Twas indeed a hectic day. After having a two hour training session with the Nigerian Turkish International College students, I was later invited for another training session this time with the students of the secondary school, SOS Hermann Gmeiner in Gwagwalada. I had fun with them and at the end of the day we found ourselves taking pictures.
The students really enjoyed the program and later in the evening that day, I received emails from them asking questions on how to navigate the CS First website.
With the Google passports in hand, they were well on their way to carrying out the Scratch projects and uploading online for their peers to see around the world.
Two clubs were started that day, Fashion & Design and Storytelling. I felt like an uncle indeed as most of them called me that.
Our overarching goal with the Code2Schools program is to take computer programming from school to school and we are doing so one school at a time. Sounds like some what of a long shot right? Wrong, we call it a "Moonshot" and that's what keeps the team and I very motivated. It has also helped us to attract just about the right kind of people we want to work with us.
When you are thinking "Moonshot" you need to develop what the Google Founders call, "A healthy disregard for the impossible." That's what we are doing right now. We don't think in terms of days and months, we think in terms of decades.
Someone once said that if you think of the next year, you will plant seeds. If you think of the next 10 years, you will plant trees. But if you think of the next 100 years, you will educate your teens. That's exactly what we here at the Edu Teens Science Development Foundation are doing.
I present to you the entrepreneurs and innovators of tomorrow. Young, naive and in school uniforms today but I tell you that I believe in the greatness that lies within each and every one of them.
I hope we can come together and try to rewrite the African narrative. Early exposure to STEM and CS is the way forward. There are geniuses on this continent and we can't afford to let them waste. These are the people who will build the mobile and web apps as well as other solutions of tomorrow that will solve the problems that have plagued Africa for so many years now.
The economic prosperity of the African Nation lies in these young and untapped minds. Feed them with the right kind of knowledge, provide an enabling environment for the seeds of creativity and innovation to grow and watch them disrupt whole industries. We at the ETSD Foundation are glad to have strategically positioned ourselves to be the gateway through which these kids will be trained.
Arreytambe Tabot is the Founder and CEO of the Edu Teens Science
Development Foundation whose overall mission is to promote Science,
Technology, Engineering, Mathematics (STEM) and Computer Science (CS)
through innovative ways that capture learner’s attention, emphasizes
relevance, increases motivation and hence participation in these fields.
He most recently released his first classic, "Planting The Seeds of Change: Preparing tomorrow's harvest with today's seed." He is a geek gone commercial, a public speaker and writer par excellence.
