The Preston Raspberry Jam
Where the kids are making the waves.
When we first went to Preston Raspberry Jam, it was the very first event way back in July 2012, mere months after the Raspberry Pi had first been released. Organised by Alan O’Donohoe, then a local teacher and passionate Computing advocate. Alan created the Raspberry Jam concept as a means to enable access to all, as at that time Raspberry Pi were exceptionally hard to come by. At this first event, the demographic was those that had grown up with computers in the 1970–1980s.
Alan has since moved away from teaching and now works to help teachers across the UK to learn computing skills, but he has remained the figurehead for the Jam. We popped along to the latest Jam and noticed that the demographic has shifted: Children are everywhere sat at Pis learning new skills in Python and Scratch and tables of adults are showing off their new projects to eager children.
It was lovely to see that two junior members of the community, Joshua and Elise were there and presenting their latest projects to an eager audience, these children are not even teenagers yet and already they are making waves in the Pi Community.
The Raspberry Jam concept is essential to the success of the Raspberry Pi. Without Jams, like the Preston one promoting the benefits of computing, working together and helping each other, the Pi would be just another single board computer.
Preston Raspberry Jam meets on the first Monday of each month, and they have an Eventbrite page where you can sign up: http://bit.ly/ Preston Raspberry Jam Feb 17.