Code Chica++: New Curriculum Launches for Latinas Pursuing Programming and Engineering
By: Ariane Stier, Latinitas Program Coordinator
Code Chica is Latinitas’ free certification program that aims to address the hurdles of underrepresentation and discrimination that young women of color face in the tech sector. In the program, girls 8th-12th grade learn HTML, CSS and JavaScript, customize their own website, and earn a $75 stipend for their accomplishments. Since 2019, Latinitas has delivered 11 Code Chica cohorts, 8 week long sessions, serving a total of 107 teen girls.
After graduating the 11th cohort, we are excited to announce that we have spent the summer crafting the curriculum for Code Chica++, our next level coding certification for girls that have completed the Code Chica Certification Program and are interested in further developing their coding skills. Our first cohort began the program in early September and will meet on Saturday mornings, culminating in a virtual graduation showcase in November.
The curriculum-writing committee is composed of Mo Khan, Senior Software Engineer at GitHub and Code Chica++ Instructor, Kirsty Brewster, Code Chica Instructor and Software Developer at ASR Analytics, Shauna Boyer, Lead Code Chica Instructor, and Avelon Pang, Software Developer at SXSW. Starting in late April 2021, we met every Thursday to create lesson plans on GitHub, a planning guide, and brainstormed unique ways to get girls passionate about advanced coding — from coding-challenges, to creating customized profiles on GitHub, and joining a Slack channel just for their cohort.
In Code Chica++, girls get to deep-dive into the world of programming in development in a free 10-week advanced coding course. Students work together with their instructor and guest speakers that currently work in computer science, engineering, technology development, and more, and will build their own features in teams. In Code Chica++, students are using the platform GitHub to learn about source control, writing tests, fixing bugs, and other development fundamentals. Throughout the cohort, they will be working in teams to build new features on an existing application. The students will get to explore roles such as Product Manager, Designer and Engineer in their groups. At the final showcase, the Chicas will present and demonstrate how they built and developed their features.
As the Program Coordinator for Code Chica, and not being a coder myself, I am grateful to the committee members for their dedication to creating a detailed and intentional advanced curriculum. The inaugural Code Chica++ cohort has successfully launched thanks to their valuable insights, guidance and direction. I am excited to witness the growth of the Code Chica program, and am looking forward to the features that the Code Chica++ cohort will build and develop. These Chicas are our future software engineers, product managers, designers and web developers. It is our goal that this will be the first of many cohorts of this advanced program, and that the curriculum can foster a lifelong love of coding, and contribute to a pipeline of women of color entering the tech sector.
