This project aims to redefine how to teach computer science to students who approach computing from a broader and more diverse set of interests than typical in most programs. These students are not traditional computer science majors but, instead, students who will follow their interests to apply computing to fields as diverse as fine arts, humanities, political science, music, writing, social science, and history, among others. There are many decades of deep integration between arts and technology from which to draw inspiration for new curricular frameworks.

The primary objective is to create an educational community consisting of diverse institutions, which will be poised to develop effective Computing in the Arts (CITA) degree programs.

Graduates of these CITA programs will create, design, and code new tools for artistic creativity. From contemporary music-, art- and theater-production, to creating new forms of animation, digital media, and games, to invigorating the visual and audio systems of tomorrow’s computers, to inventing revolutionary networked applications, the work students do in these collaborative programs will prepare them for computing-aware, productive, and integrated careers in the information and arts economies.

While the project concentrates on computing and the arts (e.g., art, music, dance, sculpture, theater), this approach in curricular integration is general and can apply across many fields.