Computing educators oral history project: seeking the trends

This report expands upon the work started by an ITiCSE 2005 Working Group, which established the groundwork for collecting and analyzing the oral histories of computing educators and provided a foundation for the Computing Educators Oral History Project (CEOHP). The main charge for the Working Group during ITiCSE 2008 was to begin analyzing the interviews already included in CEOHP. As part of the process of exploring analysis approaches, we revisited the status of CEOHP and what had been learned since 2005. We report on analytical procedures for using the interviews as research data and as the basis for informational, motivational resources. We describe techniques and software tools we investigated for qualitative (thematic) analysis of this rich set of personal histories. The analysis allowed themes to emerge naturally from the interviews and suggested specific areas for further investigation. The report describes plans, including procedural updates, archival options, web portal needs, legal and ethical issues, target groups, and publication targets. We conclude with a discussion of future challenges for CEOHP.