Rwanda has rolled out a scheme to train one million coders under the second National Strategy for Transformation (NST2), a five-year government programme that runs from 2024 through 2029, according to official information.
The target is expected to be achieved through One Million Coders (OMC) programme, a partnership of the Government of Rwanda and the Government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) aiming to enhance digital literacy among one million young Rwandans through six to seven-week online programming courses.
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On September 16, the Ministry of ICT and Innovation announced that, under the programme, people can enrol in free six-week courses in programming, data analysis and android app development.
The programme offers three courses; Android Developer Fundamentals, Data Analysis Fundamentals and Programming Fundamentals.
It seeks to equip Rwandans for the future, nurturing the next wave of technology professionals, according to its developers.
Through the OMC programme, beneficiaries will have the opportunity to gain foundational-level skills in programming, data science, and Android and Kotlin development.
They will also have access to a dedicated community platform where they will receive support from expert mentors, as well as certification upon successfully completing their chosen course.
On September 9, Prime Minister Edouard Ngirente, while unveiling NST2 to Parliament, said that in line with upskilling the youth and providing them with employment opportunities in the future, one million people will be offered coding skills, which is one of ICT targets under NST2. Coding, or computer programming, is the process of using programming languages to give instructions to a computer. It involves using computer languages to create software, websites, and applications.
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Here is a look at the courses, as indicated by the programme designers:
Android Developer Fundamentals
This track aims to teach you the core fundamentals of Android development, how app layouts are created, how interactions with the users take place, and the basics of Kotlin, a language designed especially with speed in mind. It compiles faster, makes your application more lightweight, and prevents them from increasing in size.
Data Analysis Fundamentals
This track aims to teach you the core fundamentals of Data Analysis and refine your ability to work with messy, complex datasets. You’ll learn to manipulate and prepare data for analysis and create visualizations for data exploration. Finally, you’ll learn to use your data skills to tell a story with data.
Programming Fundamentals
This track aims to teach you the core fundamentals of web development, how web pages are structured from scratch using a language called HyperText Markup Language (HTML), how this HTML structure is then designed and styled using another language called Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and finally, how this styled structure gets converted into an interactive application using JavaScript (JS)