A guest post by Tommy Collison
The launch of an app created by what’s now recognized as the world’s youngest Mac developer is only the latest triumph in a string of successes for the Coder Dojo. Harry Moran (12) released “PizzaBot” on the Mac App Store in late October, and it has since passed out major titles such as Call of Duty or Angry Birds to become to top paid app on the store.
An “Irish Led Global Youth Movement”, the Coder Dojo is a not-for-profit organization that aims to teach schoolkids how to develop software. It started in June 2011 in Cork and since then, it has expanded throughout the country and even beyond our shores.
“Our first London club our first Paris club are starting in December,” explained James Whelton, co-founder of the Coder Dojo. “We’re expanding to the US and to Germany and to other European countries in the coming months.”
Nurturing a “tech-savvy” generation
The intention of the Coder Dojo is to introduce schoolchildren to a variety of areas, such as web development and design and audio/visual technology. From there, they intend to advance things as the pupils’ abilities increase. There are plans to extend the Coder Dojo into schools around the country.
James explained that they wanted to integrate IT with the education system. They also want to help create and nurture a new “tech-savvy” generation to create and fill the IT jobs in Ireland in the future.
In the flesh, Dojos are spaces where James and the other mentors can share their infectious love of development with younger kids.
To me, the appeal of the Coder Dojo is two-fold. Firstly, the kids get to interact with, and learn from, some hugely talented people. James Whelton epitomizes the usual hacker, tapping away on a keyboard during lulls in the conversation. However, he breaks away from the stereotype in that when you talk to him, you immediately warm to his bright, affable nature.
He teaches these kids how to code because he loves coding. It’s common knowledge that all good teachers have an enthusiasm for their subject — this is definitely true in the case of James and the other Coder Dojo mentors.
There is only one rule: cool things are okay, and things that aren’t cool aren’t okay. The simplicity of the rule matches the simplicity of the Dojos.
The second huge appeal of the Coder Dojo is that it introduces these kids to each other. In my experience, a lot of coders don’t have someone to share their love of computers with while they’re growing up. For most of them, it’s a solo hobby. While their friends might be more interested in cars or sport, they’re self-teaching themselves Python or Lisp. The Coder Dojo gives these kids the opportunity to meet each other and form bonds. There is an emphasis placed in the Dojos to learn from your peers as much as you learn from the mentors — and that’s fantastic.
How Coder Dojo began
“The prologue to Coder Dojo originally started with computer clubs in my own school back in third year, I’d have people coming up and asking me “oh, how does a website like Facebook get made?” or “how do I make an iPhone app?” and so I started a computer club.”
“We had about 30 people turn up to our first session and we decided to meet up twice a week for the rest of the year. After a few weeks we had other schools contacting us; guys saying “hey, can we come after school to do this?”
“So I started working with Bill Liao and we ran our first session in Cork. We had a lot of kids at that and we even had college kids interested.”
James’ cofounder is Bill Liao, an Australian entrepreneur and philanthropist. In 2007, Liao founded neo.org, a social networking site where people could make a personal commitment for the future of the earth. Neo then founded a subsidiary, WeForest.org, an organisation promoting reforestation as a way to combat global warming, poverty and water shortages.
What happens next?
“I’m travelling out to New York, San Francisco and Boston in early December to meet with different people and, set up the infrastructure there. We’re hoping for sometime in or around late January or early February to have our first one running in San Fran and NY.”
Certainly, he does not appear to be becoming complacent in the aftermath of the Coder Dojo’s success.
“I’m hoping to really grow the Coder Dojo now. When it hits the new year, we’re really just gonna go for it, 110%.”
About Tommy Collison
Tommy Collison is a student at Castletroy College in Limerick. He has an award-winning blog at www.trusttommy.com and tweets @tommycollison.