Innovation Lab Hosts Hour of Code on Seminole campus
SPC Programs & Events January 2, 2015-
- Learning computer science basics at the Hour of Code on Seminole campus.
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- SPC student Steph Levy walks students through building a chat bot at the Hour of Code.
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- Librarian Chad Mairn and Stephen Levy help students debug their programs.
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- Levy walking students through the next step in building their bot.
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- The end of today’s lesson, more computer science workshops are planned for spring and fall terms in 2015.
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- Innovation Lab volunteers Brandon Conyers and Stephen Levy talk with Maker-in-Chief Chad Mairn after the workshop.
On Wednesday, December 10th, the Seminole campus Innovation Lab joined Google, Apple, Microsoft, and other technology leaders across the country in participating in the Hour of Code for Computer Science Education week.
According to the Hour of Code website the event reached more than 15 million students worldwide whose ages ranged from early school age to senior citizens during Computer Science Education Week, and more than 59 million students since Code.org began the Hour of Code program last year. The Seminole campus event was taught by SPC student Stephen Levy.
Levy, a student in the technology management bachelors program, used Grok Learning’s Hour of Code exercises for the hour of code workshop. The Grok learning web app made learning to program easy, as students did not have to install the python libraries or IDE, it was all handled behind the scenes by the web app. The exercise involved building a chat bot in Python, a programing language that is used by organizations like Google and NASA. The lessons were designed to teach the building blocks of programming including variables, user input, loops, and branching.
Many experts believe that learning programming helps to build problem solving skills and gives students a look behind the curtain at the technology they use every day. During his lesson Levy dispelled the myths that learning programming is complicated and requires strong math skills. Levy, and Innovation Lab Maker in Chief Chad Mairn, were on hand to help students and answer questions.
According to Levy this Hour of Code event is the first of many computer science events that he hopes to hold on campus in the coming year. He has been working with CEO Entrepreneurship officer Mike Gnoat on a workshop for future business professionals that goes beyond the basics taught at the Hour of Code event. He also hopes to host more events in cooperation with the Innovation Lab and the campus gaming club SPC Seminole Gamers.
Levy is pleased with how the first Hour of Code at St. Petersburg College turned out. “I had a lot of fun and enjoyed interacting with my fellow students. The most important thing about the event is that all the students walked away with something they can use, they learned something,” said Levy about the event.
The Seminole campus Innovation Lab is located in LI 201 and features a Monolith 3D printer, and other great creative tools. This event was covered on The Sandbox News Instagram, follow us for unfiltered photojournalism and filtered photos from on campus and around Tampa Bay.
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