TPF4Y board member and DeveloperTown employee Jon Nolen works with a student at IPS School #55.
The week of December 4th - 8th, CoderDojo Indiana, a TPF4Y initiative, facilitated Hour of Code at five IPS and Pike Township schools in order to celebrate Computer Science Education Week for the fourth year in a row. CS Ed Week is a worldwide, grassroots campaign to encourage as many K-12 students as possible (over 497 million so far!) to participate in an Hour of Code activity. Students around the globe are encouraged to try their hand at coding by completing one of Code.org’s introductory activities. We invited the students we worked with to try CodeCombat (for middle schoolers) and Minecraft or Angry Birds (for elementary schoolers).
Students work together on an Hour of Code activity.
"Technology and coding are lacing their way through more and more of our lives every day," said volunteer Nick Birch of PropelUp. "Our kids are growing up as part of a generation where understanding the basics of coding, the language of computers, will be as important as understanding spoken language between humans. Learning to code will open doors for these kids that don't even yet exist."
TPF4Y partnered with Harshman Magnet Middle School, IPS Schools #14, #15, #55, and New Augusta Public Academy South to expose students to the world of computer science. Some of the students had experienced Hour of Code in the past, while it was a new experience for others.
"I'm so thankful I was able to spend some of my work week helping kids at my local neighborhood school learn to code," said volunteer Amanda Brinkman of Appirio. "It's amazing what the Indy community is doing to help bridge the skill gap for future generations. Thanks to CoderDojo Indiana for organizing & Appirio for the VTO!"
Salesforce employee Will Brooks answers a question for a student.
Thanks to over 170 volunteers provided by multiple corporate partners, we were able to impact more than 1,200 students over the course of the week.
"We are so proud of the growth we've seen with our Hour of Code efforts," said Courtney Lambert, Program Manager for TPF4Y. "Combined, we've introduced 3,111 students to coding activities over the past four years, just during CS Ed Week. And we're looking forward to continuing to grow our reach next year."
While Hour of Code has wrapped up for this year, our CoderDojo Indiana initiative is always looking for dedicated volunteers passionate about bringing computer science to underserved students. Currently, there are 37 CoderDojos in Indiana and we are in need of volunteers at several clubs in Indianapolis as well as throughout the state. If you are interested in learning more about volunteering at a CoderDojo club, please complete this form and we'll contact you with more information!
THANKS TO OUR 2017 HOUR OF CODE PARTNERS:
