White House honors Fil-Am 'Technology Evangelist' Rebecca Garcia

The “Technology Evangelist” Rebecca Garcia was recently honored by the White House as one of the 11 Champions of Change for Tech Inclusion-- “leaders who have done extraordinary work to connect kids from underrepresented and underserved communities to tech skills and opportunities.“

 

From co-founding a world-wide organisation dedicated to teaching children about coding, she will give a talk in this year's Philippine Youth Congress in Information Technology (Y4iT), with her panel entitled “CoderDojo: Global Youth Technology Education”.

 

“I don’t teach kids for the money, I teach them for the chance to ignite that spark. To show them that you can build whatever you set your heart to,” says Garcia, co-founder of CoderDojo NYC. 

 

Growing up in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood with a prevalence of gang violence and high pregnancy rates, the self-taught developer was an outcast in youth until a hand-me-down computer from her godfather changed her life, her profile on Hello World Foundation said.

 

“I started coding when I was 10 and my sister, after realising I had an interest in computers, paid for me to go to a computer camp at MIT and that changed everything for me,” Garcia said in an interview with Silicon Republic, an Irish tech news website. 

 

“Coding”—slang for “computer programming”— is something that Rebecca thought was only for engineers “in dusty labs doing hard maths”, but she found that it offered a lot of creative paths, “and for kids to be exposed to that very early is fantastic.”

 

The advocate for girls and youths in tech stated that “it wasn't the technical know-how” that made her see the full potential of technology, but “the people who believed in me and pushed me to learn more and those who still do.” 

 

The open learning environment of the MIT program she went to, stayed with her and pushed her to join Do Something, a non-profit that supports campaigns spearheaded by 13-to 25 year-olds, as a developer.

 

While doing what she loved for Do Something, a non-profit organization, she realized that MIT iD Tech Camps, at $1,000 per week, was not accesible to most children. CoderDojo Wanting to expose children to careers they otherwise wouldn't hear about until later, she co-founded the NYC chapter of CoderDojo.

 

CoderDojo is a global non-profit organization founded by James Whelton and Bill Liao, after the former received publicity for hacking the iPod Nano and both younger and older students expressed interest in computet programming, with the latter offering assistance to see the project grow “into something bigger than just an after-school computer club”. 

 

The organization educates young people through Dojos, centers handled from beginning to end by volunteers. Tours in technology companies, talks by guest speakers, and a sociable environment that allows the organization's emphasis on open source and free software to flow made it such a powerful educational movement that it moved beyond its Cork Dojo and into the world.

 

Garcia's immersion in coding began with the encouragement of supportive peers and it was not surprising that CoderDojo's philosophy appealed to her. What was surprising was NYC's lack of a Dojo. 

 

She says in the same Silicon Republic interview, “In New York we have the ability to reach out to kids in underprivileged areas and to expand their horizons and bring them along.”

 

The organization, she says in her blog post for the White House, showcases inclusion, ethnic diversity, and gender equality.

 

Other than the need to bring technology too underpriveledged youths, she says there should be more female mentors in technology.

 

She says that it's very important that there should be more women involved to serve as role models and “to banish the stereotype of coding being a male-only activity.” 

 

Garcia currently supports CoderDojo through the support of the Hello World Foundation. 

 

It is a non-profit incorporated entity, with an application to be recognized as a charity, that serves to inspire young coders and support coding clubs.

 

This year's Y4iT, now on its 11th year, will be at the SMX Convention Center on September 17 to 19. - Rie Takumi, VVP, GMA News