Objective
Meet and Code strives to introduce children and young people aged between 8 and 24 to technology and coding through events. These events aim to teach young people how fun coding can be and how it can support and foster innovation in life. Participants learn about technology and how digital technologies impact daily life. These events also aim to help the participants explore technologies, topics, and skills needed for the future digital economy.
Meet and Code promotes science and technology-related events and is aligned with EU Code Week. The events are organised by various organisations and professionals such as schools, IT professionals, companies or computer clubs. They can receive support through resources or funding from Meet and Code with a limit of 500€ per event. Events can be in a variety of formats such as hackathons, coding workshops, lectures, film events, competitions, coding nights, robotics classes. The Meet and Code Inspiration Library provides resources to help support events.
Why is this a best practice?
Meet and Code has been active for a few years with an ever-growing number of events and participants taking part in events. In 2022 alone Meet and Code had 33 792 participants, 1685 applications, and 1056 funded events. The majority of the attendees at these events were between 8 and 16 years old. The 2022 edition of Meet and Code also saw over 3600 refugee participants of Ukrainian origin take part in events across Europe. The 2022 events took place across 21 European countries with a mix of events in both big and small cities. Additionally, 68% of Meet and Code funding recipients stated that their events were only possible because of the funding provided.
Throughout its various editions, Meet and Code have gone beyond being an educational or skills initiative. Rather it has become a way for different stakeholders to explore how they can play their part in supporting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and improving society. This initiative helps support SDG 5 and SDG 17 while also supporting other SDGs and ensuring that the twin transitions are supported by a workforce with robust digital competencies.
Meet and Code was a finalist in the European Digital Skills Awards 2018 edition, in the category “Digital skills in education”.
About Meet and Code
Meet and Code was founded by SAP, Haus des Stiftens gGmbH, TechSoup Europe with the respective country partners of the TechSoup Europe network. Each organisation is responsible for an element of Meet and Code: SAP enables Meet and Code through financial support and resources for non-profits, Haus des Stiftens gGmbH provides general management to the initiative and leads the selection of projects in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, and TechSoup Europe coordinates the funding and operations by the responsible managing country partners of the TechSoup Europe network.