For the first time in over a year, the Girls Who Code Club is back in person at The Point at Otterbein University, helping educate girls and young women in the community to pursue careers in computer science. 

“The girls are more productive to learn coding with the screen right in front of them, so they are able to take full control of the coding,” said Riya Lengade, facilitator with Girls Who Code. “I think our weekly sessions are more interactive in person and easier for the girls to get to know each other.” 

Girls Who Code was founded in 2010 and is a national movement with the mission of closing the gender gap in technology through after-school clubs, summer courses, and summer immersion programs. These programs are offered to girls of all ages and focus on developing computer science and coding skills. This year’s sessions are designed to help the girls learn more about being a professional software engineer. 

“By being in person, we were able to mimic how software teams in the industry behave with their daily standup meetings with agile. When we started working on the LEGO Mindstorm robots, each group selected a different activity for their robot to do. Then the girls were directly able to program commands and fix errors through trial and error,” said Lengade. 

Girls Who Code held their end-of-year celebration on May 5, recognizing all the hard work and new skills acquired through the club this year. 

“It felt amazing to demonstrate what these girls have put effort into over the past few months. Their robots and their functionality were centerstage and so much more dynamic than any video could ever show,” Lengade said. 

Girls Who Code is an important club because there is a need for more female representation in the science, technology, engineering, and math career sectors, Lengade added.  

The bottom line, she said, is all about how diversity and inclusion have a pivotal role in innovation and technology breakthroughs. 

“These girls, and women, are our future engineers who will create more and better solutions for our world.”