The demand for technical skills continues to grow across all sectors and it’s important to invest in young people early on to ensure we have the talent required for the future. That’s why we are proud to be supporting a local Wythenshawe STEM code club focused on AI and machine learning through the donation of eight iPad Air 5th Generation tablets.
Supporting a code club in Wythenshawe
Posted on in News
Supporting a code club in Wythenshawe Investing in young talent
Hands-on AI and machine learning
Our two Manchester data centres, MCR1 and MCR2, are located on a secure campus right in the heart of Wythenshawe. Because we operate within this community, we believe we have a responsibility to help create opportunities for the people who live here.
Understanding AI and machine learning might sound daunting for primary and early secondary school students. However, the code club, which is aimed at 9 to 12-year-olds, makes these subjects highly engaging through creative, hands-on workshops, allowing students to learn by doing. Through a combination of digital making and programming, the club aims to help these young people develop digital skills in a fun, accessible, and friendly environment.
Using Scratch, for example, learners can create their own simple games and interactive projects, helping them build confidence as they explore the basics of coding in a practical and engaging way. As students progress, they get to work with interactive hardware and software. They will use micro:bits – programmable microcomputers – to create a game, design an animated monster, or build a step counter using the micro:bit’s accelerometer, helping them see how code can power real-world outputs. And tools like MIT App Inventor enable them to build their own functional mobile applications.
Flexible learning formats
To accommodate the fact that every child learns differently, the code club offers a mixture of session formats to keep the learners engaged:
- Drop-in taster sessions: these are dedicated to single, shorter projects. A student can turn up, learn a specific skill, and complete a working project within a single workshop. This format is perfect for beginners who want to try programming without a long-term commitment.
- Continuous projects: for those who want to dive deeper, the club runs in-depth projects over a period of several weeks. These sessions allow learners to build upon their skills sequentially, ultimately creating impressive, complex projects that showcase their growing understanding of AI and machine learning.
Future tech talent
Data centres rely heavily on a highly skilled workforce, including network engineers, data centre managers, security specialists, and DevOps engineers. Supporting educational initiatives and giving local children the chance to explore computer science early on builds their confidence and opens up potential future career paths in the technology sector.
We want to ensure that every child who attends has the tools they need to experiment and code effectively, and we hope that the iPads we have donated will be useful now and in the years to come. We look forward to seeing the creative projects the students build over the coming months. And, who knows? Maybe one of these iPad users could be a Datum team member of the future …