Students from Knox County Schools, Oak Ridge City Schools and area private schools will join together at 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 8, 2017, in an attempt to break the world record for number of students learning how to code at the same time.
The idea to attempt a Guinness World Record was the brainchild of Brandon Bruce, co-founder and chief operating officer of Cirrus Insight, and Caleb Fristoe, project manager of CodeTNāa Great Schools Partnership initiative that organizes coding clubs, camps and competitions at area schools. The effort is heavily supported by Knox County Schools and its Educational Technology and Information Technology departments.
āAmazing things are happening in Knoxville and Oak Ridge in technology and education,ā Bruce said. āAttempting the Guinness World Record for the number of students learning how to code at the same time will help shine a light on the everyday great work of our students, parents, teachers and principals. Keep an eye on East Tennessee for big successes in education and technology.ā
Approximately 67 percent of new jobs in STEM are in computing, which is the largest and fastest growing source of new wages in the U.S., with 500,000 jobs currently available.
āComputer Science will provide the blue-collar work of the future, and by starting today, we can equip our students with the necessary skills to compete for those jobs,ā Fristoe said.
During the world record attempt, all students will learn how to code using Scratch, a web application developed by MIT.
The existing Guinness World Record in this category is about 1,000 students. Knox County Schools and others are currently signing up students to participate in this regional event. Classroom volunteers are being recruited through Volunteer Knoxville and local Parent Teacher Associations (PTA).
