coding Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Cross Lanes Teacher Wins Classroom Tech In CIA Competition

A Charleston area teacher has won a technology award partially sponsored by the CIA.

Tiffany Pace, a STEM educator at Cross Lanes Elementary School, was named one of the inaugural winners of the Central Intelligence Agency Mission Possible Operation Advance Technology Competition Wednesday.

The award comes with a $60,000 computer and coding lab for her Charleston classroom, as well as laptops and the choice of other STEM equipment.

Pace is one of five winners in the competition and was selected from the Southeast Region, which includes schools from Washington, D.C. to Florida, and as far west as Louisiana.

The Operation Advance Technology program aims to help improve science, technology, engineering, art and math (STEAM) education in schools and is sponsored by the CIA and managed by the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, with funding from the U.S. Department of Energy.

W.Va. Program Offers Stipend While Learning Computer Code

A program that trains West Virginians to write computer code now offers a living stipend. Generation West Virginia’s NewForce is offering $11 per hour for residents accepted into the program who demonstrate a financial need.

NewForce is a six-month, fully-remote, tuition-free coding school for West Virginia residents.

They are now accepting applications for the seventh group of residents looking to work in the tech economy. This is the first time the stipend has been offered.

Since the program started, 86 percent of graduates have found employment in software development within six months of graduating. The median starting salary for program graduates is $48,000 annually.

No coding experience is required.

Generation West Virginia is hosting a virtual information session, a live information session via Zoom on Nov. 3 at 7 p.m.

You can learn more at generationwv.org/programs/newforce/ and register for the information session here.

NewForce applications are due by Nov. 26.

Group Expanding Plans to Teach Computer Coding to Girls

A Kanawha County group is expanding plans to teach computer coding to girls.

The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports the initiative Project Code Nodes will start group sessions in downtown Charleston, Institute and Rand. Meetings already are ongoing in Kanawha City.

The new locations are affiliated with the West Virginia-based Partnership of African American Churches.

Initiative developer Ysabel Bombardiere says those locations will provide free computer coding classes to a total of 70 girls. She currently is the only instructor. But she hopes college students provided by NASA’s West Virginia Space Grant Consortium eventually will be able to teach classes and help expand the program.

The coding classes are open to middle- and high-school girls.