Prize Giving Ceremony

WeCode24 hosted their first prize-giving ceremony on Saturday, the 19th of January 2019. The participating learners together with their teachers and parents attended the event at Klein Nederburg Secondary School in Paarl. The learners received certificates for completing the 2018 WeCode24 programme.

Mrs Mary Banda, Principal of Klein Nederburg Secondary School, extended a hearty welcome to all the guests at the prestigious event.

After the welcome, Prof Rachel Jafta, Founder and Director of the WeCode24 project, spoke briefly but passionately about the significance of the event.

“The WeCode24 programme gives the learners an opportunity to realise their potential and make a positive impact in society and the economy. The WeCode24 coding project offers an exciting window into these opportunities for learners and the broader community,” said Prof Jafta.

The aim of the event was to honour the learners’ commitment and to acknowledge their accomplishments over the last year. Addressing the audience, Abraham Coetzee, the WeCode24 programme developer, gave an insightful overview of the programme. “I hope that it has now become obvious why WeCode24 focuses on learning to program games: Play is absolutely essential and games are extremely good for you in a remarkable number of ways; Programming is one of the most valuable skills; You learn — and want to learn! — more about the world when programming games than you do in any other field; And, you have a ridiculous amount of fun while doing so.”

The learners attended the coding sessions after school each week. All of the successful learners received a certificate for completing the Introduction to Programming: Graphics, Games and Embedded Systems course. They learnt to program with the Python programming language.

Theon Thomas, the top learner from Malibu High School in Eerste River said, “The prize I won has really inspired me to improve my coding skills. I hope that WeCode24 would come back this year and continue where we left off.”

The prize winners all received a Raspberry Pi computer, and the top learners also received a monitor, keyboard and mouse.

Prof Rachel Jafta congratulated all the winners and encouraged them to continue coding.

“I would like to congratulate all our winners for participating in the programme. I am proud of you and I hope you will enjoy your prizes and continue to code,” said Prof Rachel Jafta.

The Prize winners are:

In third place: Jaylen Juries, Thorne Myburgh and Marc Mia
In second place: Takudzwa Chiso, Ethan Hofsta and Samantha Stipps
In first place: Meliuethu Sibanda, Theon Thomas and Jarred Williams

These learners showed great enthusiasm and commitment throughout the year.