One of our Sponsors, Ensoft, is hosting a cocktails evening!

Monday 11th November 2013, an evening of drinks at The House, Blue Boar St. Pop in for a drink anytime from 6.30pm to 8.30pm.

Students from all disciplines are invited to join us for a cocktail and find out more about what we do. There'll be a chance to talk with members of the company over drinks and nibbles.

Turning the new school Computing curriculum into reality: opportunity and challenge

Simon Peyton Jones: Microsoft Research and Computing at School working group

The newly-published National Curriculum for Computing establishes computer science, for the first time, as part of the school curriculum, from primary school onwards. This represents a radical change of perspective: most people regard computer science as a narrow subject for specialised geeks to study at university, whereas the new curriculum positions it as a foundational subject discipline like maths or physics, that every child should have the opportunity to learn.

Job done, then? Far from it: that was the easy bit! Now we have to support and equip the Computing teachers of the nation to deliver the new Computing curriculum, with confidence and enthusiasm.

In this talk I'll describe some of the thinking that lies behind the new curriculum, and the remarkable way that it moved from aspiration to reality in two years flat. I will also focus on the question of how we, the computing community, can engage with schools to turn the vision into reality. Doing this successfully needs all of us (students, academics, software developers, parents...), and I will invite your help in doing just that.

Note: Remember to bring your laptop to these events!

About Learn to Code

During these events, there will be a mixture of interactive workshops and talks. We will be teaching you the basics of programming using Python. These events are good if you have zero coding experience, but they are also valuable if you already have started coding and would like to better your skills. We also welcome people who already have good coding experience as the more volunteers the better!

These events are always followed by our weekly Geek Night.

You can find out more information about this series of events over at ox.compsoc.net/learn

We also have a facebook group for discussion if you are taking part in this course: fb.com/groups/OXLearnToCode

...and a group for those who would like to volunteer: fb.com/groups/OXLearnToCodeHelpers