More computer programmers in Barbados . . . 19 complete coding workshop

Nineteen Barbadian students have recently completed the Fall 2019 session of Level 1 of the CSF Computer Coding Workshop offered by the Caribbean Science Foundation (CSF). Since 2018, the CSF has served 71 Barbados students in these coding workshops. The CSF is a non-profit organization promoting science and technology in the Caribbean. The Computer Coding Workshops are a key CSF initiative aimed at helping to diversify the region’s economies by harnessing science and engineering for economic development – thereby helping to raise the standard of living. The Fall 2019 Computer Coding Workshop in Barbados was funded in part by Sagicor and held on the Cave Hill campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI).

Barbados graduating class of Fall 2019 CSF Computer Coding Workshop, Instructors, and CSF Directors.

The CSF Computer Coding Workshops aim to train and retrain the Caribbean workforce of the future with a focus on increasing the low numbers of skilled ICT workers in the region, and ultimately, facilitating the formation of more globally competitive ICT companies. Through these Workshops, the CSF also hopes to stimulate more interest in science and engineering careers (especially in computer science) and help prepare students for university study in the STEM disciplines.

The recently concluded Computer Coding Workshop ran for 13 weeks and focused on website development (HTML, CSS and JavaScript) and mobile Apps using Cordova and Ionic Creator. At the workshop’s Final Projects Showcase on 14 December 2019, student teams demonstrated the various websites and mobile apps they had created to an audience of sponsors, colleagues, family and friends. The presentations included interactive websites on music for various moods, and facts about cheese, websites on rental properties and bookings in Barbados, basketball game schedules in Barbados, race car competitions in Barbados, and a mobile app comprising a luck meter. The Computer Coding Workshop Instructors Sanjay Mahabir and Andre Husain both expressed how pleased they were with the level of commitment displayed by the participants, and the remarkable progress that they made in such a short period of time.

In his opening remarks, Professor Cardinal Warde, the Interim Executive Director of the CSF, said, “Coding will be an essential skill for the knowledge workforce of the future. I would like to see more of you continue on to careers in computer science and thereby get involved in machine learning, artificial intelligence, and neural networks for applications such as the processing of big data, the Internet of Things and the control of complex systems.” Inspirational remarks were given by Dr Dinah Sah, Co-Executive Director of the CSF. To the participants, she said, “Continue to develop your coding skills and encourage your family, friends and network to learn to code.”

Beginning on 4 January 2020, the CSF will host the Barbados Spring 2020 CSF Computer Coding Workshop on Saturday mornings with a focus on girls and women. The Final Projects Showcase will be held on 28 March 2020. In parallel, the CSF will be replicating Level I of the Computer Coding Workshop in Dominica at the Newtown Primary School on Saturday mornings from 11 January to 28 March 2020. For more information about these upcoming Computer Coding Workshops, please see http://caribbeanscience.org/coding-workshop/.  Key partners for the Computer Coding Workshops are the UWI – Cave Hill Campus, and the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC). (PR)