Capital One Coders, a volunteer-backed program that teaches middle school students how to build software, is celebrating 10 years in operation this week.
“This program started with a vision to help students cultivate greater interest in computer science during a critical time in their development,” said Rob Alexander, Chief Information Officer at Capital One. “We recognized a way to leverage the talent and passion of our associates to help shed a light on the possibilities of a future with technology through mentoring relationships.”
According to Capital One, the program started in 2014 with five locations and 99 volunteers. Now, the program has 10,000 volunteers contributing over 186,000 hours at 14 locations and virtually. The Plano location has had 965 students and 366 volunteers contributing over 4,500 hours within the past year alone, a news release said. 90% of Coders programming serves low to moderate income communities.
Students in the program are guided through problem solving, teamwork and basic principles of software development and web design. Coursework focuses on HTML and CSS before challenging students to build their own website.
“Rather than giving students answers to remember, Capital One Coders gives them problems to solve,” a news release stated.
“I have a student in my spring session of Coders who has used her personal time to develop her website,” says a Richmond Public Schools teacher. “She comes to class motivated and excited to share her progress with me and now aspires to become a software engineer. I’m so proud of her progress and eagerness to learn the new skill.”
The program offers career panels for students to get industry perspectives from Capital One technologists, a webinar-based demonstration called Coders Live!, a one-day web development hands-on experience called Web Development Ignite and an eight to 10 week program with Capital One mentors called Weekly Web Development.
