St. Luke's Answers the Call to Code

Story By St. Luke's Alum, Zach Pearce '08

Norwalk resident Jeff Kress has a way with numbers. Over the past three decades, countless students at St. Luke’s have learned this fact in Calculus and computer science courses. Mr. Kress and his students regularly wrestle with large numbers. But this past week, Mr. Kress and the St. Luke’s community lived the power of large numbers.

In every Middle school and Upper School math class this past week, St. Luke’s joined a nationwide endeavor to contribute one billion lines of computer code written by one million students. As a part of Computer Science Education Week, the nonprofit organization Code.org has spearheaded the first ever “Hour of Code,” in which students across the country are encouraged to try their hand at coding through free Internet tutorials and activities of varying difficulties. “It’s good to be a part of something historical,” Mr. Kress explained. The connections continued when St. Luke’s students gathered in the school’s Global Classroom for a “chat” with an icon of technology and social media.

Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter, the ubiquitous social media service, and CEO of Square, the company behind the aptly named accessory that allows users to swipe credit cards directly into a smartphone or tablet, addressed a rapt St. Luke’s audience via videoconference. Students and faculty joined Mr. Dorsey in a virtual roundtable with other schools from Washington, Alabama, and Texas. Mr. Dorsey answered questions that ranged from queries about his favorite computer game growing up–Sim City–to the evolution of the now-universal “hashtag.”

Nate Phelps, an eighth grader, asked the social media guru how he got his start in programming. “It came out of a desire to draw maps on my computer,” said a candid Dorsey. “I could make them move–and I could play with them more.” He continued, “programming allowed me to do that in a very, very fast manner…it was something I had to do.” The message resonated with Nate who plans on taking introduction to Java next year.

“I’ve always wanted to do code since I came here. But [after] learning from [Jack Dorsey] I want to do it more,” Nate beamed.

Later, students in math classes in every grade eagerly tackled their personal “Hours of Code.” Some students wrote code for iPhone games; others worked through lines of code to create multi-color, three-dimensional geometric patterns. In Mr. Kress’s Java I/Java II class, the venerable head of the computer science department rushed to the Smart Board once a student had finished coding his game. The class cheered as Mr. Kress attempted to maneuver an animated monster around falling rocks.

Alexia Watson, a student in Susan Garnett’s sixth grade math class, emphasized the practicality of what she had learned. “Code week helps you with thinking,” she said. “In the future it will help a lot. I hope we can do it again soon.” Mr. Kress echoed Alexia’s sentiments. “When you have to solve a problem, if you have experience coding, you’ve had experience taking a problem, dividing it up into pieces, putting them together, thinking about it in a step by step, systematic way. That’s such a valuable life skill.”

At the time of writing, over 13 million students have contributed over 400 million lines of code. For St. Luke’s students, one hour of code—and one indelible experience—may be enough to inspire a new generation of computer scientists and critical thinkers.