UCLA

This dissertation aimed to address existing research gaps in the understanding of “tech social capital” amongst Black and Latino/Hispanic high school students in afterschool computer science education programs. The research employed an exploratory mixed methods approach, with afterschool high school coding program Code Next as its sample site. Given the lack of social capital measurement instruments in education, this study analyzed a set of interviews regarding students’ understanding of their networks and access to resources, and used that information to adapt (and then run) an existing social capital instrument from the public health sector.

Five findings from this study demonstrated the presence and importance of tech social capital networks in Black and Latino/Hispanic high school students’ lives. First, students reported having at least one significant relationship that encouraged their interest in and exploration of computer science. Second, almost every student reported that relationships contributed computer science-related resources to their lives, with adult-student relationships contributing at least two resources and peer-peer relationships contributing at least one resource. Third, students expressed that these relationships had a largely positive impact on their interests in and around computer science. Fourth, Black and Latino/Hispanic high school students perceived an increase in their tech social capital through their program participation. Fifth, student perceptions of social capital change suggest the multiplicative nature of relationships, in that a single relationship can lead to acquisition of multiple resources.

Across these findings, four themes emerged—1) afterschool programs can provide significant tech social capital in the form of institutional agents and hardware access, 2) Black and Latino/Hispanic students enter these spaces already possessing some tech social capital, 3) there are differences between live and online learning environments, e.g., sustained access to physical hardware, and 4) there is utility in quantifying tech social capital for education practitioners, researchers, and corporate technical organizations.