Author : Ridwan Kayode
I must say, PWS Africa 2018 is the best programming workshop I have attended as far as my search for programming knowledge is concerned.
After a few weeks of hopefulness, my fantasy became a reality. I received a letter of invitation from the team, which I accepted excitedly, though uncertain if the workshop would be worth it since the tutors are not being paid. To my amazement, it was the most wonderful and motivating workshop I had ever participated in, was so well organized, packaged and delivered professionally from start to finish.
All we ever needed was provided; all we had to bring was our laptops. We had free internet connections, there was a standby generator due to the epileptic power supply in our country, to avoid over-crowding, the workshop session was divided into morning and afternoon session, the AC was working perfectly, there was snacks and soft drinks by noon, etc. in short, the lecture was set in a make-learning-easy environment.
On the first day of the workshop, we did a formal introduction of ourselves to the tutors and they did same, we were informed on the wide range of application of python programming and everyone could just not wait to start programming. We learnt how to break down complex problems into a simplified understandable program, executable by the computer by following the rules guiding the use of python. All the tutors from Sofia, Fionnuala, Tom, Ben to Fatima attended to all questions without intimidating nor assigning any, a foolish question. Every question was welcome and attended to professionally in the best possible understandable way.
Finally, I so much wish this kind of workshop had started earlier in Africa. Maybe it would have been the tool we needed to set Africa on the solid foundation to become a science and technology hub where we employ python in the area of Manufacturing and Mass production, Data analysis, Modeling, etc, by simply coding. I will be glad to see this workshop come up every year in Africa until Africa becomes a programming hub like the US, UK, South Korea, India etc
I want to thank, profoundly, everyone who had made this program a reality, directly or indirectly, from the staff and students of the department of Computer Science, Glasgow university, the department of Mathematics and statistics, University of Ibadan, to the adorable and inspiring tutors: Sofiat, Fionnuala, Tom, Ben and Fatima, you guys are wonderful. We would love to see you guys in the nearest future, where we would have developed such that we would be using python programming in our various fields of work as a result of the solid foundation your team has been able to instill. Please don’t relent in your effort to open African eyes to the world of programming.
You guys are awesome………..!!!!