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About

Adrienne Unertl is an education researcher whose work sits at the intersection of computational thinking, culturally responsive pedagogy, and STEM teacher preparation. Her scholarship focuses on equipping educators — particularly those serving rural communities — with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to bring computer science and engineering concepts into their classrooms through hands-on, engaging modalities such as robotics and game design. Unertl's most influential contribution, "Preparing Teachers to Engage Rural Students in Computational Thinking Through Robotics, Game Design, and Culturally Responsive Teaching" (2017), has garnered 130 citations and stands as a landmark study examining how teacher beliefs and self-efficacy shift when professional development integrates culturally responsive teaching with computational thinking instruction. This work directly addresses equity gaps in STEM education by centering the experiences and identities of underserved student populations. Her complementary research further investigates how game design and robotics can serve as vehicles for developing teachers' engineering practices and broadening pathways into STEM fields for students who might otherwise remain on the margins of these disciplines. Collectively, Unertl's contributions offer practical, research-grounded frameworks for transforming how educators approach computer science instruction in diverse and rural educational contexts.