SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — The next time you see your son or daughter playing computer games, you may not realize they are building their minds for a greater future. The League of Amazing Programmers, a local nonprofit organization, is teaching kids the importance of computer coding through game play.
"It has been said that coding is the new reading and writing," Sarah Cooper, the executive director of The League of Amazing Programmers, says. "A lot of the kids will come because they are interested in games, and they come here and they learn to make their own games, and then they learn how to build apps and to build programs that will drive machines and so on."
The nonprofit's main mission is to make computer coding classes available to all kids.
Cooper says the skills used to create games are the building blocks for learning how to code more complex programs.
"It's really important to us they gain the skills that will make them useful in the work force," she says. "In San Diego County alone, there are going to be so many technological jobs over the next five years."
The classes are for kids grades five through 12 at all levels, but most importantly, the students say they're having a lot of fun in the process.
"I always really liked programming things — just getting to make it work and see it come to life on your screen," one 12-year-old Jaxon Toman says.
"When you start in the morning, you get to code a drone, so I coded like a drone that flies up and then immediately goes forward really fast," JJ Toman, 11, says.
These coding classes are all about kids creating, innovating, having fun and just tapping into their imagination.
"They remind you about the awe. They remind you of how exciting life can be, so it's really great to give them those tools and let them run with it," Cooper says.
The League of Amazing Programmers offers every kid the chance to learn computer programming, regardless of their family's financial status.
Some of the former students have gone on to work for Google and Apple, and 85% of the kids who enrolled in the program stayed more than three years.
And because of that commitment to provide opportunity for kids, ABC 10News and Lead San Diego chose Sarah Cooper and the League of Amazing Programmers as our 10News Leadership Award winner for the month of July!
