Coding for Girls

UBC Computer Science is partnering with a number of local tech companies to put together a series of tech-related activities for high school girls.  Coming up very soon is the Technovation Challenge (http://www.technovationchallenge.org/), a coding and entrepreneurship challenge where small teams of up to 5 girls identify problems they want to solve, design a plan and an app, pitch the plan and build the app!

 

To do this, groups will be paired with both business and technical mentors which we will source from industry professionals and undergraduate students from UBC to help guide the teams through a well-outlined curriculum. It’s a fantastic opportunity to develop skills within a group of friends or classmates and develop skills over the competition period. The team formation deadline is on Dec 15th, and the curriculum runs until the delivery date of April 25th. It is expected that teams will meet on an ongoing basis in-person with their mentors on most occasions to facilitate the learning and mentoring process.

 

This will mark the second year that UBC CS and Tasktop are working together to mentor girls for Technovation. Last year we had a very successful initial participation in this challenge with two of the teams winning their category – one of which won $5000 after attending the finals!

 

We’re asking for any parents or interested girls to mobilize, read about the challenge and email girlsmarts@cs.ubc.ca with names and contact information of your team members by Dec 15 so that we can make sure that every registered team has the pair of mentors to make their participation a success! Currently we have a limited supply of mentors so we are asking for teams of committed parents and high-school girls.

 

The main requirements are a parent/coach to lead your team, and a time commitment of ~50 hours (2-4hrs per week) leading up to the April date. We will be giving priority to teams comprised of girls from grades 8 to 10.

 

Some important dates you should be aware of are:

  • January 13 is the kickoff party for all teams (lunch included). Teams will meet with their mentors to brainstorm ideas for their app and set up regular meeting times for the next 12 weeks.
  • April 25th is when teams should submit all of their work
  • May 5-6th is the regional pitch competition where teams present their work