At the BASDA Summit event on 21st May, we were lucky enough to hear about the success of the Raspberry Pi Foundation in their quest to re-generate interest in computer science in schools and the wider community to ensure that the UK again leads the way in computing.
• Computer Science has the worst gender balance in university student applications – only 15% of female applicants.
• Computer Science will surely underpin the ‘grand’ challenges we face.
Since its launch in February 2012 there have been over 1million sales of the Raspberry Pi which is now manufactured in the UK by Sony – 40,000 per week. A new camera module was launched in May and sold out quickly.
Community projects are helping to demonstrate a wide range of applications, introducing an element of fun that creates a buzz and attracts more people to computing. This includes Raspberry Jams – user groups where young people mix with industry experts.
The Big Picture – school curriculum changes come into effect for Key stages 1-3 from Sept 2014 from ICT to Computing and Raspberry Pi are creating new teaching materials as well as aBCS/CAS Master teacher initiative.
Excellent news for the software development industry!