For the second year in a row, our Inquiry Hub team has won the SFU Canadian Coding League Nationals. Three years ago, in their first attempt, they came in second. That’s a pretty amazing track record. What makes this record even more impressive: Our teacher who supports this student team doesn’t know how to code. He literally has no background in coding and everything the students do is above his capabilities.

Our students go up against schools with coding classes, and teachers who understand how to both code and teach coding. Our teachers teach students how to work as a SCRUM team, to take on leadership roles, and to distribute the work load among the team… And then our students do all the work.

Our teacher was actually surprised the team won again. He knew their project was good, but figured they probably wouldn’t give first place to the same team two years in a row. They won anyways. When I congratulated the teacher, he said he literally didn’t do anything, it was the team of students that deserve all the accolades.

I’m not going to say that winning isn’t important. The students put a lot of personal time into this challenge, and deserve the accolades. However, I will say that I’d still be very proud of them even if they didn’t win. I just love that our teachers create an environment where students can be so competitive leading themselves. This is a great example of a truly student powered project.