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Google Funds Raspberry Pi And CS Teachers For UK Schools

Posted by samzenpus on from the google-a-better-grade dept.

nk497 writes "Last year, Eric Schmidt slammed British computer science teaching, saying the UK was wasting its computing heritage — since then, the Government has agreed to re-examine how the subject is taught. 'Rebooting computer science education is not straightforward,' Schmidt said. 'Scrapping the existing curriculum was a good first step — the equivalent of pulling the plug out of the wall. The question is now how to power up.' To help, Schmidt has now promised funding from Google to train 100 teachers as well as give classrooms Raspberry Pis, via charity Teach First."

6 of 165 comments (clear)

  1. Re: to train 100 teachers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What, are you suggesting Google should be responsible for the entire UK education system?

    Presumably this is a pilot project, and if it goes well, more teachers will be trained and more hardware purchased. At least that's how I'd expect this to work in a sane world.

  2. Re:The simpsons say hello by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Google don't need to slap their brand all over this. They gain in two quantifiable ways:

    1. Good will. Google are the good guys here.
    2. A better trained workforce. They'll need engineers in ten years time, after all.

  3. Meanwhile by JoeCommodore · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Microsoft has given engineers a new directive to get Windows running on the Raspberry Pi platform.

    --
    "Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
  4. Re:100 Teachers by strength_of_10_men · · Score: 3, Insightful

    100 teachers, each training another 100, who in turn train another 100. Perspicacity is obviously not your strong point. But I guess if you can't do anything else, at least you can bitch.

  5. Re: to train 100 teachers by ZeroSumHappiness · · Score: 4, Insightful

    These do Python and C as well as GPIO. Those are far more valuable in a Computer Science course than an office suite would be. We don't want to train kids to be secretaries, we want to train them to be engineers.

  6. Re: to train 100 teachers by wed128 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Did you notice how the subject being taught is "Computer Science", not "IT"? There's a reason the names are different.

    I really wish people would stop making this mistake...to the point that I think we should come up with a name for CS that doesn't have the word "Computer" in it.

    "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes, biology is about microscopes or chemistry is about beakers and test tubes."