SAP Launches Mostly-free Online Coding Course For Africa Learners

By Gugu Lourie

Through the simplification of what has historically been perceived as a highly technical arena, SAP is making coding more appealing and accessible to a wider audience.

SAP has, developed a coding course which is available at no cost on openSAP, where registrations are now open for all learners in Africa with courses scheduled to begin on 2 June 2015.

“You’ll be truly amazed at how fast your learners get up to speed with coding skills. And if you’ve never written a line of code in your life, don’t worry. This course will get you started step-by-step,” said the software giant.

Are you a teacher of young learners? Are you involved in young peoples’ extra-curricular activities?

Then this course could be for you. Whatever subjects you normally teach, you and your learners are surrounded by modern digital technology.

“This course will help you to encourage today’s young digital consumers to become tomorrow’s digital creators,” said SAP.

It is based around the popular Scratch system that is capturing the imagination of children around the globe.

The openSAP platform offers a highly engaging and effective learning experience through gamification, whilst allowing real time interaction between SAP experts and learners.

The “Africa Code Week: Teaching Programming to Young Learners” has been developed in partnership with Simplon.co, the Cape Town Science Centre and the Galway Education Centre, with the purpose of empowering youth, teachers and parents with the language of programming using a freely available “Scratch” ¹ system to help bridge the digital skills gap across many areas in Africa.

“Coding is relevant to all industries and to remain relevant in the 21^st century it is imperative that skills are constantly updated. SAP believes that only through sharing of skills and knowledge, are we able to empower people to take control of their futures,” said Mehmood Khan, COO of Sap Africa. “openSAP provides this platform for sharing and we encourage teachers, parents and students across the continent to register for the “Africa Code Week: Teaching Programming to Young Learners” course on the openSAP platform as a means of accessing a valuable resource to further develop the youth of Africa.”