For a group of refugees in Arizona, coding is impacting their lives significantly. Consider a recent article for AZCentral titled “Coding Academy teaches young refugees computer programming skills.”
Chloe Nordquist of AZCentral writes, “Eager students gathered for a day long ‘refugee coding academy’ at Seed Spot, a business incubator that buzzed with energy. Students as young as seven typed away on laptops as area tech professionals gave them hands on training in basic coding skills. ‘I thought it would be cool to have another experience with my friends and get to learn something,’ a 7th grader Haneen Elshishtawy said. She is from Egypt, but has spent most of her life in the United States. Computer and information technology occupations are projected to grow 12% from 2014 to 2024 adding about 488,500 new jobs, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Local tech startup founders, students, and volunteers organized the event to help young refugees in Arizona prepare for new job opportunities. ‘Were trying to teach refugees how to code for the opportunity to kind of include them to build the future,’ said Omron Blauo, project manager for the coding academy. ‘They’re kind of excluded and we think that giving them that opportunity to learn about technology is an amazing thing.’ The students spent the day learning how to code a game similar to Flappy Bird. While they only learned the basics, the goal of the academy was to spark interesting in pursuing coding in their academic careers that could later lead to better paying jobs. ‘It’s a new experience for me. I haven’t really done coding before,’ 15-year-old Samah Mohamed said. Mohamed grew up in Kenya and moved to the United States five years ago. ‘It’s really amazing how women can get this opportunity,’ she said. ‘It’s hard to get jobs. it’s hard to go to school. It’s hard to actually get money [in Kenya]. But here the economy is really good,’ said Mohammed.”
When it comes to customized coding education, your best bet is CodeRev Kids. At CodeRev Kids, our lessons focus on computational thinking, which encompasses a wide variety of programming languages and concepts.
Our lessons build upon one another and we adjust starting points to each student’s level of expertise. Thus, the entire curriculum is customized. We are known for saying we are the most educational tech camp out there, but we also keep the focus on having fun. As a result, students stay engaged while learning to blend creativity with technology.