Django Girls Den Haag

This blog post was written by Catherine Pollock. Thanks Catherine ❤️

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Like any tech-savvy traveler, I looked to the internet to discover what was happening soon in the city I was in. I am currently on a five-month-long exchange program in Den Haag, Netherlands and had only been here for about two weeks before I discovered the Django Girls event. When I saw that there was “A free programming workshop for women,” I was all too interested.

At my home university in the U.S., I study Computer Science and Engineering. I am also a part of a programming club for women and helped to create an event that also introduces women to programming. While my event has the same goal as Django Girls, the other organizers and I have always found it difficult to find high-quality material to present at it.

When I read the description for the Django Girls event in Den Haag, I could instantly picture myself there. I was worried that I was too experienced to participate, since I have experience coding through my classes. On the other hand, I was worried that I wasn’t experienced enough to be a coach, since I didn’t know anything about Python or Django. Luckily, I was offered the perfect role - event blogger.

As official event blogger, I was offered a seat at coaches dinner that occurred two days before the event. Meeting and conversing with the coaches reminded me about one of the reasons I love coding: magnificent communities are created from it. I enjoyed talking about our various interests in tech and learning about the backgrounds of the coaches and organizers.

The day before the event I sat myself down in front of my laptop and began the tutorial. With each page of the tutorial came a new topic or challenge. I was amazed by how well the tutorial was written and how many different topics it introduces to participants. Many of these topics I didn’t learn until a year or two into my computer science courses, but the Django Girls tutorial presented them in an easy-to-understand manner that enables novices to follow along. I spent most of my day on the tutorial and went to bed slightly confused about how a QuerySet works with only a few steps left in finishing my blog.

Right before the event I spent some time working through a few more steps of the tutorial; I was so close to finishing! When the event began, Rain shared her unique dancer-turned-programmer story, which filled the room with inspiration, curiosity, and excitement.

After the keynote, participants and coaches began to chat amongst themselves and work on the tutorial. I felt déjà vu. Watching women be introduced to the wonderful world of coding makes the cut as one of my favorite activities - and I was about to enjoy a day full of it. My favorite aspect of observing someone code for the first time is watching them realize that they are able to do it! No matter what doubts they had before, newcomers soon realize that they are smarter than they give themselves credit for.

Another one of my favorite parts of introducing others to coding is watching them work through their first bug. Of course, no one likes bugs, but can you imagine how boring programming would be without them? Watching someone’s face light up after they fix a bug is like watching someone win an olympic event. I know from experience that working through a pesky bug feels like winning a gold medal after running a marathon (not that I’ve ever ran any marathons).

I had the chance to speak to a few participants about their experiences with the tutorial. I was truly amazed by the amount of diversity among the attendants. There were women from many different career, educational, and cultural backgrounds. Each person had their own reason for wanting to spend their Saturday learning to code.

One participant, Yentl, attended the event to learn more about how technology works, since she works as an IT recruiter. At first, she attended the event to be able to converse better with developers and other IT professionals, but this ended up not being the highlight. Yentl said that her favorite part was when her website refreshed and said “It worked!” She was so excited that she even took a picture to show friends.

Another participant, Lana, also attended the event in hopes of making improvements at her current job. She works as a teacher and has little experience with computers. Lana hoped that by attending the event she could improve her computer skills which would result in better teaching skills. “The beginning was the hardest part,” she said, “but once I got past it I learned many skills… I feel accomplished to have my own website.”

One especially jubilant participant, Punitha, attended in hopes of eventually getting a job in the tech-industry. She had gone to school for computer science but diverged from it to pursue a career in another field. It had been a while since she last programmed and wanted to see if she was still interested in it. As it turns out, she was! When asked about what her favorite part of the day was she said, “Everything! Just sitting in front of a computer to do something creative is nice. It makes me feel worthwhile. I feel accomplished. It doesn’t feel like work.”

It was interesting to learn about people’s various backgrounds and reasons for attending, and the coaches were just as intriguing as participants. Coach Remon found his interest in programming through using scientific calculators in college, which he and his friends would reprogram. Part of the reason Jure helped to coach the event was to improve his communication and mentoring skills.

The coaches’ interest in Django Girls was especially fascinating to me. One coach, Zowie, is passionate about Django Girls because, “A lot of women can do so much more than they believe, and I believe this has to change. Women need to get the feeling that they can do more. There is a standard image that women cannot [program]. Society needs women in the industry. It solves problems for so many people. It doesn’t matter if they become programmers; they should understand that they are able to do it… Django Girls helps accomplish this.” I agree, Zowie, and I couldn’t have said it better myself.

I got so caught up in conversation that I forgot to continue the tutorial (which I finished from home later that evening). With each participant or coach I spoke to I became more and more excited about Django Girls. I’m so excited about it that I plan to organize a Django Girls event when I return home to Reno. In the meantime I plan to coach any nearby events and work on the tutorial extensions.

Django Girls Den Haag taught me that even though we all have various career, educational, and cultural backgrounds, and we all have various reasons for attending the event, we can all come together to create a more cohesive, inclusive, and enjoyable tech-community.

And for my readers who haven’t yet done the tutorial…  Here are a few words of advice (from Coach Rain):

• Don’t panic

• Break it down

• Google

• Make a mess

• Breathe

• Walk away

• Have fun!