The Virtual Voice

FLVS Codes

Celebrating College & Career-Ready Students

By on February 26th, 2019

From contests to clubs, FLVS offers a variety of ways to learn about coding and computer science, including online technology courses that develop the skills students need for the careers of tomorrow.

Career and Technical Education (CTE) courses combine academics and the real world, providing hands-on learning that puts students at the center of the action. CTE also helps develop critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork, and communication skills, which means students are better prepared for college and career life.

As we wrap up CTE Month at the end of February, we want to celebrate several student participants who wowed us with their entries in our recent #FLVSCodes contest. Continue reading

Congrats to our #FLVSCodes Contest Winners

By on February 1st, 2019

February is Career and Technical Education Month – a time to recognize the importance of practical skills students need to succeed in the real world.

In support of this same goal, FLVS recently held an online photo and video contest encouraging students to share their love for coding and computer science. The entries featured students participating in a variety of STEM-related activities, from programming robots to participating in an Hour of Code. Continue reading

Catching Up with a Computer Science Expert

By on December 9th, 2016

To get a better idea of what Computer Science Education Week and Hour of Code is all about, FLVS Content Writer Irene Pynn-Cunha sat down to chat with Amie Ross, FLVS Computer Science instructor.

flvs-hour-of-code-2016Mrs. Ross looks forward to Computer Science Education Week every year. In the past, she’s worked with students both online and face to face. She loves watching mental light bulbs go off all around the room as, one by one, students who thought they would never learn to code begin solving programming puzzles.

“When something works,” she says, “the excitement on their faces, that’s really cool.”

This year, she’ll be helping students with one of her favorite puzzles: a storybook about Santa’s missing socks. It may seem like a simple exercise, but by the end, students discover they’ve just worked through a challenging computer science concept: the binary search.

Mrs. Ross says one of the great benefits of Computer Science Education Week and Hour of Code is that participants “tackle very complicated concepts without even realizing it.” In many ways, this is the key to showing students that programming actually is for anyone. In fact, she says, programming is a heavily creative field. “I’ve watched a lot of students really surprise themselves,” she says. “There isn’t just one type of person who gets into programming.” Continue reading