CODE CONNECTION
With just an idea, Erica Peterson brought Pittsburgh mothers together
IPittsburgh Post-Gazette n June, Erica Peterson was frustrated, then she had a flicker of an idea.
Ms. Peterson, 30, of Robinson, wanted to learn how to code alongside her children since her nonprofit, Science Tots, helps families looking for early childhood education by steering them toward coding games where they can learn together.
But she needed to brush up — the HTML and CSS programming languages that she’d practiced in Myspace’s heyday were a bit rusty and between taking care of her sons Hesher, 5, and Halford, 1, her life was hectic.
There was a desert in support groups for mothers looking to code, Ms. Peterson found. So she posted a loose idea for a mothers’ coding community on the forum that seemed most appropriate — social media.
“I posted the idea and bought a domain and said, ‘I’ll get back to it later,’” Ms. Peterson recalled at a launch party Thursday at Alloy 26 on the North Side for what is now her own support community, called Moms Can Code.
The demand for this type of online community was astounding, Ms. Peterson said, noting that women in rural areas simply don’t have the same access to a network of mothers who code and program, like those in San Francisco might.
But still, “It’s not a want or a need to learn something,” Ms. Peterson said. “It’s the time.”
She quickly had more than 700 email subscribers for the group and an in-box full of stories from mothers who had also become frustrated with a lack of resources — all before she even fully developed her website.
Moms Can Code, while not a program meant to teach coding, provides support, inspiration and opportunities to connect with other like-minded women online.
Some coding mothers shared stories through social media about their frustration with the pipeline to coding-based jobs while also juggling the responsibilities of motherhood. Others shared their flat-out frustration with coding while being a mother.
Christina Gorton, a front-end developer from Kentucky and a mother of three, said coding helped her through postpartum depression.
Ms. Peterson said mothers can enroll in the program for free on Teachable, a website that allows users to create online courses. Users gain access to quizzes that assess learning style, worksheets to help weigh the pros and cons of coding, time management sheets to allocate slots for coding, and resources on where to find free coding courses online, boot camps or degree programs.
About 75 women already are enrolled on the Moms Can Code platform. The website went live Thursday.
In a few weeks, Ms. Peterson plans to launch a Kickstarter page to raise funding for the group.
There are two tiers of paid membership. For $5 per month, a level one package for beginners will feature coding courses created by other Moms Can Code members (which the creators can receive payment for) and for $9 per month, advanced coders can chat live with experts in tech.
Ms. Peterson said her goal is to create a directory by November for companies offering internships to mothers who code.
“These don’t have to be seven weeks, they can just be one hour,” she said. “To get a glimpse of what it’s like to work in tech.”