CoderDojo’s success celebrated
04 December, 2013
CoderDojo’s success celebrated
13 December 2013 – Today Minister Simon Coveney TD assisted in marking the birthplace of CoderDojo by unveiling a plaque at the NSC Campus in Mahon. The very first CoderDojo was held in the NSC on the 23rd of July 2011, which was also attended by Minister Coveney.
A gathering of the CoderDojo community, mentors and supporters came together at the NSC to mark the birthplace of CoderDojo, which was founded by James Whelton and Bill Liao with the support and backing of AxisBIC and the NSC.
.jpg)
Michael O'Connor, AxisBIC; Shemas Eivers, NSC; Minister Simon Coveney TD and James Whelton and Bill Liao, CoderDojo with some of the young coders
CoderDojo is an open source, volunteer led movement orientated around running free not-for-profit coding clubs and regular sessions for young people. Since that very first CoderDojo not only has the movement grown extensively in Ireland it has gone global with 220 Dojos in 31 countries with over 6,500 coders.
Speaking at the unveiling Minister Coveney said “CoderDojo has been an incredible movement that has brought a huge number of young people together in an open and sharing experience. It has been great to see so many young people engage with this initiative both in Ireland and all over the world. These are the entrepreneurs of today and of the future and will reinvent how we communicate, do business and interact online.”
Michael O’Connor, CEO AxisBIC also commented that “When James Whelton and Bill Liao came to us in July 2011 to discuss setting up CoderDojo, both AxisBIC and the NSC were happy to support the initiative. With the ethos of all CoderDojo’s being free and open, it has really enabled the movement to expand globally, little did we know in July 2011 that we would be looking at 220 Dojos in 27 countries in just over 2 years!”
"Hats off to AxisBIC, NSC and Minister Coveney who were all present at the birth of CoderDojo when it was a total unknown without any proof. Each, in their own way, took a risk put aside the doubts and assisted CoderDojo to go for it and make a real difference in the lives of young people around the world” said Bill Liao, co-founder CoderDojo.
CoderDojo, who have been helping young people with coding and programming for over 2 years, also work closely with the National Digital Strategy. CoderDojo is a movement orientated around running free not-for-profit coding clubs and regular sessions for young people. At a CoderDojo, young people learn how to code, develop websites, apps, programs, games and more. Dojos are set up, run by and taught by volunteers.