The Institute of ICT Professionals, Ghana, (IIPGH), is proposing a partnership with the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications to promote and sustain its coding program in schools within three regions namely, Volta, Eastern and Central regions.
The partnership, which forms part of the Institute’s Coding Caravan initiative is part of efforts to scale up its coding program nationwide and ensure that many more children, across the country, especially those in deprived and hard-to-reach communities, are introduced to coding.
In a statement issued by the Institute of ICT Professionals, Ghana, the company noted that the move which will create national awareness about the importance of coding and build the confidence of young people in the practical use of technology, will begin with a pilot phase to assess the impact of the project.
“Towns other than the capital cities of these regions will be selected for this pilot phase to assess the impact of the project. The project will, therefore, target 3 schools (1 per region) and impacting 600 pupils (200 per region). The schools will be selected in conjunction with the GCT and directorates of education under the Ghana Education Service (GES). The pupils will be treated to 4-hour sessions of coding and during the second phase of the implementation, the teachers will be offered a 3-day residential trainer of trainers’ (ToT) capacity-building workshop,” he said.
It further noted that, “based on the specialized software (particularly Scratch and CodeIt!) adopted by IIPGH, the teachers and learners would not need to possess any prior knowledge of programming. Essentially, they would be introduced to basic programming concepts and computational thinking. The trained tutors would then take over and continue building the skills of the beneficiaries of the project and prepare them for a national coding competition.”
Coding for Kids programme
In 2018 the Institute of ICT Professionals Ghana, IIPGH introduced its Coding Program for Kids with the vision of revolutionizing the teaching, learning and application of technology in Ghana. Fortunately, the Institute received the buy-in of some German organizations, particularly Code for Africa, Code-It! and Tinkertoys who supported the establishment of the Digital Design and Creative Coding Hub.
The hub is equipped with ultramodern, state-of-the-art laptops, smartboards and 3-D printers. In the last four years, the Institute has trained over 10,000 young people in coding using a blended teaching and learning approach (in-person and online).
In order to promote and sustain the coding program in schools, IIPGH has entered into an agreement with more than a dozen schools including Englebert School (Airport Residential Area), International Community School (East Legon), Alpha Beta School (Dansoman), Jack & Jill School (Roman Ridge), Angel Specialist School (Tema), Oasis International School (GREDA Estate), Shield International School (Adenta), Redwood Universal (Dzorwulu), West Hill School (New Bortianor) where the Institute has introduced coding as an extra-curricular activity.
