Listen: National Coding Week

Is AI going to take all our jobs? Can it write its own programmes? Will we no longer need coders and programmers? What do young people think about AI? All these questions have been asked in the media landscape in the past year particularly.

The 16th of September marks the start of the National Coding Week and the theme of it is, you guessed it, AI. The UK’s tech sector is warning that the skills gap is very much prevalent, with 93% of UK businesses saying there is an IT skills gap which is largely attributed to the rapid development and evolution of technologies such as cloud computing, data analytics, AI and more.

STEM Learning is encouraging all young people, particularly girls, to have another look at computing and computer science if they find them interesting this National Coding Week, now that the new academic year is underway.

STEM Learning have this year celebrated 20 years of promoting excellence across STEM subjects. The
organisation also delivers a successful Department for Education funded programme – the National Centre for Computing Education (NCCE). The NCCE is strongly positioned to support teachers in England to improve computing education and through the I Belong programme encourage more girls to study computer science – starting from key stage 2 and progressing into secondary education. Young people’s lives can be greatly enhanced by choosing STEM and computing-linked careers, so this National Coding Week, we are encouraging all teachers to explore ways to engage more students in these subjects.

Aston spoke to Severine Trouillet, CEO of STEM Learning UK.

Photo by Glenn Carstens Peter on Unsplash