Recognizing Cameron Wilson

For CS Education Week and #HourOfCode, I want to recognize and thank Cameron Wilson, one of the most important contributors to the CS education movement.

Since 2005, Cameron has worked on CS education, initially as the policy chief for ACM, where he founded Computing in the Core, a coalition which included CSTA, Microsoft, Google, NCWIT, and others. This coalition put CSEdWeek on the map, and also lobbied the US federal government for policy change. 

In 2010, Cameron, LeighAnn DeLyser, Mark Stehlik, and Chris Stephenson wrote the seminal paper, Running on Empty, which laid out the problem in K-12 computer science in the USA. https://runningonempty.acm.org/

After Code.org launched in 2013 to tackle this problem, Cameron was asked by Brad Smith at Microsoft and Maggie Johnson at Google to join me as my COO and #2, to bring Code.org his near-decade of experience in the CSEd community.

I’ve learned so much watching Cameron over the years as he established a policy agenda with impact in all 50 states, and architected a school outreach operation that reached tens of thousands of schools. 

One of Cameron’s greatest legacies is the leaders he’s grown. For example, Jake Baskin used to work in outreach at Code.org, and Cameron promoted him to manage advocacy, and next encouraged him to apply to run CSTA, where Jake is now Executive Director. 

As we celebrate CSEdWeek, I have a special story from 2013. When I told Cameron my idea of a grassroots campaign to call on every classroom to teach CS, he responded “what, you mean like an hour of code?” That is how the name #HourOfCode was born. 

1 billion #HourOfCode student engagements later, I want to recognize how much effort Cameron Wilson has poured into K-12 computer science, and what a global impact he has had.  Thank you.