Dancing and coding
- Joanne Jacobs
- Jul 9, 2022
- 1 min read
Philadelphia girls are learning dance and coding in a bid to "educate, inspire, and cultivate girls of color in STEM,” says Betty Lindley, co-founder of danceLogic.
"Both coding and dance use repetition and combination," Lindley tells Chalkbeat's Nora Macaluso. Dance is “a hook” to get girls in the door each Saturday. “Much of our dance class is centered around composition and choreography,” says instructor Cameron Bridgers.
Students, who are 12 to 18 years old, are encouraged to help others. One girl "developed her own coding curriculum and taught younger children in her neighborhood library," writes Macaluso. When the pandemic forced a switch to remote learning, the student designed and implemented a virtual video-game design class for children.
I can think of no way that dancing could make you a better coder, make it easier to learn to code or improve your odds of getting a coding job. Might as well use basket weaving or jogging for the same effect.
Once again, when the term "people of color" is used, one has to ask whether it includes Asians or not. Since the topic concerns STEM, I will assume from context that Asians do not count as people of color in this context.