Our first online candidates start taking grades next week. 🎉 After lots of development, refinement and testing, this is a big step. 👣 We'll learn loads from these brave souls (and thank you). 🚀

Hello, world! 👋🌍 Our blog is back... here's an update: blog.codegrades.com/posts/he… More (lots more) soon... ;-)

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An essential part of CodeGrades is slotting into place... :-) xitter.cf/ntoll/status/100940690…

Finally, mentors (since they are experienced professional programmers) are a source of feedback for the future development of the resources, curriculum and syllabus (along with teachers and learners).

Having said that, we'd welcome strong candidate mentors from all backgrounds (especially if you identify as coming from an under-represented group in tech). We simply expect you to demonstrate the technical strength, communication skills and compassion as a people-person.

Since CodeGrades is run for community benefit we especially welcome members of the open-source community as mentors. It's hard to be financially recognised for your open-source work, and me hope mentoring is a way to help you support your work.

Becoming a mentor is a badge of honour: you're helping (and paid) to nurture your future colleagues, collaborators & users. Furthermore, it's a public acknowledgement that you have the technical & pedagogical skill to mentor effectively. Finally, it's fun career development!

Q: "Who are the code mentors and how do you become one?" A: Code mentors are experienced professional programmers who are at an advanced enough level to demonstrate the exceptional technical, communication and "people" skills needed to mentor effectively.

We've been chatting to ballet dancers today to learn all about *their* grading system. Fascinating stuff. :-)

Keep the questions coming... :-) hello@codegrades.com

Even if you took every grade at full price, the total cost would be a fraction of what you'd pay for a coding bootcamp or classes (and we expect many will skip grades if they make good progress).

If you can't afford fees we'll have a financial support / fee waiver programme (for example, if you're a young person in the UK who qualifies for free school meals, your grading will be *free*). We'll move mountains so grading is available to everyone, no matter your situation.

Q: "What bits of CodeGrades require payment?" A: You only pay for one thing: grading. Grades cost between c£40-£120 (depending on level, a similar price to music grades). All resources, tools, support, curriculum & syllabus are free (the costs being swallowed by grading fees).

As always, please keep asking questions! :-)

CodeGrades will be a for-profit company run for community benefit (where community means learners & coders). At the earliest opportunity we intend to achieve 3rd-party certification to show the aforementioned ethical outlook is in our Articles of Association & business policies.

Q: "What sort of organisation is CodeGrades?" A: We have two major goals: 1. An educational initiative to help anyone learn to code. 2. A way to financially support & sustain open source development. Learners pay for grading. Mentors (devs) get paid. We sponsor projects.

CodeGrades bring the knowledge, skills & current practices of a highly experienced community of supportive developers within the reach of learners of all backgrounds. Learners get a clear and sustainable path for growth, all within a supportive & relevant community. ❤️💻📈👍

Q: "How do you fit with, say @djangogirls, @CodeClubWorld or #picademy?" A: We complement & amplify their amazing work: grades are a post-workshop framework for growth. If they're the introductory "draw two circles", we're the 8 missing steps to "draw the rest of the damn owl".

We've been getting questions (please ask more, we ♥️answering questions!). We'll try to answer one question a day until we run out! First question and answer coming in a moment...