; (2) direct the Director of the Institute of Education Sciences to identify best practices to improve the effectiveness of activities funded under subpart A; and (3) disseminate research on best practices to significantly improve the academic outcomes of children living in our Nation’s most distressed communities. 8023. National activities From the amounts appropriated under section 8024 for a fiscal year, the Secretary may reserve not more than 5 percent for national activities, which may include— (1) research on the activities carried out under subpart A; (2) identifying and disseminating best practices; (3) support for the community of practice related to the purposes of this grant, which may include technical assistance and conferences; (4) professional development; and (5) other activities consistent with the purpose of this part. 8024. Authorization of appropriations There are authorized to be appropriated to carry out this part such sums as may be necessary for fiscal year 2019 and each of the 4 succeeding fiscal years. 2 Increased Access to Computer Science Education 8031. Definitions In this part: (1) Computational thinking The term computational thinking aims to capture the wide range of creative processes that go into formulating problems and their solutions in such a way that the solutions can be carried out by a computer, and may involve some understanding of software and hardware design, logic and the use of abstraction and representation, algorithm design, algorithm expression, problem decomposition, modularity, programming paradigms and languages, issues of information security and privacy, the application of computation across a wide range of disciplines, and the societal impact of computing. Programming is a hands-on, inquiry-based way in which computational thinking may be learned. (2) Computer science education The term computer science education includes any of the following: computational thinking; software design; hardware architecture and organization; theoretical foundations