
President of Finland writes code with 4-9 year old children - valtsu
http://reaktor.com/president-of-finland-codes-with-children
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danielvf
And here's the President of Singapore's Sudoku Solver in C++. (There is a link
from his Facebook post to the actual source in Google docs.)

[https://m.facebook.com/leehsienloong/photos/a.34471077892496...](https://m.facebook.com/leehsienloong/photos/a.344710778924968.83425.125845680811480/905828379479869/?type=3&source=48&locale2=en_US)

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ryangittins
Dang, that's not even a terribly naive attempt. Do you think he really wrote
that, or is it a PR thing? I don't know anything about the guy but props to
him!

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simonebrunozzi
He wrote it. 100% guaranteed.

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Juha
The president was interviewed after the event asking him: "How much can you do
with programming?" He answered: "I just learned basics...I can make a
circle!". Everybode's gotta start somewhere :).

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bitwize
It's cool and all -- President Obama did a similar PR move a few months ago --
but is it going to help? It's not like the PC was invented yesterday. Desktop
computers have been around for 40 years, and at first they HAD to be
programmed in order to be useful. Despite widespread mainstream recognition
that this was indeed a game changer, the mainstream complained that
programming was too hard and waited for Steve Jobs to come up with a suitably
simplistic mode of interaction before embracing personal computing.

Let's face it: programming is a niche activity. A vital niche, but still a
niche. Is the President next going to fix a leaky pipe in order to emphasize
society's need for plumbing infrastructure and the plumbers it takes to
maintain it?

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vlehto
The interesting question here is why you have that attitude? And why you are
passionate enough to write it down as comment?

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sfk
What is the point? Children need to learn how to think, not how to code.

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crdoconnor
It appears to be a PR stunt to promote putting programming on the core
curriculum.

I guess they're either trying to attract foreign IT investment or creating a
wedge to create space for more privatization in the Finnish schooling system
(they're bringing in private sector expertise to teach programming).

It might be a reaction to the slow death of Nokia, too.

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dirtyaura
I think your cynicism is unwarranted. What I've understood, Reaktor's Code
School for Children has been a very much grassroots effort and not a
calculated PR stunt.

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BBopUndRawkS
A code school sponsored by a private company is very much a calculated effort.

Reaktor is very much focused on profit through staff augmentation and project
implementations. This code school is to establish branding.

