Africa Code Week aims to teach 20,000 children to code in one week

Almost everybody has heard of Code.org, the American non-profit that aims to get kids to code.

They’re hard to miss. In 2013, the organization got Will.I.Am, Ashton Kutcher, Shakira, Sheryl Sandberg, Bill Gates and many more to promote the Hour of Code, an initiative that teaches students the basics of computer programming in just 60 minutes (with an inspiring video).

Their ambition is to change the view that coding is only for tech-savvy kids, and to show that anyone, girl or boy, can have fun learning to code.

Behind this program is a simple belief: coding teaches one how to think, and is an invaluable skill that not enough people in the workforce master. So it was only a matter of time until a similar initiative popped up on the continent that has the highest number of youth in the world: Africa.

Some 11 million youth are expected to enter the African labor market every year over the next decade. Digital jobs could increase their income by 40 percent to 200 percent, according to Africa Code Week.

The organization has ambitious goals. It aims to introduce coding to 20,000 kids in 17 African countries from October 1 to 10.

Original article by Aline Mayard

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Africa Code Week aims to teach 20,000 children to code in one week