Free Tucson course teaches basics of computing to attract new workers – Arizona Daily Star

If you’ve been thinking about a career in computing, a free program being launched by Startup Tucson and Arizona Forge may help you figure out if a job in cyberspace is for you.

The nonprofit startup business group and Arizona Forge — a University of Arizona entrepreneurship center and business incubator — are a launching the basic computer-science course at their shared space in the historic Roy Place building downtown.

Applications are open now for the first of two planned 11-week sessions of the Computer Science and Career Services Program, also known as [CS]2.

The program will initially run in four-hour sessions on Saturdays from late January through mid-March, using an introductory computer-science curriculum developed at Harvard University. 

An online informational session is set for Nov 16. To register for the session or apply to the program, go to startuptucson.com/cs2.

The program, which is being funded by the city of Tucson, was launched as  a pilot to help fill a local need for computer programmers and software developers, said Dre Thompson, executive vice president of Startup Tucson.

“We are constantly under-resourced and understaffed for developers in our area and this is a huge issue our startups face,” Thompson said.

The [CS]2 course is designed for beginners with no computer programming experience and is based on Harvard’s Computer Science 50 (CS50), a basic-computing course taught in person at Harvard and Yale and widely used online, topping 2 million enrollments last year.

The curriculum includes the basics of programming languages starting with Scratch, a visual-based language often used by beginners, and progressing to the basics of other common coding languages.

While the course is free and open to anyone 18 and older, students can earn an optional verified certificate of course completion through the Harvard program at a cost of $150.

A certificate from the program won’t qualify graduates for junior developers immediately but will help them decide if computer science work is for them and decide their next steps, said Arizona Forge program coordinator Aleshia Howell.

“The mission is to demystify computer science, help participants identify their strengths and interests in software development, and then help put them on a path to whatever their goals are,” said Howell, who headed a computer coding program in Savannah, Georgia, a few years ago and joined Forge in July. 

Organizers hope to sign up 12 to 18 students for the initial course and again for a second session from April through June, with a goal of at least 20 program graduates, Howell said.