2023 will go down in history as a year of exciting growth with our partners and our product! We were able to utilize the power of AI in our computer science platforms, created a ChatGPT replacement that is safe for K-12 classrooms, created AI-powered tools that save teachers hours a week, created industry certification prep courses, introduced Robotics curriculum and so much more!  

It was a year full of innovation, creation, and growth. In this blog, we’ll share exciting engagement numbers, product updates, and a few words from our partners. Enjoy! 

2023 Engagement Data in Computer Science

Year after year we hear about how more states are requiring computer science (CS) curriculum in districts. We’ve been fortunate to see districts adopt CS into their classrooms, and feel very passionate about taking it one step further. It’s not just about access–it’s about engagement!  We’re excited to share with you our student user engagement numbers to prove students don’t just have access to computer science. They are engaging in it and love it! 

‍

This incredible number highlights how much our student users engaged with the platform in 2023. Thanks to the support of our district and school partners in computer science, we made it possible for students across the U.S., including rural and underserved communities, to log in and explore Skill Struck a whopping 2,458,962 times. Truly amazing!

‍

Within our curriculum, students have opportunities to work on a variety of projects either individually or in groups. These projects allow students to put the skills and concepts they are learning into practice solidifying their learning. The projects they complete are often open-ended and the students get to create in ways that align with their interests. This year students created 40,836 computer science projects. This is exciting for their current learning and their future goals. Skill Struck’s projects have the potential to be saved for their portfolio and can be shared later on as they apply for jobs in the computer science field. 

‍

Every lesson within Skill Struck has checkpoints and challenges for the students to practice the new skills they have just learned. This 1,293,560 number showcases the many opportunities our students had to engage in coding, improve their comprehension, and solidify their retention. 

‍

We are grateful to all our current and prospective partners as well as internal Skill Struck team members who take the time to submit feedback on our products. This year we received 117 Feedback forms from prospective partners, 346 forms from current partners, and 224 forms from Skill Struck team members.  It’s important to note that oftentimes feedback forms include more than one idea or suggestion. With that in mind, it’s safe to say that our feedback team reviewed well over 687 ideas to improve our products.

Because our mission is to inspire creators, grow problem solvers, and strengthen communities, we put great emphasis and value into the feedback we receive. Listening to and implementing feedback is how we accomplish our mission. We understand that to positively impact the variety of schools and students that use or will use our platforms, we need to listen to our partners. We must understand their perspective and unique circumstances to make our products as impactful as possible. 

‍

This might just be our favorite metric yet–4,301,710 lines of code!  Students put their coding skills to use, building websites, games, calculators, and more. They learned computational thinking, developed problem-solving skills as they searched for errors and bugs, and used their coding skills to create meaningful projects. 

These skills students develop when they learn to code are not only beneficial to students pursuing a career in computer science but also for all students, regardless of their chosen career paths. This is why we are passionate about computer science education reaching as many students as possible. 

2023 Product Recap: Robotics, AI, Scratch Replacement, and more

‍

Robotics

We introduced our Robotics curriculum for the Micro:bit. Our Robotics curriculum includes four units ranging from beginner to advanced including a Python unit. 

Blocks Pro (a Scratch replacement) 

Over the years we’ve heard about the privacy concerns districts have had with different products. In 2023 we were able to launch Blocks Pro, a secure platform for K-5 students to learn block coding. Not only did we launch this product but we also increased the variety of checkpoints and challenges available to students as they progress through Skill Struck year over year.

Interactive Presentations

Engaging students in computer science will always be a huge focus for Skill Struck. That’s why we added interactive presentations to the built-in curriculum in our products! 

Added Customizations 

In 2023 we created custom content opportunities for our student and teacher users. Students are now building their own block puzzles for their classmates to solve and teachers have been creating assessments to test student comprehension.

Custom Hints

We integrated AI into our computer science curriculum by adding custom hints to guide students to meet the requirements of our challenges and checkpoints. We also added custom AI-generated explanations for the answer keys we provide our teacher partners.

Chat for Schools

We launched Chat For Schools, a safe, guided ChatGPT replacement for K-12 classrooms. Chat for Schools teaches students how to learn and use AI. It can be used as a brainstorming partner or as a tutor! Teachers have access to controls to gauge student usage and sentiment.  

Learning Studio

In addition to our AI-powered product Chat for Schools, we also launched Learning Studio. Learning Studio includes AI-powered tools that help teachers do busy work, like writing their lesson plans, creating quizzes, creating tutors, and more. 

AI Saves Teacher's Time

In November 2023 we launched a beta program with 150 of our current teacher and administrator users to test Chat for Schools and Learning Studio in the classroom. These educators were given access to these two platforms and gave us feedback. 

We heard a lot of positive feedback and learned our product was saving educators multiple hours a week.

“The quiz generator and lesson plan generator were time savers because they helped with producing material and questions aligned to our learning standards which saved me time thinking things up.  All I had to do was tweak to add my own personal touch,” said Nicole Kiesewettern, a teacher at Klein Independent School District.

After the beta, we met with these educators and plan to publish exciting new updates to these AI-powered products in 2024! Stay tuned for these updates. 

Skill Struck's 2023 Recognitions

This year Skill Struck was recognized and won three different awards. It is always exciting when others see the impact and importance of the products we are creating for K-12 computer science education. 

1. Women In IT Summit & Awards Series (US Edition) Skill Struck was Awarded Employer of the Year
2. Skill Struck CEO Parker Gentry received the 2023 Utah Business 20 in their 20's Award
3. DA Top Ed Tech Product Awards awarded Skill Struck the Future Learning Technology Category, for the Midsize Division.

This was a wonderful year for Skill Struck and are looking forward to 2024. We’ll be building more curriculum, diving deeper into AI solutions for classrooms, listening to our partners, and continuing to spread awareness of the importance of CS education.  We appreciate all our partners who have joined our mission and made our goals and dreams become a reality, we know we could do none of this without you.