In partnership with institutions around the world, from Imperial College London and Fondazione Golinelli in Bologna, we are committed to to boost digital skills, particularly among girls, and develop a diverse talent pool of future innovators.
Our programmes cover the whole lifecycle of learning: supporting the teaching of digital skills at primary and secondary schools; incubating tech talent in secondary school students and partnering with world-class higher education institutes including Bocconi University.
Beyond ensuring the next generation are provided with the skills they will require to thrive in our digitalized world, we place a particular focus on educating girls so as to tackle the lack of diversity in the technology industry. In the past twelve months alone, over 2,000 students have benefited from our digital education programmes across the UK and Italy, with over 50% of these young talents being female.
As the job market becomes more digital and competitive by the day, it’s important that we provide the younger generations with the relevant skills they need.
Alex Alexander CIO YNAP
Imperial College London: Since January 2017 YNAP has partnered with Imperial College London, one of the world’s leading universities, to work together to improve the advancement of education for the benefit of the public, in particular by supporting a coding outreach programme in the Department of Compuring, Called Codelab. “Imperial CodeLab Powered by YOOX NET-A-PORTER GROUP”aims to boost digital skills, particularly among girls, and develop a diverse talent pool of future innovators.
Targeted at children between the ages of 8 and 14, with a particular focus on the West London community, CodeLab introduces children to computer science and looks to tackle the lack of diversity and gender inequality within the technology industry.
Over 400 students took part to the programme in 2017, 70% were girls and 15% were on free school meals. They learned how to build their own games and apps using JavaScript – developing their aptitude and ability to solve problems in a creative environment.
We live in the digital age, where technology is crucial to our day-to-day lives. If we are to make sure that technology works for everyone, we need a diverse talent pool of coders and computer scientists.
Susan Eisenbach Professor of Computing, Imperial College London
Fondazione Golinelli: In Italy, a similar partnership between YNAP and Fondazione Golinelli in Bologna introduces schools to the opportunities that digital offers. As part of this co-developed interactive programme, over 1,600 students at 30 different schools benefited from coding and digital technology free workshops led by YNAP’s tech experts during Europe Code Week, in October 2017. The students from pre, primary and secondary school were invited to free workshops covering robotics, visual coding and virtual reality.
Hour of Code: Every year together with our partners Imperial College London and Fondazione Golinelli we also take part in the Hour of Code initiative, the biggest technology-learning event worldwide created by the non-profit association Code.org to raise awareness of computer science and teach people the basic skills of computer programming. During this week, the Group actively takes part and offers activities to the young generations: YNAP’s technologists visit schools in both Bologna and London, where they lead coding classes, assist IT teachers and give inspirational talks.
Looking forward, we aim to further expand the next generation’s access to digital skills, via these partnerships, and also as a member of the European Commission’s Digital Skills and Jobs Coalition, set up to provide training for digital jobs to 1 million young people by 2020.
