More than 1,000 UK woman will be trained to code for free over the next two years thanks to an agreement between cloud services provider OVH and and Code First: Girls.
The ongoing partnership between OVH and the Code First: Girls programme aims to train more than 20,000 women to code for free by 2020.
Among those being trained will be up to 150 women from OVH’s own staff and partner networks to continue its push to maintain and build diversity within its own organisation.
Since the launch of the 20:20 Campaign in December 2017, the number of coding courses run by Code First: Girls has seen a 70 per cent growth, with a total of 90 courses running this Autumn 2018, with OVH’s contribution amounting to 1,000 free coding course spots for young women.
“Helping the tech industry close the gender gap is one of our key priorities at OVH,” said chief human resources officer Antoine Tison.
“One of the biggest challenges the IT industry faces is how to attract more women into a profession that has for too long been dominated by men.
“The statistics in the UK speak for themselves – of all the students taking computer science at A-level only 7 per cent are female and just half of the girls that do study IT or tech subjects actually go on to pursue a career in that field. Governments and industry need to do more to change perceptions and open-up this world to more women.”
Amali de Alwis, CEO of Code First: Girls added “it has been a pleasure working alongside OVH”.
She said: “Huge progress has been made in the past six months with 1,415 of girls having completed or started one of our training programmes.
“I look forward to finding out just how far this partnership can take us.”