ORT South Africa’s new Academy trains coders for the future
HOUGHTON – ORT SA says they are ready to train coders.
The new ORT South Africa Stem Academy, which is based in Houghton, is committed to driving science, technology, engineering and mathematics programmes to promote coding, robotics and 21st century skills amongst young people.
“These skills are necessary in order to make people employable in tomorrow’s world,” said CEO Ariellah Rosenberg.
ORT SA, is an educational NGO affiliated to World ORT, one of the biggest global educational and training non-profit organisation which has been in operation for 136 years in over 30 countries.
The new ORT SA Stem Academy will be taking this line of thinking and will be holding workshops and lectures in coding and robotics. ORT SA already runs coding workshops for teachers in the Ivory Park area where ORT SA runs mathematics projects.
The participating teachers have, in turn, started coding as an extra-mural activity for Grade 5s and a ‘Destructobots’ Club has already begun with many enthusiastic pupils.
According to Rosenberg, in South Africa, the challenge is the skills gap experienced in the job market. “Governments and education systems around the world have identified computational thinking, coding and robotics as essential and relevant subjects to develop higher thinking skills which are required for the future workplace,” added Rosenberg.
“In some countries, robotics and coding are already part of the school curriculum as governments have acknowledged that this as crucial to supporting their nations for generations to come.”
Kevin Cummins, an expert in teaching computational thinking, robotics and coding at schools, finds that such subjects encourage students to explore solutions to problems which remain unsolved. It inspires innovation and supports problem-solving skills which form the basis of advanced mathematics and science. Coding can embed thought processes which will be essential to any future tradesperson, CEO or surgeon.
“In addition to preparing ourselves for these changes and the implications that new technologies will bring with them, we also need to be getting ready for the reality that many professions are going to become redundant. Society has a responsibility to ensure the next generation is equipped with the skills required to solve, create, invent and reinvent ideas, problems and ourselves. This is exactly what ORT SA is doing, “concluded Rosenberg.
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