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⚡🖤 Black History Month Spotlight: Meet Our Code2College Superheroes This month, we’re shining a spotlight on our Black alumni trailblazers who are breaking barriers, driving innovation, and shaping the future of STEM. Next up in our superhero lineup… 🦸🏾♂️ Emmanuel Ahonle From interning at Atlassian to forging a career as a Platform Engineer at IBM, Emmanuel’s journey began with Code2College and then studying Electrical and Computer Engineering at UT Austin. He mastered cloud systems with AWS, bends code to his will using Python, and shows what happens when skill, curiosity, and determination collide. Just don’t ask him to walk away from a system until it’s fully optimized and production-ready! 🚀 Stay tuned as we spotlight more Code2College superheroes making history every day. #BlackHistoryMonth #STEMLeaders #WorkforceDevelopment

As we continue to celebrate **Black History Month**, observing the intersection of innovation and education is essential. From the early architects of computing to the modern founders of #AI-driven learning platforms, African American pioneers have not just participated in #EdTech—they have fundamentally reshaped it. I would like to honor the legacy of those who broke barriers and the leaders currently building the future of #edtch and #learning and #development. Here are some of the pioneers and modern entrepreneurs who have shaped education technology, learning management, and workforce development. *Roy Clay Sr. - Known as an architect of the modern tech industry at HP, his work on data accuracy and his mentorship of Black engineers paved the way for diversity in the technical education workforce. *Clarence Ellis - The first African American to earn a PhD in Computer Science, Ellis helped invent **groupware**. Every collaborative tool we use today—from shared Google Docs to virtual classrooms—traces its roots back to his vision of digital connection. *Mark Dean - An IBM engineer who helped develop the personal computer and the hardware that allows devices to connect, helping bring technology out of labs and directly into classrooms. *Kimberly Bryant - Founder of Black Girls Code Bryant has redefined access and representation by introducing young girls of color to programming, robotics, and digital creation. Today’s founders are leveraging #AI, #mobile technology, & community to bridge the opportunity gap: *CareerKarma: Revolutionizing workforce training by connecting over 2.5 million monthly users with bootcamps, upskilling programs, and peer mentorship in high-growth tech fields. *Kredit Academy: Gamifying financial literacy by teaching children the fundamentals of credit and money management through a task-based mobile app. *Skilldora Inc.: Leading the charge in AI-instructed learning, Skilldora Inc. offers accredited professional development courses taught by avatar instructors. EdTech is more than just software, it is a vehicle for **access, equity, & empowerment**. Whether it’s improving school-home engagement through AI, or focusing on culturally responsive teaching, these contributions ensure that the future of learning is inclusive by design💡 As we look toward a global EdTech market expected to reach $348 billion by 2030, we must continue to support and invest in the Black founders who are driving this innovation! #BlackHistoryMonth #EdTech #Innovation #LearningandDevelopment #WorkforceDevelopment #BlackInTech #FutureOfLearning #DiversityInTech

Excited to announce the strategic partnership of Shooting Stars Foundation with IBM SkillsBuild for the I Can Become program! 🚀 As the implementation partner, Shooting Stars Foundation is supporting students with free access to 1000+ online courses in AI, resume building, interview prep, design thinking, sustainability, and more complete with globally recognized IBM digital credentials. The goal is to have, over 30,000 learners engaged and 6000+ project-based learning experiences for students from non technical education background! Students, register now via our unique link: https://bit.ly/4k7xHgY and kickstart your skill-building journey. Tag a friend who needs this boost! 💫 #ICanBecome #IBMSkillsBuild #ShootingStarsFoundation #DigitalSkills #AIforAll

The Experience Mismatch Reality: Why Entry-Level feels anything but. Why does "entry-level" in tech often feel like a locked door? In my current series exploring the Lift Every Voice in Tech report, one of the most glaring systemic barriers identified is the Experience Mismatch. It is a frustration shared by many Black workers and learners: job postings labeled as "entry-level" that paradoxically require 3 to 5 years of experience. Many entry-level roles now require unaffordable certifications or formal degrees, even when the actual work can be performed with skills gained through alternative pathways. While some companies claim to use skills-based hiring, many hiring managers still harbor biases, prioritizing candidates with traditional four-year degrees over those with industry certifications. This mismatch forces talented individuals to sacrifice compensation just to obtain the years of experience that companies demand for supposedly beginning roles. This acts as a systemic barrier for newcomers, especially those from non-traditional backgrounds, and call for employers to recognize transferable skills over arbitrary year-counts. With AI taking over routine tasks, junior roles are evolving. For populations that already experience this discrepancy of entry level not being entry, this just further moves the baseline. Workers and learners with robust skills from lived experience or frontline roles, often do not even present those on resumes as the industry standard has been set around traditional pathways. When we require 5 years of experience for a junior role, we aren't raising the bar. We are closing the door on diverse talent that has the skills but lacks the legacy access. How do we level the playing field and stop moving the baseline? Have you ever been ghosted by a "Junior" role because you didn't have senior-level experience? Let’s talk about how we can push for more honest hiring in the comments. #TechHiring #EquityInTech #SkillsBasedHiring #EntryLevelTech https://lnkd.in/eT5Ec_rw https://lnkd.in/ev3tqG5r

No one prepares you for the moment you realize your career plan might not survive AI advancements. It happened to me before I even graduated. Here’s how I built the skill that saved me. ( and continue building ) In university, I was studying translation. Halfway through my degree, it became clear: the job I was preparing for would be heavily automated by the time I graduated. So I pivoted. While still finishing my bachelor’s degree, I started teaching myself storytelling through video. No roadmap. No formal training. Just projects. That’s when I discovered something about myself: I don’t learn well by passively consuming information. I learn by building something that forces me to struggle. I pick a project slightly above my current level. I hit roadblocks. I look up tutorials. I read. I ask people who’ve done it before. I apply. I fail. I adjust. I finish. That process became my system. Now I set a goal of learning something new every single week. Part of the reason is accountability. I run a SKOOL where I share what I’ve learned and the mistakes I’ve made. If I’m not growing, I have nothing to share. But the deeper reason is this: The world is moving fast. Within six months, new tools, new frameworks, new technologies emerge. If you don’t understand how you learn, change feels overwhelming. If you do, change feels manageable. Learning becomes a muscle. At first it’s uncomfortable. Then it becomes familiar. Eventually, it becomes part of your identity. And in a world where industries shift overnight, that muscle might be the most valuable skill you build. Thank you Black Students Career Development for inviting me to speak on your panel about Soft Skills.

Curiosity drives growth, especially in the early stages of our careers. As a 2nd year computer science student and AI enthusiast, I've had the privilege of collaborating with friends, peers, and teammates on various projects, hackathons, and mini-collaborations. One key observation stands out: we grow faster when we grow together. Here are some practices I'm focusing on: • Setting simple, personal learning goals – instead of vague targets like "get better at coding," I aim for specific objectives such as "implement X algorithm" or "ship Y feature." • Embracing stretch tasks in projects – I choose slightly uncomfortable areas (like backend development or deployments) to learn and adapt on the go. • Providing honest yet kind feedback – I share insights on what worked, what didn't, and how we can improve in future endeavors. The results? Teamwork becomes more fluid, communication increases, and even challenging problems transform into enjoyable puzzles when everyone learns together. As I continue my journey, I'm eager to learn from others: How do you foster growth in your teams, classrooms, or projects? Your insights could inspire my next experiment in a hackathon or AI project.

"The retreat challenged the narrative that AI eliminates the need for junior developers. Juniors are more profitable than they have ever been. AI tools get them past the awkward initial net-negative phase faster. They serve as a call option on future productivity. And they are better at AI tools than senior engineers, having never developed the habits and assumptions that slow adoption. The real concern is mid-level engineers who came up during the decade-long hiring boom and may not have developed the fundamentals needed to thrive in the new environment. This population represents the bulk of the industry by volume, and retraining them is genuinely difficult. The retreat discussed whether apprenticeship models, rotation programs and lifelong learning structures could address this gap, but acknowledged that no organization has solved it yet." — Thoughtworks, findings from a retreat concerning "the future of software engineering", conducted under Chatham House rules

When the Pipeline Does Not Exist, You Build It: Dr. Kimberly Bryant's Revolution In 2011, Dr. Kimberly Bryant's daughter returned from a tech summer camp as the only Black girl in the program. For a Vanderbilt-trained electrical engineer who had spent years navigating predominantly white spaces in biotech and pharmaceuticals, this was not surprising. But it was unacceptable. Black girls represented less than one percent of technology professionals. The pipeline problem everyone discussed was not a pipeline at all. It was abandoned infrastructure. So Bryant built Black Girls CODE. Not a mentorship program. An engineering program. Teaching girls ages 7 to 17 to actually write code, build robots, design websites, develop mobile applications. Hands-on technical training delivered in communities where tech education was systematically absent. Thirteen years later: 30,000 plus girls trained. Fifteen chapters across the US and internationally. Alumni now working as software engineers, data scientists, product managers at companies that once claimed they could not find qualified candidates. Bryant did not wait for tech companies to solve their diversity crisis. She created the solution they claimed was impossible. How many other pipeline problems are really just institutional abandonment waiting for someone to build what should have always existed? Day 6 of 28 | Black Innovation | Women Who Built the Future #Leadership #TechDiversity #WomenInSTEM #BlackHistoryMonth #Education #Innovation #STEM #Equity #ThoughtLeadership