Let’s Get Europe Coding!

This week (October 10-18, 2015) is EU Code Week! Samsung has joined the European Coding Initiative and is running a number of activities all week to spread the word about coding.  Since 2013, over 125,000 people have taken part in Samsung’s programs for digital creators in Europe.  These initiatives are part of Samsung’s Corporate Citizenship activities in education and teach young people how to code and create their own digital content.

The European Coding Initiative will play a central role in a number of Europe-wide projects to promote the education of coding and computational thinking, including EU Code Week.

To mark the partnership with the European Coding Initiative, Samsung hosted a demonstration class at EU Code Week’s All You Need Is Code event in Brussels on October 12. Children from the Coding Masters program in Poland were on hand to present a class and show the adults how it’s done!

Sangwoo Kim, President of Corporate Affairs for Samsung Electronics Europe said, “Our vision is a world where digital making is a basic skill for every young person in Europe, along with math and literacy. We live in an increasingly digital world, and teachers and schools need to be equipped to support the transition to a connected society. We want to give young people the opportunity to be creative and to experience the joy of digital making through coding, robotics, electronics and app development.  With confidence, the new generation can become creators of the digital world, not just consumers of it.”

Here is an overview of Samsung’s activities during EU Code Week:

• Germany: On October 10, the winning projects of the Code Week Award were broadcast to the main opening event for Code Week in Berlin. Samsung Electronics GmbH and Gesche Joost, EU Digital Champion, initiated the Code Week Award, a prize honoring the motto “Every Week is Code Week.” As part of the competition, 700 young people in eight different cities participated in workshops and hackathons.
• U.K.: Samsung will be opening its fifth Code Club Hub in the U.K., offering free after-school coding clubs for children at community centers in need of technology support. Samsung has been a partner of the Code Club since 2013, also supporting the recruitment and training of volunteers to help sustain these free provisions.
• Italy: Samsung Italy is hosting coding lessons at the Samsung Smart Area in Milan. On Tuesday, October 13, the results of research managed by Cattolica University of Milan on the impact of coding on students and teachers were revealed. For anyone planning to visit the Milan Expo 2015, Samsung will offer coding lessons at the Samsung TIM open space.
• Poland: Samsung Poland is supporting the Polish edition of Code Week as a main partner and is organizing nearly 500 events connected to the Coding Masters program across Poland. The official opening of Code Week Poland took place in the National Audiovisual Institute. Samsung also supported the organization of the Coders’ Picnic at the Copernicus Science Center.
• Norway: Samsung is a partner of Laer Kidsa Koding and its 50 code clubs will have events throughout Code Week, including a robot workshop at the University of Oslo, Code Club at Tekna in Oslo, Girls Coding Day and an Edtech day for teachers.
• Finland: MehackIT is publishing blog posts of interviews with students in Lahti schools in Finland. The blog posts share experiences from students taking MehackIT coding, robotics and electronics classes.
• France: On October 14, Samsung employees ran two workshops, which both hosted 25 children to introduce them to coding.  Samsung France launched Campus Junior, a free online coding course for children between 7-13 years old, in May 2015.

Stay tuned for more stories from Samsung about coding.

For general updates, follow @NeedCodeEU.