The changing face of education

Codecademy provides free platform to learn real-world skills

By Patrick Vaillancourt, Columnist

The Internet has made the professional world much more competitive, changing the way individuals go about their daily lives. Technology has changed the way we communicate with each other, the way we shop, and how we go about doing our banking. Despite all of the conveniences that we’ve come to benefit from, education systems around the world have been slow to adapt to the realities of a new economy.

For the most part, it has been left to the private sector to come up with innovative ways to promote changes in education, whether it be through the development of new interactive educational programs or games or implementing new learning platforms for people to learn in-demand skills for today’s workforce.

Codecademy is one such platform making waves in the education world, particularly in Britain. Codecademy is a website which allows a user to learn valuable computer skills such as website building, programming, and basic animations, all without the need to register to their website. You can simply access the site and start coding using their interactive tutorials.

Most importantly, it works. In my case, I spent much of my weekend going through all of the tutorials for HTML and CSS, essential skills if you are looking to design a website.

Codecademy was founded in late 2011 by Zach Sims and Ryan Bubinski, both of whom realized while studying at Columbia University that people tend to learn best by exercising their desired skills. Codecademy was designed to help bridge the gap between what was being taught in schools and what was expected of people in the modern workforce.

The platform has partnered with schools in the United Kingdom and offers teaching resources, lesson plans, and exercises for teachers to give to students, in addition to providing an interactive learning environment for anyone willing to learn skills such as HTML, CSS, programming in PHP and Python and basic animations in JavaScript.

Startups designed to complement traditional educational services are on the rise, and Codecademy believes that this is because “education is broken.” Their mission is to rethink education and bring more valuable learning opportunities online.

Codecademy is able to offer its learning platform free to its users, having raised $12.5 million through investors.

To access Codecademy and start learning valuable computer skills, go to their website at www.codeacademy.com