Jammin' With JavaScript!

If you were to head into the yurts at Summit Campus, you'd find nine students taking a programming and coding class with Mr. Crider, a parent volunteer and mentor of the 4085 Robotics Team. Together with Ms. Phillips, a chemistry and physical science teacher with the Encore Academy, and two additional mentors from the Robotics Team, the leaders are teaching kids JavaScript and coding. 

Each student had a "finch" or a robot that could execute commands using JavaScript. The yurt was abuzz with finches moving forward and backward, at various speeds, and some sat quietly while their noses flashed different colors.

Autumn, a rising sophomore at the eSTEM Academy took the summer class because she joined the Robotics Team as a freshman and wanted to learn code. "I was teaching myself, so this opportunity to learn from programmers in IT really interested me," she said.

JavaScript is a programming language and computing program. By "refactoring," students were able to rewrite existing code to tweak the actions of their finch.

Mr. Crider has a coding background and has been in the IT industry for more than 20 years. "Exposure to code will help these kids understand most facets of professional life," he explained. "Code is important in every industry- from teachers to fashion design to selling insurance. This will give our students a competitive edge."

In fact, some colleges are requiring students to take programming classes so they can develop a computational mind. 

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