UW CSE’s Ed Lazowska writes in the WTIA blog:
“Our industry creates a wide variety of jobs, employing people with a wide variety of preparation. But at its heart, our industry (and our state’s overall economic growth) is powered by the “essential ICT occupations” as defined in WTIA’s recent ICT Economic & Fiscal Impact Study …
“There are several moves afoot in the current legislative session that would make a real difference if enacted.
“One is H.B. 1813, introduced by Reps. Drew Hansen and Chad Magendanz, which includes a number of smart provisions related to computer science in K-12.
“A second is the Governor’s request, in his capital budget, for partial funding of a second building to accommodate growth for UW CSE …
“A third is work by Reps. Hansen and Magendanz that will hopefully lead to operating funds enabling expansion of the computer science programs at UW CSE, WSU EECS, and WWU Computer Science – the three programs that leading employers have told these legislators are their principal in-state suppliers of talent.”
Read more here.