The Federal Government through the National information Technology Development Agency, (NITDA) has trained 800 children on Information Technology skills with the aim to promote digital skills.
Kashifu Abdullahi, director-general of NITDA, disclosed this on Saturday in Abuja, during the close of the Stem Bootcamp for kids (SB4Kids) designed by NITDA in collaboration with the National Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (NCAIR).
The Stem Bootcamp for kids (SB4Kids) aims to inspire young Nigerians in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, through the well-known Stem programme.
“The SB4Kids engages youngsters between the age of 8-16 years in an immersive and well-articulated bootcamp meant to coach and inspire them to imbibe a passion in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics in order to create an early interest in digital technologies which will hopefully shape their future careers in these fields,” Yau Garba, national director NCAIR, disclosed.
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The Director-General of NITDA, in his remarks, stressed the need to acquaint children with IT skills to enable them stay abreast with global development. He said the programme would help develop their interest.
Abdullahi said: “The world has gone digital and for us to impact the world and develop our economy efficiently, we must catch the children young by imparting them with the necessary skills.
“The essence of this programme is to develop the children right early for these skills that are most needed in the world. The highest earnings and fastest growing job is IT; so we must prioritise the skills.”
Skills learned by the kids include; coding, artificial intelligence and robotics, digital communications, 3D Printing, embedded system and IoT, and virtual reality.
