Virtual Girls Into Coding #2 – Sep 6th, 2020
Last month we had a great start to the virtual Girls Into Coding events.
We had a really good turn out and received some amazingly encouraging feedback from the girls & their parents.
Last Sunday, September 6th, we held our second virtual event. This time around it was made up of four different workshops instead of three, as was the case in the first event.
We had a robot simulator, Py Creature, Microbit robot, and also a 3D design & printing workshop where the girls got to compare and assess some of the best freely available 3D Design software. Thank you Graham for all of the hard work you put into making this workshop possible.
The Robot simulator and the Py Creatures workshops both took place in virtual environments and attendees were guided through their challenges by their mentors. Thank you Llewelyn & Ben for once again delivering two fantastic virtual workshops. For my Microbit robot workshop, the robotics kits were sent out to the girls in advance so we could build and code them together on Zoom during the event.
About The Guest Speakers
We also had two fantastic speakers who shared their tech stories, helping to raise awareness of women in tech careers.
Colleen Wong
The first guest speaker was Colleen Wong, the founder & Director of Techsixtyfour Lld. Techsixtyfour’s first brand, My Gator Watch, is the UK and Europe’s most highly rated wearable mobile phone and tracker for children.
Lauren Alie
Lauren Alie was the second speaker (with “The Art of Programming”) and she provided a really clear insight into her relationship with tech and her technology degree apprenticeship with PwC. Lauren also gave the girls a great tutorial Python Turtle, demonstrating how to use code to create art. Lauren aims to improve diversity and inclusion in the technology industry. She is working on encouraging young people from under-represented backgrounds to consider a career in technology, through her work with Hackathons for Schools Association and being a recruitment ambassador for the PwC technology degree apprenticeship programme.
I definitely had a great time during this event and the girls once again demonstrated that STEM is for everyone.
A massive thank you to all of the mentors, the speakers, the girls, and all of the parents including mine. A special thank you to our sponsor for this event, Angular London Meetup.
I have included below some of the amazing feedback that we received after the event.
“Thank you and your daughter so much for the robot building & coding workshop. E. was really pleased with the outcome and wouldn’t stop showing everyone the end result. She was also amazed that another girl within her age range was leading the workshop, so that has opened up her world to a number of possibilities regarding what is out there for her. Thanks again for the amazing workshop. “
“Thanks so much for organising today’s workshop. A. and R. both enjoyed it a lot – in particular the core robot design/build/coding.”
“F. spent the afternoon doing a Microbit robot workshop on Zoom with Girls Into Coding – it looked like a lot of fun! Running such a physical hands-on coding workshop over Zoom sounded like a brave thing to try, but it went perfectly”
The next Virtual Girls Into Coding event will be September 27th, 2020. I am looking forward to it!
Avye
