Talk

The digital divide: training to be a coder at the Waterfront while living in the surrounding townships

We are black South African women and men that are in an intensive 1 year training that will place us into full stack agile developer jobs. We love coding and dream of the day when we will develop tech solutions that will transform our homes- Langa, Phillipi, Khayelitsha, Delft and Mtata. We want to share our stories of navigating two worlds. One world that provides us unlimited access to technology, safety, and a very western way of working and another world that is our home- traditional, vibrant, crime-ridden, and technologically disconnected communities. We will share how we became interested in coding and the cultural, physical, financial, and emotional barriers we had and have to overcome to be in this coding programme. We will share how our communities perceive coding when we try and explain it to them. The divide is so wide that our families cannot even comprehend what we do. Sharing our story at Alterconf will provide information that is key to understanding how to bridge the digital divide in Cape Town.