Free activities for young people who want to learn more about computing and coding will begin again in York this month after a two-year hiatus.
The Keeping Digital Foundation, one of York’s largest providers of free digital making activities and digital inclusivity support, is glad to confirm that their services are resuming.
York Pi Jam’s last activity ran weeks before the first lockdown in March 2020, with volunteers since providing free activities via the organisation’s website.
Two years later, York Pi Jam is to bring back face-to-face digital making activities to the city of York. It returns to Acomb Explore Library on Monday 28 February, from 5.15pm-7.15pm.
Under 16s must be accompanied by an adult.
The activities remain free of charge for everyone. It’s an opportunity for young people to get hands-on with physical computing and learning to code. The activities are perfect for beginners, and for young people with experience already.
The event also celebrates the Raspberry Pi’s 10th birthday, which was created to help teach the basics of computer science in schools, so it’s a very special chance to be able to continue our free activities.
Exciting time
Luke Castle from Keeping Digital and York Pi Jam, said: “It’s an incredibly exciting time that these activities are able to resume in person, and we thank Explore York for helping us facilitate this.
“York Pi Jam has been running activities for over five years now, and coronavirus was a weird time for the organisation where we had to move all of our services online.
“All of our activities will be resuming to pre-pandemic levels which is highly promising and will be of great benefit to York as we help to become a digitally inclusive city.
“Young people are very much the future, and our activities provide young people the chance to learn a new skill that not all schools can provide. It’s incredibly rewarding for our volunteers to get the chance to be part of that mission.”
Keeping Digital volunteers will also be running ‘CoderDojo’ type activities that will make digital making activities more accessible for young people across the city. These activities will also expand to Selby for the first time.
People are required to book a free ticket to York Pi Jam in order to keep to room capacity. Tickets can be booked at the Keeping Digital Foundation website.