Tech executive aids effort to teach kids to code
Janine Zacharia
As Washington teetered on the brink of default and the U.S.
Department of Education's thousands of workers remained home amid the
government shutdown, a new Silicon Valley nonprofit, Code.org, announced a
campaign to introduce 10 million K-12 students to an hour of computer science.
It's got the backing of an array of tech luminaries. And Code.org's CEO Hadi
Partovi is one of dozens of examples of Silicon Valley's new
I-can-fix-any-social-problem spirit.
Q: Do you see a power shift westward from D.C. to here?
A: Building software doesn't just teach you how to harness
the power of computers to create websites and apps. It also teaches you
optimism - if you can build technology, you can change the world you live in.
That's why tech entrepreneurs look at the world around us, and instead of
seeing dysfunction, we see the opportunity to improve the system. Whether it's
eradicating polio (Bill
Gates), building an electronic car (Elon
Musk/Tesla), mining asteroids (Planetary Resources), defeating death
(Google/Calico),
fixing immigration (fwd.US), or improving education (Code.org), the deeper
story behind these initiatives is that America's tech industry is creating not
just technology, it's empowering social entrepreneurs. This is very much a
positive change.
Q: Is Code.org a response to the Department of
Education's inability to get computer science taught in the schools? To the
miserable comparative statistics you always see of how the U.S. lags behind
other countries? Or is it a mercenary goal - i.e., Silicon Valley needs future
workers to be literate in computer science?
A: There's a misunderstood idea that Silicon Valley is doing
things purely out of self-interest, to hire more workers. That makes for a
nicely controversial story, but the shortage of computer scientists isn't a
Silicon Valley problem. It's an American problem. Two-thirds of software jobs
are outside of tech companies - in banking, retail, government, transportation,
medicine. Every single state in the union is creating more jobs in software
than our schools are producing students.
Q: How badly are we lagging behind others?
A: There's a math and science problem we've had for decades.
The computer science problem is new. In the 21st century, every student should
receive some basic exposure to computer science, but 90 percent of schools
don't even teach it. This is a worldwide problem (except for China, Vietnam,
Estonia). But at least countries like the United Kingdom and Australia are
moving to bring computer science into the mainstream core of education for
every child starting in eighth grade. In the United States, our style of government
can't do that, which is why I'm bringing together all the companies and leaders
in tech to help make it happen.
Q: How did you get so many VIPs to back Code.org?
A: Really, it has
been amazing and humbling - it's because what we're doing is so critical - not
just to the tech industry, but to the future of our country, our national
competitiveness, and basic social justice. So people have joined our coalition
with open arms. I guess it also helps that I'm a proven entrepreneur with some
success behind me.
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