How is your business helping to solve the health, social, or economic challenges created by COVID19?
In a world increasingly driven by technology, many black & brown youth are effectively excluded from economic & social opportunity by the lack of equitable access to digital tools, a too-narrow focus on coding in K-12 schools, and the absence of culturally responsive teaching in school environments.According to the Kapor Center, low-income students & students of color are twelve times less likely to have access to computer science courses at their schools than their more advantaged peers. In our COVID context, education as we have known it has transformed overnight. 140,000 public and private schools have been closed impacting over 55.1 million students. Parents are forced to juggle working from home, homeschooling, and potentially taking care of sick family members. Teachers were unprepared for the overnight pivot to distance learning. Students are disengaged with boring curriculum and the loss of a structured learning environment. We're positioned to authentically serve our community and meet the overwhelming need for engaging, future-forward, and fun technology education. Now is our time to offer our gifts, make dynamic impact in our community, and shape the future of education. This will now include the need for out-of-the-box, self-directed distance learning resources for students as schools will inevitably shift to adopt hybrid in-person/remote classroom formats in the coming school year.
Does your business contribute most to recovery, response, or resilience?
Response - we're responding directly to issues caused or exacerbated by the COVID-19 outbreak.
What is the stage of your product development?
I have a prototype or a simple version I can show my customers
What strengths does your team bring? Include skills and personal experience with the problem.
Our life’s work has been committed to using art to transform the communities we come from. While working at a nonprofit, we refined a methodology using original music, technology & youth culture to translate educational concepts to diverse learners. We applied it in over 100 schools with thousands of students & witnessed the measured impact of our work. As we scaled this project, we witnessed a unique market emerge that we couldn’t address within the constraints of that nonprofit. This inspired us to establish our own company to engage the demand for our content & approach. CodeScty gives us the opportunity to use all of our talents to fulfill our purpose, pursue our passions & have a deep, dynamic impact on generations to come. It has the potential to inspire & equip young people to architect a reality that improves their communities. We exist to teach and inspire young people of color to develop the future.Our 19 years of combined experience in developing arts/technology education programs has helped us identify a unique gap in the technology education pipeline. Despite the explosion in the number of coding organizations working to diversify tech, many still struggle to engage, inspire, and retain students of color. Our unique approach culturally responsive technology education using interactive, high-quality content gives us a competitive advantage in the education market.
What countries do you operate in?
United States
Is your company headquartered in a US "Opportunity Zone"?
No
