Broadening Computing Participation in the Navajo Nation

Native Americans (NA) have historically been the most underrep-resented population when it comes to participating in STEM and computing careers. The Navajo are one of the country's largest NA groups, and understanding the barriers and developing solutions to increase their participation will have far-reaching consequences on informing the research and practice on how computing can be taught at NA-serving high schools. The paper describes the experience gained over three years of working in this region via project Let's Talk Code, which aims to help math, science, and art teachers from Navajo high schools develop CS-based projects in their existing courses and provide mentorship and guidance. Let's Talk Code is constructed as a research-practice partnership (RPP) where the teachers (practitioners) work with a multi-institutional team of researchers and CS educators to improve the capacity-building needs of its partners (high schools). The paper details the evolution of the project over the years and highlights challenges, barriers, and strategies that were used to impact a significant number of teachers throughout the project.