Springs – The Ekurhuleni East TVET College has partnered with WeThinkCode to support 80 students at the Artisan and Skills Development Centre.

Bringing the programme to the institution was the brainchild of Jacob Molefe, the acting centre manager.

“We have always tried to ensure that we build capacity to address the skills shortage in the ICT sector. This partnership will help to close that gap by exposing students and equipping them with the necessary skills. We want these young people to be employable, and some will be entrepreneurs,’ said Jacob.

Launched in 2015, WeThinkCode aims to eliminate the digital skills shortage by developing 100 000 coders in Africa over the next 10 years.

“The partnership helps us, as a private company, increase our reach through a public institution. The students will enjoy a unique training style, which includes peer-to-peer learning and self-learning before they reach the performance administrators.

“We focus a lot on work readiness as well, because we want them to be ready to work as soon as they complete the programme,” explained Kelebogile Motlhamme, the director of operations at WeThinkCode.

The students will acquire skills in software development and coding in the NQF6 qualification over 16 months.

In the first eight months, students focus on the fundamentals of programming and software design patterns. This starts in Python and transitions to Java.

ALSO CHECK: Department of Social Development and SANCA empower Duduza youth in substance abuse awareness drive

In the final eight months, they cover brownfields (developing a new app that integrates with or modifies an existing system) and specialised electives.

WeThinkCode has graduated over 1 800 software developers and placed over 70% in employment with leading SA businesses.

Since its inception, WeThinkCode has built strong talent pipelines for tech-driven businesses across the financial services, consulting and telecommunications sectors and is not slowing down.

Their goal is to systematically shift SA from being a net consumer of technology to a primary creator of digital technology.