan for computer science education in all public schools. 

“Computer science education is an investment in both the present and future,” Louisiana Department of Education Deputy Chief of Policy Ashley Townsend, who chaired the Computer Science Commission and Standards Committee, said. “It supports problem-solving across the curriculum; regardless of a student’s future engagement with computing. As we expand computer science throughout grades K-12, more students will also have the opportunity to prepare for in-demand computing careers -- or for careers that may not even exist yet.”