Code First: Girls
Closing the Gender Gap in Technology
Code First: Girls is a national movement with a mission to empower young women by giving them skills they need both for professional and personal development. Women are an underrepresented group in tech industries, and Code First: Girls aims to change that.
In the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM), graduates are predominantly male in most countries, only around 22% are women. Only 14% of female students enroll in a computer science course. In 2017, female software developers and programmers made up 3.9% of telco and tech professionals in the UK, a disappointing decline compared to 10% in 2007 (Source: ONS Dataset EMP04: Employment by occupation). Encouraging more women to pursue these professions has a huge potential to transform the UK economy for the better and is a way to avoid creating biased tech foundations for our future society. Almost all industries increasingly require tech professionals, from medical fields to online casinos. Websites like Gala Casino Promotions can equally be made by women and men, and the disparity is becoming glaringly obvious. Similar to the gambling profession, legal, or construction professions, which were once mostly male, the IT sector needs a change, and Code First: Girls hopes to aid in that.
Code First: Girls has created another opportunity for young women. Free coding courses for women is the main activity of this multi award-winning social enterprise aiming to train 20 000 women to code by the end of 2020. More than 5000 women learned how to code for free by using some of the Code First: Girls programmes, currently available in London and Manchester. If you are a young woman looking for professional development, you can greatly benefit from this program. Coding is becoming one of the most sought-after skills across industries, and there is no reason why one large part of the population should be falling behind.
Free coding course available is “Introduction to Web Development”. It lasts for 8 weeks, 2 hours per week, and after completing the course the students should be able build their own website. It is a beginner’s course that introduces all the important elements of front-end programming: HTML, JavaScript, CSS, GitHub collaboration, jQuery, and more.
Eligible for this course are women aged 18 to 23, or women who are over 18 years old and are currently students, or have been studying in the past two years. All you need to start this course is a laptop.
What are we waiting for girls? Let’s learn about technology together!