In the fall of 2012, fifteen brave students embarked on an unknown course called "AT CS Principles" - a pilot AP course. 

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AT CS Principles was designed as a "computing class for everyone else."  I'm not sure it became that exactly, but we made steps in the right direction. 

A typical intro computer science course treats programming itself as the object of study.  In this course we used programming as a tool for creative expression.  We considered many aspects of the world of computing through reading, activities, drawing, discussions, and yes, programming.

Students developed Android cell phone apps that addressed a number of computing issues including human/computer interaction, collecting and processing large sets of data and making GWAPs (Games With A Purpose).



Students also produced "computational art" in Processing making interactive visualizations.  Processing allowed us also to use Microsoft Kinect devices to process live video with depth data, enabling students to develop games in which human movement was mode of interaction with the program.



Finally, we also studied a number of computational concepts that did not produce artifacts such as security, privacy, data encryption and public policy related to these issues.