The Kenya government has approved coding as a subject of study within the official education system for primary and secodary schools, making Kenya the first country in Africa to approve coding as a subject of study in early schooling.
The move by the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) was praised by the Kenya President, Uhuru Kenyatta, saying that the move will ‘enhance employment creation, enable and scale up ICT innovation and the development of a dynamic and robust ICT sector that will enhance the growth of all sectors of the economy.’
At the same time, as the government was introducing the coding curriculum, it also unveiled other digital initiatives, including the National Digital Master Plan and the 2022 National Cybersecurity Strategy.
The President highlighted that the ‘the master plan also guides investors while planning their investment priorities.’
Part of the master plan is to introduce what are referred as 20,000 digital village hubs that will spur innovation and projected to create employment for 40,000 youth.
While the Kenyan government is introducing those initiatives, we can see that the Kenya private sector is also rolling out initiates to contribute to the sector. Kenya which has established itself as one of the hotspots for cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology on the continent continues to witness programs for education and development of these technologies.
One such program is web3 Developer Student Clubs, a leading Web3 educational initiative based out of Kenya, which unveiled 30 student developers during its first cohort graduation ceremony in August 2022.
As the first of its kind in Africa, the Kenyan graduation followed a 3-month rigorous training that saw the students get trained on building smart contracts on the NEAR blockchain protocol.
Web3 clubs is also an accelerator and Incubation developer club focused on adopting Web3 ecosystem across learning institutions in Kenya.